RESEARCH ARTICLE
Self-Other Positioning in Obesity: A Pilot Study Using Repertory Grid Technique
Marco Castiglioni1, Alessandro Pepe2, Gabriella Gandino3, Guido Veronese4, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2013Volume: 6
First Page: 61
Last Page: 68
Publisher ID: TOPSYJ-6-61
DOI: 10.2174/1874350101306010061
Article History:
Received Date: 05/08/2013Revision Received Date: 09/09/2013
Acceptance Date: 09/09/2013
Electronic publication date: 18/10/2013
Collection year: 2013
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Self-other positioning was investigated in a group of obese youths in order to empirically test the clinical hy-pothesis – based on the constructionist theory of Family Semantic Polarities – that obese people are affected by a negative self-perception and low self-esteem. Repertory grid technique was used with 30 participants (15 obese-overweight and 15 control) to elicit and compare their personal constructs and assess, via ad hoc measurement indices, the positions they as- signed to the self and significant others in relation to these constructs. The results confirmed the research hypotheses, with obese subjects displaying a tendency to pos ition both self and others at the negative pole of bipolar constructs and reporting greater self-ideal discrepancy. These findings and their limitations are discussed in relation to their clinical applications and in light of the methodologi cal issues arising from the study.