Examining factor structure of body compassion assessment among university students in India

Although body compassion is a relatively new construct, there is a growing interest and greater importance in the current global scenario of heightened mental health issues. Thus, the construct needs to be researched in different cultures/nations. Body image dissatisfaction is prevalent in India, impacting people across age groups and genders, while self-compassion promotes positive body image and self-worth. Considering the widespread impact of body-related issues on mental health and the positive impact of self-compassion, studying body compassion in the Indian context is crucial. However, the existing scale of body compassion was developed based on data collected mainly from the Western population. Therefore, the present study translated the Body Compassion Scale (Altman et al. in J Health Psychol 25:439–449, 2020) into Manipuri in India. Pearson correlations between the overall and the sub-scales of the original and translated scale resulted in correlation values, r = 0.95 to 0.99 (n = 50, study 1). In study 2 (n = 420), exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted in which a three-factor solution of the scale having a good fit was observed. Evidence of measurement invariance was also seen across females and males. The findings show that the scale of body compassion transcends cultural variation regarding its applicability as the study replicated the original three-factor solution. Further, it also offers valuable insights for practitioners, providing a clear framework to understand and address body compassion in their work. However, the study is limited to young adults on university campuses.