AASP Newsletter - November 2016

Nick Galli, Ph.D., CC-AASP, University of Utah

Like many other boys of the 80’s, I had a fascination with the hyper-masculine characters depicted on TV, movies, and cartoons. I was a certified “Hulkamaniac,” and the proud owner of a vast collection of action figures ranging from G.I. Joe to He-Man. As I grew older, I focused on achieving a physique worthy of my childhood idols by adhering to a strict weight training program and experimenting with a variety of over-the-counter supplements in an effort to bulk up. It was around this same time I chose to pursue a career in sport psychology, and in 2005 began my doctoral studies at The University of Utah under the guidance of Dr. Justine Reel. I quickly discovered a scarcity of research in male body image and disordered eating, and based on this gap in the literature as well as my own experiences, I decided that this would become an area of scholarly focus for me. I began reading any books or articles related to body image and disordered eating in men on which I could get my hands, but was particularly influenced by the works of Dr.’s Harrison Pope and Donald McCreary. Pope’s book, The Adonis Complex (Pope, Phillips, & Olivardia, 2000), helped me to understand how my childhood interest in action movies and super heroes may have played a role in my later muscle-building behaviors. McCreary and Sasse developed the Drive for Muscularity Scale (DMS; 2000) as a way to measure the extent to which people prioritize and strive for muscularity. The works, both in and out of sport, of Pope, McCreary, and others have served as the foundation for my work thus far.

Noting the overall lack of empirical knowledge regarding male athletes’ body image, and informed by Pope’s work on the sociocultural antecedents of male body dissatisfaction, my first project was a qualitative investigation of body image and sport weight pressures in male athletes. One-on-one interviews with young adult male athletes revealed that although they were largely satisfied with the form and function of their body, they did feel pressure from peers, family, coaches, and teammates to get bigger, stronger, and faster (Galli & Reel, 2009). One golfer said, “I’ve had coaches make plenty of jokes...I mean...I just laugh and walk away, but you get home and you think, ‘Do I really [need to lose weight]?’ For some athletes, form fitting and revealing uniforms were a concern. One diver exemplified the nature of sport uniform pressure when he said, “I just get self-conscious...basically it comes down to that you’re just wearing a Speedo and they’re in the stands fully dressed.” The conclusion was that male athletes are under no less pressure to strive for a body ideal than female athletes are, and may also be at-risk for unhealthy body change behaviors aimed at decreasing body fat and increasing muscle mass.

The study previously described was a starting point for the development of a sport-specific measure of weight and body pressures for male athletes. The Weight Pressures in Sport Scale for Men (WPS-M; Galli, Reel, Petrie, Greenleaf, & Carter, 2011) measures three types of sport-specific weight and body-related pressure for male athletes: (a) coach/teammate pressures, (b) uniform pressures, and (c) importance of body weight and appearance. My colleagues and I have used the WPS-M along with other relevant constructs to better understand the psychosocial predictors of disordered eating and drive for muscularity in male athletes. In one study, we found that personality variables shown to predict eating disorder symptomatology in collegiate female athletes (e.g., perfectionism, optimism) failed to do so in a sample of collegiate male athletes (Galli, Petrie, Greenleaf, Reel, & Carter, 2014). This suggests that the psychosocial mechanisms appear to be different than for female athletes. In terms of the drive for muscularity, our findings suggest that sport-specific weight pressures, negative affect (e.g., guilt, sadness), and body satisfaction all play a role in male athletes’ muscle-building beliefs and behaviors (Galli, Petrie, Greenleaf, Reel, & Carter, 2015).

Although much more is known about the role of sport in influencing body image and disordered eating in male athletes than in 2005, many questions remain. For example, what changes occur to male athletes’ body image and eating behaviors over the course of a season, from in-season to off-season, and from pre to post-retirement? Questions like these will require longitudinal designs, which are currently lacking. And, what about binge eating among male athletes in sports such as football? Considering that Binge Eating Disorder is the most common eating disorder for men in general, it makes sense to examine it in male athletes. I hope to work with my colleagues to answer these questions in the years to come.

References

Galli, N., Petrie, T., Greenleaf, C., Reel, J., & Carter, J. (2014). Personality and psychological predictors of eating disorder symptoms in male collegiate athletes. Eating Behaviors, 15, 615-618. doi: http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.lib.utah.edu/10.1016/j.eatbeh.2014.08.007

Galli, N., Petrie, T. A., Greenleaf, C., Reel, J., & Carter, J. (2015). Psychosocial predictors of drive for muscularity in male collegiate athletes. Body Image, 14, 62-66. doi: 10.1016/j.bodyim.2015.03.009

Galli, N., & Reel, J. J. (2009). Adonis or Hephaestus? Exploring body image in male athletes. Psychology of Men and Masculinity, 10, 95-108.

Galli, N., Reel, J. J., Petrie, T. P., Greenleaf, C., & Carter, J. (2011). Preliminary development and validation of the weight pressures in sport scale for male athletes. Journal of Sport Behavior, 34 (1), 47.

McCreary, D. R., & Sasse, D. K. (2000). An exploration of the drive for muscularity in adolescent boys and girls. Journal of American College Health, 48, 297-304. doi: 10.1080/07448480009596271

Pope, H. G., Phillips, K. A., & Olivardia, R. (2000). The Adonis Complex: How to Identify, Treat, and Prevent Body Obsession in Men and Boys. Free Press.