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Using focus groups with a sample of men attending a weight management programme, this study explored men's experiences and understandings of anti-fat bias and weight stigma, including their sources, men's immediate responses to them, the psychosocial impact these experiences had on men's mental health, and the self-protective strategies men developed as mechanisms to reduce further stigma. Findings from a thematic analysis indicate that weight stigma undermines men's sense of self-concept and men's masculine values. Weight stigma becomes a social threat-real or imagined-that entails negative psychosocial outcomes, preventing men's participation in social activities, including weight loss. With adequate social support, a men-only weight management programme is perceived as a safe environment where the men fix their impaired self-concept. We suggest that weight stigma should be considered in the design of men's weight management interventions, and the possibility of more compassionate approach to weight loss may be contemplated.
Keywords: men, health, weight, stigma, intervention
The negative attitudes some people hold toward overweight/obese persons (i.e., anti-fat bias) often translate into the social disapproval of big1 bodies (i.e., weight stigma) when thought to violate what is considered to be an acceptable physique (Lieberman, Tybur & Latner, 2012). This mistreatment often entails a negative dynamic between the individual and society that results in a deleterious cognitive set (Ogden & Clementi, 2010). Hence, stigmatised individuals are more vulnerable to depression, low self-esteem, poor body image, lower mood and increased self-criticism (e.g., Bombak, 2014; Puhl & Heuer, 2009, 2010). An insufficient understanding of how people experience weight stigma may explain the inadequacy of interventions to reduce stigma. As a result, after 30 years anti-fat bias still re- mains "the last socially acceptable form of prejudice" (Stunkard et al., 1986). Worse, the prevalence of weight stigma has increased by 66% in the last decade (O'Brien, Latner, Ebneter & Hunter, 2012).
These undesirable outcomes may be driven by the inconclusive evidence that characterises many studies on weight stigma (Carels et al., 2009; Monaghan & Hardey, 2009; Puhl & Heurer, 2009, 2010). These are often cross-sectional, quantitative, and-problematically for males-are dominated by female samples (Monaghan & Hardey, 2009; Puhl & Heuer, 2009). Although stigma may trigger dieting among men or figure in their accounts of engaging in a weight-loss diet (Monaghan, 2008), fear of...