Abstract
M.A. (Counselling Psychology)
Weight loss is predominantly framed as a promoter of health in health psychology. Health in
mainstream health psychology emphasizes the physiological benefits of losing weight. The
increasing number of obese people globally has made weight loss central in health promotion.
Moreover, weight-loss messages are mainly targeted at women. Women’s health magazines in
particular contain information about weight loss and being thin. This study takes on a critical
perspective to explore how women’s stories in a regular Women’s Health column portrayed weight
loss. Twenty-two weight-loss stories were analyzed using discourse analysis, a method for studying
how language is used in text. The objectives were to identify discourses, identify identities, and
explore how the women in the columns drew on societal meanings in their conceptualizations of
weight loss. This analysis identified five discourses and eight subject positions. Moreover, the
women in the columns drew on thin ideology, the fitness industry, and the self-help industry in their
construction of weight loss. This study concluded that weight loss was represented as a means of
attaining beauty and maintaining a feminine identity, and this was located within patriarchy and
social privilege. Furthermore, weight loss created ideal subject positions for the women. The ideal
subject positions implied that the women did not lose weight purely for health reasons, as would be
the frame in mainstream health psychology conceptualizations of weight loss. Health or overall
wellbeing was portrayed as self-actualization that resulted from the specific positionings that
women assume after they lose weight in a disciplined manner. Essentially, weight loss was
portrayed as improving women’s overall wellbeing by creating new identities. However, these
identities may be perceived as stigmatizing for fat women.