Gendered Racial Microaggressions and Emotional Eating for Black Young Adult Women: The Mediating Roles of Superwoman Schema and Self-Compassion

Abstract

Black young adult women's stress experiences are shaped by intersecting racism and sexism. To respond to this stress, some Black young adult women engage in emotional eating, which may threaten their health. Yet processes in the association between gendered racial microaggressions and emotional eating for Black young adult women remain unclear. In the current study, we used cross-sectional online survey data from a 2021 national investigation of 504 United States Black young adult (18–35 years old) women (98.4% cisgender) to test if the superwoman schema and self-compassion mediated the link between gendered racial microaggressions and emotional eating. Employing a serial mediation model in which we controlled for sociodemographic and health covariates, we found support for the hypothesized mediation: more gendered racial microaggressions were associated with greater endorsement of the superwoman schema; greater endorsement of the superwoman schema was associated with less self-compassion; and less self-compassion was associated with more emotional eating. Results provide cross-sectional evidence of theorized processes between gendered racial microaggressions and emotional eating for Black young adult women and point to self-compassion as one potentially important component of health behavior interventions to reduce emotional eating for Black young adult women who take on a superwoman role.