The Effect of Some Demographic Variables on Body Image in Students of Zanjan University of Medical Sciences

Body image is one of the important issues in humans’ mental health and trigger of behaviors.

The present study aimed to investigate the effect of some demographic variables on  mental image of the body of students of Zanjan University of medical sciences.

The present study isan analytical-cross sectional study done in the 2018 autumn at Zanjan University of medical sciences. Three faculties were selected through cluster sampling and 520 questionnaires were distributed randomly among respondents. Data were collected by Yonesi & Salagegheh body imagequestionnaire and tested using descriptive statistics and statistical tests of K2 and ANOVA. Significant p-value was considered 0.05. evel.

About one-third of the participants had an inappropriate body image. Further, the results showed that body image in female students was lower than that in male students. Those aged 25 years and earn more than 1.5 million tomans had better body image than the others.

The results generally showed that female students, under 25 years old and with low income, had an unfavorable mental image of themselves. Accordingly, universities must plan basic programs to improve the body image of students exposed to inappropriate mental image. On the other hand, improving this variable will improve the various aspects of the student’s life, including his educational dimension.