Validation of a French Measure of Body Comparison: The Physical Appearance Comparison Scale
Résumé
This study examined the validity of a French version of the Physical Appearance Comparison Scale (PACS; Thompson, Heinberg, & Tantleff, 1991).The participants were university students (N = 297, 81.1% female) from two French universities, between 18 and 30 years of age (M = 20.77, SD = 1.99). The factor structure obtained for the French version of the PACS was concordant with the version proposed for the original scale (Davison & McCabe, 2006), and internal consistency and test-retest reliability were good. The participants' scores on the French PACS were significantly correlated with self-weighing, body size estimation, body size satisfaction, social physique anxiety, self-esteem and depression. This measure can help to better understand body dissatisfaction processes and the impact of this dissatisfaction on psychological distress.