Psychologists Highlight Early Childhood as the Foundation for Body Image Perceptions in a New Study - Video

Our perceptions of body image are shaped by what we see from as early as seven years old, according to new research by Durham University. The research also found that these body ideals continue to be influenced by visual exposure to different body weights into adulthood. The results show that people’s perceptions of body weight are flexible and adult-like from seven years of age onwards and have implications for our understanding of body size and the perceptions, and possible misperceptions, of weight in health and wellbeing.

The study, published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, found that children as young as seven years old adjust how heavy or light they rate other people’s bodies after seeing a series of pictures of low or high weight bodies. The research involved more than 200 individuals aged seven through to adulthood, also indicated that media influences known to shape adult body perceptions can almost certainly impact children to the same degree, starting from early childhood and continuing to evolve into adulthood.

Participants viewed bodies ranging from low to high weight before and after being adapted to bodies with very low or very high body mass. Participants of all ages showed a significant change in their weight estimates after being adapted to larger bodies (but not to smaller bodies), suggesting that this aspect of body perception is functionally mature by 7 years.

Hence, it was concluded that perceptions of body weight are subject to adaptation aftereffects that are adult-like from 7 years of age onward. Thus. these results have implications for our understanding of body size (mis)perception in health and well-being contexts as well as for our broader understanding of the development of body perception.

Ref: Anjali Batish, Amelia Parchment, Evan Handy, Martin J Tovée, Lynda G Boothroyd, Body size aftereffects are adult-like from 7 years onward, Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 2025,https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2025.106203.