Body shaming as a form of emotional abuse in sport

In this study, we explored the experiences of body shaming as a form of emotional abuse and the effects of these experiences. The reported findings represent a secondary analysis conducted of data gleaned from a study exploring the long-term effects of emotional abuse of 8 female National Team athletes in aesthetic sports. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the athletes and analysed from a constructivist lens. The athletes indicated that they experienced negative verbal comments about their bodies, body monitoring, forced restrictions of food and water, public criticism of the body, and punishment when body-related standards were not met. Athletes discussed the effects of these experiences, which included normalisation, social comparison, extreme weight control methods, negative health outcomes, performance decrements, and decreased enjoyment. These findings are interpreted to suggest that the coaches’ actions to monitor and control the athletes’ weight constitute body shaming practices and that body-related shaming should be considered a form of emotional abuse.