A scoping review of shame, guilt, and pride in body image: Insights from the body and appearance self-conscious emotions scale

The Body and Appearance Self-Conscious Emotions Scale (BASES; Castonguay et al., 2014) is a measure of shame, guilt, authentic pride, and hubristic pride self-conscious emotions. The scale has been widely used, yet details about implementation, outcomes, and contributions to the literature have not been summarized. This scoping review was designed to summarize and examine research utilizing the BASES to identify trends, findings, and gaps, providing recommendations for future research. A total of 2888 documents were reviewed, comprising records identified through database searching and those citing the BASES development article, resulting in 63 studies included in the final review. Data extraction focused on research objectives, scale applications, and key findings. Most studies used the BASES to explore relationships between self-conscious emotions and disordered eating, body ideals, and physical activity. Of the reviewed studies, 46 % used the full scale and 44 % used subscales, often using the authentic pride subscale in isolation or a combination of the shame and guilt subscales. The scale was frequently used in English (67 %), Spanish (10 %), and Polish (6 %) among emerging adults (38 %), adults (32 %) and adolescents (25 %). Significant positive correlations were reported between shame and guilt (r = 0.38-0.96) and authentic and hubristic pride (r = 0.57-0.87). Shame and guilt were generally linked to maladaptive behaviours (e.g., dietary restraint), while authentic and hubristic pride were protective. Investigations of intervention strategies to reduce appearance-related shame and guilt while fostering pride are needed.