Evaluation of the Impact of Symptoms of Obsession and Social Physical Anxiety on Tendency to Cosmetic Surgery by the Mediation of Negative Body Image and Neurotic Defense Mechanisms - the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM)

Introduction: the present study was conducted to examine the mediation effect of negative body image and neurotic defense mechanisms regarding the symptoms of obsession and social physical anxiety on a tendency to cosmetic surgery.methods: the participants of this causal-correlation descriptive study included 200 people (40 males and 160 females) selected with available sampling method among applicants of cosmetic surgery in yazd city, iran. the research instruments were yale-brown obsessive compulsive scale (y-bocs), social physique anxiety scale (spas), negative beliefs about appearance, defensive style, and scale of acceptance to cosmetic surgery. analysis method employed in this work was the structural equation modeling (sem).results: results showed that symptoms including obsession, social physical anxiety, negative body image, and neurotic defense mechanisms were related to the tendency to cosmetic surgery. accordingly, obsession symptoms indirectly and through negative body image were related to the tendency towards the cosmetic surgery. moreover, social-physical anxiety indirectly and through negative body image and neurotic defense mechanisms was related to the tendency to cosmetic surgery. an sem-based conceptual model was fitted in the research.conclusion: the obtained comparative fit index (cfi): 0.88, increasing fitting index (ifi): 0.88, normed fitting index (nfi): 0.80, and the root mean square of the approximation (rmsea): 0.07, showed that the satisfactory fitting of the conceptual model.