Understanding fitness professionals’ weight biases and uptake of weight-inclusive practices: Findings from a mixed-methods survey

Weight bias is highly prevalent in the fitness industry, posing significant challenges for fat people seeking to engage in health-promoting behaviours, such as physical activity. Despite small ideological shifts in the fitness industry towards more weight-inclusive practices, little is known about fitness professionals’ engagement with such approaches. The aim of the current study was to explore weight bias attitudes among weight-normative and weight-inclusive fitness professionals and factors influencing adoption of inclusive approaches. A mixed-methods survey was conducted among 120 fitness professionals (Mage=34 years; weight-inclusive n=62 [51.7%], weight-normative n=58 [48.3%]) to gather quantitative data on weight bias and attitudes towards working with fat people, and qualitative data on motivations, facilitators, and barriers to adopting weight-inclusive approaches. Weight bias was positively associated with negative attitudes towards working with fat people. Weight-inclusive fitness professionals reported higher empathy (d=–.86), size acceptance (d=–.79), critical health attitudes (d=–.91), and attribution complexity (d=–.78) and less negative attitudes towards working with fat people (d=.81) than weight-normative fitness professionals. Thematic analysis of qualitative data resulted in four higher-order themes: (1) “It’s what the science says”; (2) “It’s what the client wants”; (3) “It’s bad for business”; and (4) “I want to, but I don’t know how”. Fitness professionals who adopted weight-inclusive practices displayed less weight bias and less negative attitudes towards working with people in larger bodies. Qualitative findings highlighted multiple barriers that need to be addressed in order to encourage more fitness professionals to adopt weight-inclusive approaches.