About the Book
For five decades, negative body image has been a major focus of study due to its association with psychological and social morbidity, including eating disorders. However, more recently the body image construct has broadened to include positive ways of living in the body, enabling greater understanding of embodied well-being, as well as protective factors and interventions to guide the prevention and treatment of eating disorders.
Handbook of Positive Body Image and Embodiment is the first comprehensive, research-based resource to address the breadth of innovative theoretical concepts and related practices concerning positive ways of living in the body, including positive body image and embodiment. Presenting 37 chapters by world-renowned experts in body image and eating behaviors, this state-of-the-art collection delineates constructs of positive body image and embodiment, as well as social environments (such as families, peers, schools, media, and the Internet) and therapeutic processes that can enhance them. Constructs examined include positive embodiment, body appreciation, body functionality, body image flexibility, broad conceptualization of beauty, intuitive eating, and attuned sexuality. Also discussed are protective factors, such as environments that promote body acceptance, personal safety, diversity, and activism, and a resistant stance towards objectification, media images, and restrictive feminine ideals. The handbook also explores how therapeutic interventions (including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Dissonance, and many more) and public health and policy initiatives can inform scholarly, clinical, and prevention-based work in the field of eating disorders.
Table of Contents:
Focusing on the Positive: An Introduction to the Volume
Tracy L. Tylka and Niva Piran
Section I. Identifying Positive Ways of Living in the Body: Intra-individual Constructs
Chapter 1: The Experience of Embodiment Construct: Reflecting the Quality of Embodied Lives
Niva Piran
Chapter 2: Body Appreciation
Tracy L. Tylka
Chapter 3: Body Functionality
Jessica M. Alleva and Carolien Martijn
Chapter 4: Body Image Flexibility
Emily K. Sandoz, Jennifer B. Webb, Courtney B. Rogers, and Emily Squyres
Chapter 5: Broad Conceptualization of Beauty
Tracy L. Tylka
Chapter 6: Mindful Attunement
Catherine P. Cook-Cottone
Chapter 7: Intuitive Eating
Elyse Resch and Tracy L. Tylka
Chapter 8: Attunement with Exercise (AWE)
Rachel M. Calogero, Tracy L. Tylka, Beth Hartman McGilley, and Kelly N. Pedrotty-Stump
Chapter 9: Attuned Sexuality
Sonya Satinsky and Virginia Ramseyer Winter
Section II. Cultivating Positive Body Image and Embodiment: Protective Relational, Social, and Other Environmental Factors
Chapter 10: The Developmental Theory of Embodiment: Protective Social Factors that Enhance Positive Embodiment
Niva Piran
Chapter 11: Environments that Cultivate Positive Embodiment Through Mindful Movement
Christy Greenleaf and Caitlyn Hauff
Chapter 12: Adolescent Female Desire: Influences on the Construction of Agency and Desire
Sharon Lamb and Julie Koven
Chapter 13: Personal Safety as Bedrock and Safeguard for Positive Embodiment
Rachel M. Calogero, Tracy L. Tylka, and Jaclyn A. Siegel
Chapter 14: Promoting a Resistant Stance Toward Objectification
Tracy L. Tylka and Rachel M. Calogero
Chapter 15: Negotiating Gender Roles to Enact Body Appreciation and Positive Embodiment
Sarah K. Murnen and Linda Smolak
Chapter 16: Resisting Restrictive Feminine Molds and Promoting Embodied Well-being Among Breast Cancer Survivors
Lianne Trachtenberg and Niva Piran
Chapter 17: Promoting a Resistant Stance Toward Weight Stigma
Brooke L. Bennett, Emily C. Stefano, and Janet D. Latner
Chapter 18: Black Women's Positive Embodiment in the Face of Race × Gender Oppression
NiCole T. Buchanan, Isis H. Settles, and Krystle C. Woods
Chapter 19: Promoting a Resistant Stance Toward Media Images
Janet M. Liechty
Chapter 20: Relationships that Cultivate Positive Body Image Through Body Acceptance
Marika Tiggemann
Chapter 21: Cultivating Embodiment Through Positive Peer Connections
Nina Mafrici and Niva Piran
Chapter 22: Cultivating Embodiment Through Positive Family Environments
Tracy L. Tylka
Chapter 23: Acceptance, Activism, and Freedom from Bullying: The Online Context
Ann Frisén, Kristina Holmqvist Gattario, and Sofia Berne
Chapter 24: Positive Body Image in People Living with Visible Differences
Diana Harcourt and Heidi Williamson
Section III. Enhancing Positive Body Image and Embodiment: Interventions
Chapter 25: Compassion-Based Interventions to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Allison C. Kelly, Kathryn E. Miller, Kiruthiha Vimalakanthan, Jessica R. Dupasquier, and Sydney Waring
Chapter 26: Emotion-Focused Therapy to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Iryna Ivanova
Chapter 27: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Jennifer B. Webb
Chapter 28: Health at Every Size: A Social Justice-Informed Approach to Positive Embodiment
Andrea LaMarre and Sigrun Daníelsdóttir
Chapter 29: Mindfulness Training to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Melissa J. Atkinson and Tracey D. Wade
Chapter 30: The Practice of Yoga: Can It Help in Addressing Body Image Concerns and Eating Disorders?
Dianne Neumark-Sztainer
Chapter 31: Brain Integration, Embodied Mindfulness, and Movement-Based Approaches to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Catherine P. Cook-Cottone
Chapter 32: Promoting Positive Body Image and Embodiment in Schools: Past, Present, and Future
Zali Yager
Chapter 33: Cognitive Dissonance-Based Interventions to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Emma Halliwell and Phillippa C. Diedrichs
Chapter 34: Media Literacy Interventions to Facilitate Positive Body Image and Embodiment
Simon Wilksch
Chapter 35: Feminist and Social Justice-Informed Approaches Towards the Enhancement of Positive Embodiment
Niva Piran
Chapter 36: Public Health Interventions to Facilitate Positive Embodiment: Implementation and Future Directions
Rachel F. Rodgers, Debra L. Franko, and Alice S. Lowy
Chapter 37: Policy Initiatives to Promote Positive Embodiment and Reduce Weight Stigma
Rebecca M. Puhl and Mary S. Himmelstein
The Handbook of Positive Body Image and Embodiment: From the Present to the Future
Niva Piran and Tracy L. Tylka
About the Author :
Tracy L. Tylka is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at The Ohio State University. The Editor-in-Chief of Body Image: An International Journal of Research and a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders, she has published many articles, chapters, and scales on positive body image.
Niva Piran is Professor Emerita in the Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development at OISE/University of Toronto. A Fellow of the American Psychological Association and the Academy for Eating Disorders, she has published extensively on embodiment, treatment, and prevention of eating disorders.
Review :
"Handbook of Positive Body Image and EmbodimentÂprovides insights from a powerhouse list of world-renowned body image and eating disorder researchers and practitioners. The chapter authors provide both theoretical and practical suggestions for how individuals can better understand and appreciate their bodies, offering a variety of perspectives that provide refreshing and innovative ways to view the body. Each section provides a unique, in-depth look into
how the reader can focus on the positive aspects of the body and navigate potentially damaging physical, social, and digital environments. Unique to this text is its inclusion of protective factors,
providing the reader with a better understanding of how social justice, activism, and diversity play a role in positive body image." -- CHOICE
"The view we have of our body impacts on so many aspects of our lives. How refreshing to read a book that focuses on positive aspects of the body: the broad social environment as well as interventions to enhance our view of our body. The authors of the chapters read like a Who's Who of contemporary body image researchers."
-- Marita McCabe, PhD, FAPS, Research Professor and Team Leader, Health and Aging Research Group, Swinburne University
"The Handbook clearly confirms the significance of this cutting edge topic. Editors Tylka and Piran, renowned for their brilliant leadership in the field, have assembled this unique compilation of innovative perspectives, state-of-the-science knowledge, and creative applications. The handbook is essential reading for researchers and practitioners who are fascinated by the human meaningfulness of body image and embodiment."
-- Thomas F. Cash, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Psychology, Old Dominion University, and Founding Editor-in-Chief of Body Image: An International Journal of Research
"This book brings together an exciting array of world-class researchers, scholars, and practitioners to address fundamental questions that people new to the fields of body image and eating disorders will have and that experts should still be asking. This book is groundbreaking because it provides multiple and clear paths to the breadth, depth, and integration needed to advance positive body image and embodiment as forms of personal, interpersonal, and public
health."
-- Michael P. Levine, PhD, FAED, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Kenyon College
"This Handbook is an important and refreshing contribution that ushers in a necessary and desirable shift from the body as problem to the body as possibility. Framed rightfully as a matter of social justice, the handbook's focus on the critical roles of mindfulness, embodied practices and literacy as interventions and forms of therapy offers clinicians and practitioners, as well as researchers and teachers, roadmaps for finding and following the too-often
obscured signs to encourage and enable us to demand the freedom, happiness and health that we each deserve."
-- Deborah L. Tolman, Professor, Women and Gender Studies at Hunter College and Critical Social Psychology at The Graduate Center, City University of New York
