Obese adolescents who are victimized by their peers suffer increased depression and negative feelings about their bodies. Victimized girls gained more weight as they got older, while the opposite was true for boys.
Dr. Ryan Adams of the University of Cincinnati and Dr. William Bukowski of Concordia University studied the effect of victimization on obese teenagers. Victimization comes from the peer group in general, whereas bullying tends to be one-on-one. Professors Adams and Bukowski used data on 1,287 teenagers at different points in their teen years.
The obese victimized girls suffered from lowered self-esteem and depression, and tended to increase their BMIs as they grew older. The obese victimized males also suffered depression but they tended to decrease their BMIs as they grew older.
This study appears in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.
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