Abstract

The aim of this study was to find out the gender difference with reference to socio_x0002_cultural attitude towards appearance among young adults. A cross sectional study was conducted on the sample consisted of 253 males and 256 female students of Karachi University with age range 18-24 years. Urdu translated version of Socio-Cultural Attitudes towards Appearance-4 (Thompson et al., 2015) scale was used to explore the gender difference in social and cultural aspect for ideal appearance. SATAQ-4 consist of five subscales two internal (thin/low body fat and muscular/ athlete) and three external (pressure peer, pressure family and pressure media). Males significantly scored higher on Internalization- Muscular/ Athletic and on all three subscales of external pressure (peer, family and media) as compared to female participants. The results of this study reveal that in our society, males are more conscious about their appearance and feel more pressure from external world through various means to retain their physique and fulfil social criteria of attractiveness. Although the female participants also facing internal pressures to have thin body having low fats to meet criteria of beauty as they scored higher on internalization - Thin / Low Body Fat subscale but the finding was insignificant.