Body image, defined as the multidimensional mental representation that a person constructs about their own body, including perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and behaviors related to physical appearance, constitutes a central construct in understanding contemporary mental health and psychological wellbeing (Cash, 2004; Tylka and Wood-Barcalow, 2015). Over recent decades, research has consistently documented that culturally derived aesthetic models of beauty exert influence on body image and, by extension, on the development of eating disorders and body dissatisfaction (Abdoli et al., 2024; Lacroix et al., 2023).

The Tripartite Influence Model, proposed by Thompson et al. (1999), and still current today (Schaefer et al., 2021), has established that media, family, and peers constitute the primary socializing agents that transmit and reinforce dominant body aesthetic ideals, generating pressure to conform to specific beauty standards, particularly the thin ideal in women (Burke et al., 2021; Öztunç et al., 2025; Pérez-Bustinzar et al., 2023). This sociocultural influence operates fundamentally through two psychological mechanisms: internalization of the aesthetic ideal and social comparison with prevailing beauty standards. Nevertheless, the majority of empirical evidence supporting these theoretical models comes from studies conducted in populations from North America, Europe, and Oceania, predominantly in urban contexts and with participants from middle and upper socioeconomic strata (Harris et al., 2025; Iannattone et al., 2025; Kakar et al., 2023; Tennfjord et al., 2025).

This geographic and demographic concentration of research has generated significant gaps in knowledge about how sociocultural factors interact with body image in populations residing outside these predominant contexts. In response to this limitation, an increasing number of cross-cultural studies—including research conducted in non-Western and Latin American settings—has sought to expand the empirical base, thereby offering a more comprehensive understanding of body image–related phenomena across diverse cultural contexts (Odinga and Kasten, 2020; Silva and Cohen, 2025). However, this emerging literature remains limited in scope and coverage.

Notably, indigenous communities in Latin America and the Caribbean continue to be systematically underrepresented in the scientific literature on body image, despite comprising more than 800 indigenous peoples and approximately 58 million individuals (United Nations Educational Scientific Cultural Organization, 2025). This lack of information is particularly concerning, as indigenous populations present highly specific social, economic, and health vulnerabilities, such as socioeconomic marginalization, and simultaneous exposure to traditional values and Western cultural models (Mikhail and Klump, 2021; Williams-Ridgway et al., 2025).

The scarce studies that have explored body image in indigenous populations from other continents, particularly in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United States, have documented findings that challenge traditional theoretical models, showing patterns of body dissatisfaction, preferences for bigger body sizes, and cultural protective factors that differ significantly from urban Western populations (Burt et al., 2020; Cleland et al., 2023). However, these findings may not be directly applicable to Indigenous communities in Latin America, given distinct historical trajectories, colonization processes, levels of market integration, and cultural configurations (Gone and Kirmayer, 2020; Gracey and King, 2009). In Latin American contexts, sociocultural dynamics such as colourism and skin-tone ideologies have been associated with body-related shame and appearance pressures (Teran et al., 2024). Additionally, changes in diet and nutrition practices associated with globalization, as well as forced displacement and migration, have been linked to nutrition-related health concerns and evolving social norms surrounding body and appearance (Castro-Prieto et al., 2024; United Nations Educational Scientific Cultural Organization, 2025).

Together, these findings underscore the importance of examining sociocultural dynamics such as colourism, displacement, and dietary change when considering body image and related constructs in underrepresented Indigenous populations in Latin America, despite the scarcity of direct empirical studies.

In Latin America, indigenous communities are experiencing significant cultural changes, where their traditions coexist with a growing influence of Western aesthetic models that arrive through urbanization, schooling, and mass media. This situation raises questions about how dominant aesthetic beauty models—centered on thinness, youth, and European physical features—interact with traditional cultural values that have historically assigned different meanings to the body, frequently associating bigger body size with health, prosperity, and social status (Martin and Latner, 2025; Odinga and Kasten, 2020).

Understanding the dynamics of Western aesthetic models in indigenous communities will not only contribute theoretical knowledge enabling the development of more inclusive and culturally sensitive models of body image, but also the design of prevention and treatment strategies for eating disorders and body image disorders that are culturally relevant and respectful of ethnic and cultural diversity. Furthermore, this knowledge contributes to making visible the experiences of historically marginalized groups in psychological and biomedical research, promoting more equitable and representative science.

Considering the arguments previously presented, the objective of the present research was to identify the influence of aesthetic beauty models and sociocultural factors on body image in indigenous communities belonging to Latin America.

The search was initiated employing all MeSH terms and keywords, as well as their respective synonyms identified in the literature and the Boolean operators [AND] and [OR]; however, both in the databases and in the specialized journals, no results were found. Consequently, and after exploring multiple combinations, results were identified with the search strategy (Indigenous Peoples [All Fields]) AND (Body Image [All Fields]), that is, only with two keywords and identifying these words in any part of the article (All Fields). Table 2 shows all search strategies.

In total, 478 articles were found in the databases, 37 in three specialized journals, and 6 in the references and in similar results suggested by the databases, yielding a total of 521 results; only 16 articles met the eligibility criteria. The flowchart of article selection can be observed in Figure 1.

The aim of this systematic review was to identify the influence of aesthetic beauty models and sociocultural factors on body image in indigenous communities belonging to Latin America. The findings of this systematic review reveal a scarcity of studies focused on Latin American indigenous populations, with only 16 articles that met the inclusion criteria, which evidences very limited regional representation considering the diversity of more than 800 indigenous peoples in Latin America (United Nations Children's Fund, 2023).

Across the 16 included studies, body image in Latin American indigenous and rural communities was not characterized by a single dominant aesthetic model, but rather by the coexistence of two partially competing frameworks: (1) the persistence of local/traditional values in which bigger bodies and/or curvilinearity may be associated with normality, health, prosperity, fertility, or functional strength; and (2) increasing exposure to Western/globalized beauty ideals emphasizing thinness and/or particular body proportions, especially among younger generations and in contexts of market integration and media access (Boothroyd et al., 2020; Daiy et al., 2020, 2023; Pérez and Estrella, 2014; Thornborrow et al., 2022).

This duality is particularly evident when comparing communities or subgroups with different degrees of external exposure. For example, in Mayan communities (Guatemala and Yucatán), the community described as more exposed to external influences showed stronger pressure toward thinner bodies and a tendency to avoid identifying with obese silhouettes, whereas the less exposed community maintained stronger cultural normalization of “being chubby” as status and prosperity (Maupin and Brewis, 2014; Pérez and Estrella, 2014). Similarly, among Qom participants, generational differences (especially among women) suggest that younger women are adopting thinner “healthy” ideals compared to older women, consistent with an acculturative shift that may unfold unevenly across gender and cohort (Daiy et al., 2020, 2023).

These findings align with broader Indigenous body-image research outside Latin America showing that dominant societal beauty ideals often reflect colonial histories and exclude Indigenous bodies. In Australia, Indigenous women described racism and colourism as negatively affecting body image, while developing a strong cultural identity mitigated these impacts by facilitating belonging and body acceptance—highlighting cultural identity as a protective factor (Chalmers et al., 2022).

A central contribution from the Nicaraguan evidence base is that sociocultural exposure may shift ideals not only toward lower weight but also toward specific body shapes and proportions. Thornborrow et al. (2022), found that components of ideal body shape (curvaceousness) were associated with film/television consumption, whereas body mass itself was not necessarily the primary axis of change. Similarly, Boothroyd et al. (2020) provided convergent cross-sectional, longitudinal, and experimental evidence that media exposure can directly influence body size ideals in a population undergoing technological transition.

This is important because much of the classic body-image literature conceptualizes Westernization primarily as “thin-ideal internalization.” The Latin American indigenous/rural evidence suggests the need for a more nuanced framework that distinguishes size-based ideals (body mass) from shape-based ideals (waist-to-hip or other proportionality cues), particularly in contexts where curvilinearity is culturally salient and thinness is not the only aspirational endpoint (Boothroyd et al., 2020; Sorokowski et al., 2014; Thornborrow et al., 2022).

Complementarily, recent scholarship argues that Indigenous knowledge systems provide a robust foundation for positive body image via body functionality—valuing what the body can do rather than how it looks. Martin and Latner propose that Indigenous cultural practices and values foster appreciation for embodied lived experience, and that the relationship between an Indigenous body and land, culture, spirituality, and community promote a holistic celebration of functional capabilities (Martin and Latner, 2025). This perspective resonates strongly with several included Latin American findings in which larger body size may be valued for social meaning and/or daily functionality rather than aesthetic appearance alone (Pérez and Estrella, 2014; Pérez and Romero, 2008; Santos et al., 2020).

A key synthesis from the included literature is that “sociocultural influence” is not reducible to media exposure. In the Qom mixed-methods study, quantitative analyses did not find strong direct associations between media/technology exposure and ideals, healthy-body norms, or body dissatisfaction, while qualitative interviews suggested stronger influence from family, peers, and health providers and the persistence of culturally grounded acceptance (Daiy et al., 2023). In contrast, in Nicaragua, media exposure has been observed “in action,” with experimental and longitudinal components supporting a causal role of television in recalibrating ideals (Boothroyd et al., 2020; Thornborrow et al., 2022).

Rather than treating these findings as contradictory, they likely indicate that media effects are context-dependent and moderated by: (a) stage of technological transition (media-naïve vs. saturated), (b) local normative climate and cultural identity strength, and (c) the relative salience of proximal agents (family/peers/healthcare) and structural conditions (poverty, marginalization, food insecurity; Boothroyd et al., 2020; Daiy et al., 2023; Thornborrow et al., 2022).

Several indigenous/community-based samples in this review were characterized by high prevalence of overweight/obesity, yet dissatisfaction was not uniformly aligned with a thinness goal. For example, among indigenous women in Hidalgo, high dissatisfaction coexisted with desire to be thinner and desire to be more robust, underscoring heterogeneous ideals rather than a single Westernized standard (Guzmán-Saldaña et al., 2017). This heterogeneity suggests that interventions focused solely on thin-ideal internalization may overlook locally meaningful drivers of dissatisfaction, including health discourses, functionality constraints, stigma processes, and culturally specific social meanings attached to body size (Guzmán-Saldaña et al., 2017; Santos et al., 2020).

The distinction between “healthy body” and “ideal body” is also supported by evidence from Indigenous youth research in the United States. Rinderknecht and Smith used a modified and validated body-image measure for Native American youth and found that the median figure perceived as healthiest was moderate (4.0 on an 8-figure scale), while the figure most likely to develop diabetes was the largest (8.0), indicating that youth differentiated health risk from attractiveness and that many still desired to be thinner (41% of boys; 61% of girls; Rinderknecht and Smith, 2002). Although not Latin American, this study underscores the conceptual importance of distinguishing (a) aesthetic ideals, (b) health norms, and (c) culturally mediated meanings of weight in Indigenous populations.

Across the included studies, a major limitation concerns the cultural appropriateness of measurement tools, particularly silhouette scales developed in Western populations. Several studies reported low agreement between silhouette selection and BMI or noted phenotype mismatch (e.g., stature and body proportions), language barriers requiring interpreters, and potential reactivity to outsider interviewers (Guzmán-Saldaña et al., 2017; Santos et al., 2020). These issues can inflate apparent “misperception” or obscure true associations, and they complicate comparisons across groups.

The studies that introduced culturally flexible methods—such as 3D avatars that allow participants to construct their ideal without predefined Western stimuli—represent a promising direction for improving construct validity in Latin American Indigenous research (Boothroyd et al., 2020; Thornborrow et al., 2022).

Taken together, the evidence suggests that Latin American Indigenous and rural communities may experience a dual burden: increasing exposure to appearance-related pressures and internalization pathways associated with body dissatisfaction and eating-disorder risk, alongside persistent contexts of socioeconomic vulnerability and high excess weight prevalence. Prevention and health promotion should therefore prioritize culturally anchored protective factors (e.g., cultural identity, community belonging, and functionality-based body appreciation) while avoiding the uncritical transfer of Western thin-centric frameworks (Chalmers et al., 2022; Martin and Latner, 2025).

Future research should: (1) expand coverage across the diversity of Latin American Indigenous peoples, (2) employ longitudinal designs to disentangle cohort vs. age effects, (3) develop and validate culturally grounded instruments (including shape- and functionality-based measures), and (4) explicitly model multi-level sociocultural influences (media, peers, family, healthcare, and structural conditions) to clarify when and why Western beauty ideals become internalized or resisted.

This systematic review shows that in Indigenous and rural communities in Latin America, traditional body values (which may favor larger/curvier bodies) coexist with the growing influence of Western ideals, which is more evident among younger women and in contexts of greater integration and sociocultural exposure. Body dissatisfaction is neither uniform nor always oriented toward thinness, reflecting complex processes of cultural transition. More representative and longitudinal research, using culturally validated instruments, is needed to guide preventive interventions that promote body wellbeing without imposing Western frameworks or undermining culturally grounded protective factors.