Relationship to psychological disorders

Poor body images can often contribute to the onset of a variety of eating disorders, including anorexia nervosa, bulimia, and binge eating disorder. Other possible effects of the cultural obsession with looking slender include excessive exercising, fad diets, and lawsuits involving fast food chains.

Concerns with body image have been linked to a decrease in self esteem and an increase in dieting among young women. This latter trend has been identified as an indicator of the onset of eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. Great body dissatisfaction can also lead to Body dysmorphic disorders, which cover a range of personality disorders where a person is dissatisfied with one's own body.

On the other hand, having a good body image can be a source of satisfaction to an individual.

Attractiveness and social issues

Some researchers also found that men judge the female figure they found most attractive as heavier than women's ratings of the ideal body shape. In contrast, most women, including overweight women, desire men with a very low percentage of body fat, whether they be thin or muscular. This suggests that, contrary to the media focus, men are far more likely to be attracted to larger women than women are to be attracted to larger men.

Additionally, men are also more likely to be unsatisfied with their height, due to a perceived preference in women for men above average height. Men, on the other hand, don't tend to factor height in when choosing a mate; they're attracted to short, tall, and everything in between. According to a study "Gender Differences in Body Dysmorphic Disorder" by Katharine A. Phillips and S. Diaz (1997), the most common body areas that cause the most distress among men with body image disorders include skin (58%), head hair (57%), nose (38%), body build (25%), eyes (18%), genitals (15%), legs (14%), chest (12%), and stomach/abs (11%).