An attempt to reduce negative stereotyping of obesity in children by changing controllability beliefs

The purpose of the present study was to investigate whether changing childr en's beliefs about the controllability of obesity would reduce their negati ve attitudes toward fat people. The participants were 74 children from Grad es 4-6, 42 in the experimental group and 32 in the control group. The exper imental group were presented with a brief intervention which focussed on th e uncontrollability of weight. The study found that the intervention was su ccessful in reducing the amount of controllability that children assigned t o obesity, but was not successful in reducing negative stereotyping of the obese among the experimental group compared to the control group. These res ults indicate that while children's beliefs about the controllability of ob esity can be changed, reducing their negative stereotyping is more difficul t.