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Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts

Existing research investigating gay men’s eating behavior has focused on stereotypes and body image, rather than to understand why disordered eating is prevalent in gay men. The current study adopted a qualitative approach and employed interview methodology to explore gay men’s attitudes, feelings a...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Regan, Harvey, Jama, Adrian, Mantzios, Michael, Keyte, Rebecca, Egan, Helen
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8165848/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34041991
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15579883211016341
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author Regan, Harvey
Jama, Adrian
Mantzios, Michael
Keyte, Rebecca
Egan, Helen
author_facet Regan, Harvey
Jama, Adrian
Mantzios, Michael
Keyte, Rebecca
Egan, Helen
author_sort Regan, Harvey
collection PubMed
description Existing research investigating gay men’s eating behavior has focused on stereotypes and body image, rather than to understand why disordered eating is prevalent in gay men. The current study adopted a qualitative approach and employed interview methodology to explore gay men’s attitudes, feelings and experiences of their eating behavior, and the potential link to mindfulness and self-compassion. Twenty gay men aged from 21 to 51 years were interviewed using an interview schedule with open-ended questions. Three main themes emerged from the transcript data sets: “Lean to be Seen,” “Sod it ‘I’ll Have a Pizza,” and “You Can’t Sit with Us.” The first theme was developed following responses that participant’s eating behavior and exercise engagement were influenced by their perceived attractiveness by the gay community. All participants spoke of achieving or maintaining a slim or muscular body type and adopted their eating behavior or exercise regime to reach corresponding goals. The second theme relates to the lack of acceptance felt from the gay community upon not conforming to the bodily expectations set out by the community. The third theme relates to the conflicts in participants’ attitudes around how exercising and eating healthily would improve their mental well-being; but that they also would give preference to calorie dense foods to reduce stress. These reflections are observed through a context of self-kindness and self-compassion and are seen to be related to increased feelings of self-criticism and body dissatisfaction. The limitations and implication for this research and suggestions for future research are discussed.
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spelling pubmed-81658482021-06-07 Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts Regan, Harvey Jama, Adrian Mantzios, Michael Keyte, Rebecca Egan, Helen Am J Mens Health Original Article Existing research investigating gay men’s eating behavior has focused on stereotypes and body image, rather than to understand why disordered eating is prevalent in gay men. The current study adopted a qualitative approach and employed interview methodology to explore gay men’s attitudes, feelings and experiences of their eating behavior, and the potential link to mindfulness and self-compassion. Twenty gay men aged from 21 to 51 years were interviewed using an interview schedule with open-ended questions. Three main themes emerged from the transcript data sets: “Lean to be Seen,” “Sod it ‘I’ll Have a Pizza,” and “You Can’t Sit with Us.” The first theme was developed following responses that participant’s eating behavior and exercise engagement were influenced by their perceived attractiveness by the gay community. All participants spoke of achieving or maintaining a slim or muscular body type and adopted their eating behavior or exercise regime to reach corresponding goals. The second theme relates to the lack of acceptance felt from the gay community upon not conforming to the bodily expectations set out by the community. The third theme relates to the conflicts in participants’ attitudes around how exercising and eating healthily would improve their mental well-being; but that they also would give preference to calorie dense foods to reduce stress. These reflections are observed through a context of self-kindness and self-compassion and are seen to be related to increased feelings of self-criticism and body dissatisfaction. The limitations and implication for this research and suggestions for future research are discussed. SAGE Publications 2021-05-27 /pmc/articles/PMC8165848/ /pubmed/34041991 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15579883211016341 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Original Article
Regan, Harvey
Jama, Adrian
Mantzios, Michael
Keyte, Rebecca
Egan, Helen
Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title_full Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title_fullStr Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title_full_unstemmed Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title_short Exploring the Experiences of Gay Men with Regards to Eating, Exercise, and Mindfulness-Based Concepts
title_sort exploring the experiences of gay men with regards to eating, exercise, and mindfulness-based concepts
topic Original Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8165848/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34041991
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15579883211016341
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