Not Fit for Office: Does Weight Bias Impact Evaluations of Political Candidates?

Voters often use metrics to evaluate political candidates that are entirely unrelated to ideology, competence, or policy positions. Factors such as height, facial appearance, physical attractiveness, and vocal pitch can impact candidate selection. Less understood is the role of body weight bias in how voters evaluate political candidates. This is surprising given the pervasiveness of rhetoric regarding “fitness” for office and the way in which the health of candidates is speculated about in the media and popular culture. There is extensive evidence that overweight and obese individuals are discriminated against in hiring and promotion, in healthcare settings, and even in the criminal justice system. Obesity stigma involves stereotypes that overweight and obese people are self-indulgent, lazy, and less intelligent. How does this translate into the political sphere? In this pre-registered report, we ask do voters discriminate against political candidates based on their weight? Using an experimental research design, we test the hypothesis that voters more negatively evaluate fat candidates and are less likely to support them electorally. We also explore whether factors such as participant ideology and candidate gender moderate perceptions of fat candidates. More specifically, we test whether women are punished more by voters for being overweight than male candidates. With increasingly diverse pools of candidates running for all levels of office, it is essential that we fully understand the biases voters possess and how these biases may disadvantage certain types of candidates for public office.