Body Image Perception and Body Composition in Different Populations: The Role of Physical Education and Sport

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue aims to collect and disseminate the most current research examining the role of physical education and sport in the development of a positive body image perception through education for a healthy lifestyle and the achievement of an optimal body composition.

Body image is the dynamic perception of one’s body—how it looks, feels, and moves. It can change with mood, physical experience, and environment. There are many different factors affecting body image, including gender, media, parental relationships, and puberty, as well as weight and popularity. In Western society, the ideal body for males is muscular and lean, whereas for females, a thin body is viewed as more desirable. For both genders, the desire to alter shape or weight during adolescence is common, and is associated with emotional distress and dramatic measures to alter appearance such as cosmetic surgery, depression, eating disorders and exercise addiction.

Physical education could provide the opportunity to develop a positive body image. People that are sufficiently active enjoy better psychophysical well-being and report more positive physical self-concept and global self-esteem. Sports practice and a healthy lifestyle result in optimal body composition and more positive body image.

Although being physically active is usually encouraged as a health-promoting behaviour, exercising compulsively and excessively is a common purging strategy used to compensate for caloric intake or to change one’s body weight, size or shape. This tendency to develop disordered behaviours around exercise has received numerous labels including, but not limited to, exercise dependence, exercise abuse, exercise addiction, obligatory exercise, and over exercise.

Topics of interest consist of body image intervention works including new training methodologies and programming, nutritional strategies integrated with physical activity, and interventions aimed at improving the quality of physical activity, avoiding strategies that may have a negative impact on people’s body image.

Authors are invited to contribute to this Special Issue by submitting original research articles, meta-analyses, reviews, and brief reports that contribute new knowledge to this area. Papers selected for this Special Issue will be subject to a rigorous peer-review process with the aim of rapid and wide dissemination of research results, developments, and applications.

Dr. Gianpiero Greco
Guest Editor

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