Visual body image disturbance assessments of whole body and body-parts in males

Body weight misperception is a core feature of EDs, with prognostic and therapeutic relevance. Most of the commonly used EDs assessments are normed for females, thus requiring the need for male-specific assessments.

We describe the results obtained by using 2D and 3D tools for the assessment of whole body and body-parts misperceptions in males in relation to self-reports of body awareness and internalization of beauty ideals.

We suggest a combined approach of visual assessment tools for body disturbances in males may prove useful to uncover core predictors of EDs and monitor therapeutic changes over time.

Dr Valentina Cazzato

I am a lecturer (assistant professor) in Cognitive Neuroscience and Lab Leader of the Body Image Lab at Liverpool John Moores University (UK). After completing a PhD on the neural correlates of reflexive social attention at 'Sapienza' University of Rome (Italy), I became interested in the neural underpinnings of body representation in Anorexia Nervosa during my post-doc at the University of Udine (Italy). I had since then continued to research in this area which now spans across a broad range of topics, including psychological and neural bases of body image disturbances in disordered eating and body dysmorphic disorder, using mainly psychophysics and non-invasive brain stimulation (TMS and tDCS) methods.