Online Victimization, Womanism, and Body Esteem among Young Black Women: A Structural Equation Modeling Approach

This study used structural equation modeling to examine the associations between four categories of online victimization (i.e., general online victimization, online individual racial victimization, online vicarious racial victimization, online sexual victimization) and body esteem. We further examined whether womanism, an identity-based factor, moderate d the relationship between online victimization and body esteem. A sample of 1,595 young Black women completed an online survey. Results showed that online sexual victimization was significantly negatively associated with body esteem and that high levels of womanism buffered the harmful impact of ge neral online victimization on body esteem. Future research is needed to examine Black women’s and gender expansive people’s experiences with online gendered racial victimization along with other forms of online intersectional oppression.
Source: Sex Roles - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research