Dr Phillippa Diedrichs

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  • Qualifications:PhD (Health Psychology), BSc (Psychology, First Class Honours)
  • Position:Professor in Psychology
  • Department:HAS - Health and Social Sciences
  • Telephone:+4411732 83756
  • Email:Phillippa.Diedrichs@uwe.ac.uk
  • Social media: LinkedIn logo Twitter logo Facebook logo

About me

I am a Professor in Psychology known internationally for creating and evaluating evidence-based strategies to improve body image and mental health in digital, community, business, and policy settings. With a PhD in Health Psychology, I'm passionate about creating environments that accept diversity in appearance and support people, particularly girls, women and gender diverse people, to live free from the constraint of appearance concerns. 

At the Centre for Appearance Research, I lead a team of researchers investigating psychological and social influences on body image (social media, advertising, friends, family), and the development and evaluation of digital and face-to-face body image interventions around the world. My research is published in over 70 peer-reviewed papers and book chapters, and has featured in the New York Times, BBC, Time, Forbes, and teaching case studies at Harvard's Business School and School of Public Health.

The evidence-based programmes that I've co-created and evaluated have been delivered to over 80 million young people in partnership with global youth organisations and business, including a long-standing academic partnership with the Dove Self-Esteem Project. Notably, I helped develop the first evidence-based girl scouts global badge programme, Free Being Me, implemented in 142 countries. 

Skilled in science communication, I regularly work with media, brands, agencies, and non-profit organisations. I'm proud to have worked alongside Unilever, UNICEF, Instagram, Nike, NHS England, Cartoon Network, and Girl Effect.  

My industry consultancy projects have transformed media landscapes to promote appearance diversity and improve mental health. Recent highlights include the Cannes Lion award-winning Project #ShowUs - a ground-breaking library of 5000+ photographs of female-identifying and non-binary individuals shattering beauty stereotypes; Tribeca Film Festival award-winning Girls Room, a scripted series highlighting the growing pains of female adolescence; and a Clio award-winning series of Steven Universe cartoons promoting body confidence among children.

I've served as an advisor to the British Government Equalities Office, Meta, OfCom, Transport for London, and parliamentary select committees. I'm a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders and serve on the Editorial Board for Body Image: An International Journal of Research.

For more information, please visit www.phillippadiedrichs.com

Area of expertise

Body image, appearance-based prejudice and discrimination, social media and advertising, intervention development and evaluation, eating disorder prevention, weight bias, strategic science, mixed methods research.

Publications

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