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Development of a Forced Choice Assessment of Appearance Importance: The Appearance Preference Task (APT)

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Abstract

Background

Appearance importance is a core transdiagnostic construct that has been identified in the maintenance of body-image pathology that has primarily been measured through self-report questionnaires.

Methods

The Appearance Preference Task (APT) is a 33-item computerized forced-choice task designed to measure appearance importance. In Study 1, the latent factor structure of the original 34 items was evaluated in a sample of undergraduate women (N = 300) through the use of principal axis factoring. In Study 2, this factor structure was replicated in another sample of women (N = 367) utilizing confirmatory factor analysis, and the validity of the APT was assessed by observing its relationship with measures of appearance importance and clinically relevant symptoms.

Results

The 33-item APT was found to be an internally consistent three-dimensional measure. The APT demonstrated appropriate convergent and divergent validity and was also associated with symptoms of eating pathology, body dysmorphic disorder, and appearance anxiety.

Conclusion

The present investigation provides preliminary support for the APT’s potential utility as a novel assessment of appearance importance.

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Notes

  1. While appearance importance and overvaluation are used interchangeably, the present paper refers to this construct as appearance importance.

  2. McDonald’s Omega was chosen over Cronbach’s alpha given its robustness in handling underestimation that is typical of Cronbach’s alpha.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Florida State University, 1107 W Call St, Tallahassee, FL, 32304, USA

    Tapan A. Patel & Jesse R. Cougle

  2. Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Berta J. Summers

Authors
  1. Tapan A. Patel
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  2. Berta J. Summers
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  3. Jesse R. Cougle
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Contributions

TAP: Conceptualization, Data Curation, Formal Analysis, Methodology, Writing—Original Draft. BJS: Conceptualization, Data Curation, Investigation, Methodology, Writing—Review & Editing. JRC: Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology, Project Administration, Resources, Supervision, Writing—Review & Editing.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Tapan A. Patel or Jesse R. Cougle.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

Tapan A. Patel, Berta J. Summers, and Jesse R Cougle declare that they have no conflicts of interest or financial information to disclose.

Ethical Approval

The institutional review board of Florida State University approved the studies described in this investigation.

Animal Rights

No animal studies were carried out by the authors for this article.

Informed Consent

Informed consent was obtained from all of the participants before conducting study procedures.

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Appendix

Appendix

Appearance Preference Task

In the following task, you will be presented with word pairs. Please choose which word from the pair represents the concept that seems more important to you.

Which is more important?

<<these are randomized by item and by order of word presentation>>

  1. 1.

    beautiful - courageous

  2. 2.

    beautiful - motivated

  3. 3.

    beautiful - responsible

  4. 4.

    beautiful - loving

  5. 5.

    beautiful - happy

  6. 6.

    beauty - strength

  7. 7.

    beauty - intelligence

  8. 8.

    beauty - kindness

  9. 9.

    pretty - smart

  10. 10.

    pretty - trustworthy

  11. 11.

    pretty - honest

  12. 12.

    pretty - generous

  13. 13.

    pretty - loyal

  14. 14.

    pretty - brave

  15. 15.

    gorgeous - talented

  16. 16.

    gorgeous - brilliant

  17. 17.

    gorgeous - genuine

  18. 18.

    gorgeous - interesting

  19. 19.

    gorgeous - hilarious

  20. 20.

    gorgeous - patient

  21. 21.

    attractive - perceptive

  22. 22.

    attractive - funny

  23. 23.

    attractive - driven

  24. 24.

    attractive - supportive

  25. 25.

    attractive - compassionate

  26. 26.

    attractive – caring

  27. 27.

    attractive - intelligent

  28. 28.

    good-looking - fun

  29. 29.

    good-looking - reliable

  30. 30.

    good-looking - thoughtful

  31. 31.

    good-looking - witty

  32. 32.

    good-looking - strong

  33. 33.

    good-looking – creative

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Patel, T.A., Summers, B.J. & Cougle, J.R. Development of a Forced Choice Assessment of Appearance Importance: The Appearance Preference Task (APT). Cogn Ther Res 47, 232–242 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-022-10341-w

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