Maladaptive perfectionism, body image satisfaction, and disordered eating behaviors among U.S. college women: The mediating role of self-compassion

•Examined mediator of self-compassion for perfectionism and body image satisfaction.•Investigated self-compassion as a mediator for perfectionism and disordered eating.•In two studies, self-compassion mediated perfectionism and body image satisfaction.•Self-compassion was not a mediator for perfectionism and disordered eating.•The most consistent mediating subfacet of self-compassion was self-judgment.

Maladaptive perfectionism has been linked with body image dissatisfaction and disordered eating behaviors. From the standpoint of social mentality theory, this relationship may be the result of an overactive threat system and/or an underactive self-soothing system. Self-compassion represents the activities of the self-soothing system. This article describes two studies that were conducted in order to investigate whether self-compassion mediates these relationships in a large sample of U.S. college women. Study 1 found that self-compassion mediates the relationship between maladaptive perfectionism and body image dissatisfaction. Study 2 replicated the results of Study 1 but found that self-compassion did not mediate the relationship between maladaptive perfectionism and disordered eating. Results from both studies suggest that the self-judgment component of self-compassion was the most consistent mediator, suggesting that maladaptive perfectionism impacts body image satisfaction and disordered eating through negative self-evaluations.