Explicit Weight Stigma among Physiotherapy Students: A Cross-Sectional Study

Obesity is one of the most pervasive phenomena in this world and it is now regarded as the main public health challenge. Obesity is highly stigmatized in our society. Weight stigma in health care professionals can lead to poor treatment outcome to obese patients. This study is aimed to determine the attitude of physiotherapy students towards weight. A cross-sectional study was conducted in Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia. A total of 179 physiotherapy students participated in this survey. Anti-Fat Attitude Questionnaire was used as an outcome measure to determine explicit weight stigma. Questions on demographic data and experience of weight bias were also included in the questionnaire. Majority of the students score negative marks in Anti-Fat Attitude Questionnaire in which any value greater than 0 was considered as explicit weight stigma. The relationship between gender with dislike, fear and willpower subscales shows statistical significance. Clinical posting has also shown significant association with fear and willpower subscale. Body mass index has shown no statistical significance with dislike and willpower subscale though it shows statistical significance with fear subscales. Overall, physiotherapy students do not demonstrate explicit weight stigma.