Anti-fat bias

Anti-fat bias refers to the prejudicial assumption of personality characteristics based on a visual assessment of a person as being obese. Fat activists allege anti-fat bias can be found in many facets of society, and blame the media for the pervasiveness of this phenomenon.

Trait attribution

Anti-fat bias leads people to associate individuals who are overweight or obese with negative personality traits such as "lazy", "greedy", "stupid", "smelly", "slow", or "unmotivated." This bias is not restricted to clinically obese individuals, but also encompasses those whose body shape is in some way found unacceptable according to society's modern standards (although still within the normal or overweight BMI range). It is a classical example of the halo effect in cultures where physical preferences favor low body fat. Fat-shaming is fairly common in America, even though most adult Americans are overweight. Huffington Post wrote "two-thirds of American adults are overweight or obese. Yet overweight and obese individuals are subject to discrimination from employers, healthcare professionals and potential romantic partners".