Face to face counseling sessions and Internet based therapy can help women dissatisfied with their body image. It's not teenagers and adolescents who are obsessed with their looks any more. More and more adults, especially middle-aged women are also getting conscious about their body image. Women with high levels of body dissatisfaction are seen as developing eating and related mental problems as well. As a result of this, many such women seek counseling and other therapies to get rid of these symptoms. To assess the efficacy of one on one counseling sessions and Internet based therapy for body image problems, researchers at La Trobe University in Bundoora, Melbourne, Australia compared the effectiveness of eight weekly small-group therapy sessions led by a therapist when delivered in person or by the internet to 116 women, 18 to 35 years old, all of whom had disordered eating and were highly dissatisfied with their bodies. Forty-two of the women participated in the face-to-face group, 37 received counseling via the Internet, and 37 were assigned to a delayed treatment group that served as a "control" comparison. The results showed that the traditional in-person therapy is better than the cyber approach for improving both image concerns and disordered eating. Though Internet-based interventions offer the advantage of privacy and anonymity and greater accessibility in comparison to personal care, they can have certain disadvantages as well. These could range from the likelihood of miscommunication due to the absence of nonverbal and auditory cues. Both therapy groups showed large improvements in their scores on tests of body image, shape concerns and eating attitudes and behaviors compared to the control group, although improvements in the face-to-face group were greater. Thus, face-to-face body image interventions and Internet based therapy can benefit women with body image issues.
International Journal of Eating Disorders,
November 2007