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oai:figshare.com:article/33915712 2026-09-17T22:17:58Z portal_1197 item_type_3 month_year_09_2026

Data for Perceptions of the “Embodied Self and Body Image” Amongst Young Women with an Acquired Visible Physical Disability in the UK –DClinPsych thesis jointly awarded by Coventry University and University of Warwick Emma Campbell (7508561) Migrated from ePrints Background: Body image has been an important area of research worldwide for several decades. An online UK-based survey conducted by the House of Commons Women and Equalities Committee (2020) (N=7,078) indicated that 71% of people who identified as living with a disability self-reported feeling ‘negative or very negative about their body image’. This highlighted the potential prevalence of body image difficulties in the UK. Overall Aim: To explore the existing body image and physical disability literature and to inform the development of an empirical study. The empirical study aimed to capture women’s experiences of body image following the acquisition of a visible (visible to self and others) physical disability in young adulthood. Here, acquired physical disability is understood as a ‘change or variation’ in people’s physical condition due to their ‘birth, an accident, injury, illness, or environmental factors’ (GOV.UK, 2010). Young adulthood (between 18 and 40 years old) was the specific focus of the empirical study from Erikson’s Psychosocial Life Stage Theory and to narrow the sample in accordance with an IPA methodology. The focus upon this life stage provided unique developmental insight into phenomena under investigation during young adulthood. Methods: A conceptual framework was developed to integrate existing body image theory, followed by a systematic-narrative hybrid literature review across the following databases: APA PsycINFO, CINAHL, Medline, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. Both chapters informed the development of a qualitative Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) study. Women aged between 18 and 40 years, in the UK, who identified as living with an acquired visible physical disability and had encountered changes in body image were invited to take part. Five women, recruited via social media and 3rd-sector organisations, completed the online interviews. Main Findings: Evidence from the review highlighted the importance of ‘the acquired nature of physical disability’; ‘visible and invisible disability’; and the role of ‘social factors’ during the adjustment process. Through the IPA study, four main group experiential themes were developed: ‘threat-related flux and emotional distress’, ‘healing and harm within systems’, ‘adjustment and multifaceted positive body image’, and ‘beyond traditional body image: power in contextual rediscovery’. The results indicated how the women’s embodied survivor self and body image were shaped through a range of contextual factors that drove and ignited a sense of self-unity beyond physical appearance. Women utilised their visible differences to move towards their personal values in life and to contextually make meaning of their profoundly traumatic experiences and body image perceptions. Conclusions and Clinical Implications: Women raised several areas for consideration, supported by previous literature, that highlighted the need for improvements in psychological and emotional support following the acquisition of a physical disability. Three clinical recommendations were outlined: (1) the development of psychological interventions for distress caused by acquiring a physical disability; (2) the development of psychological and trauma-informed positive body image interventions; and (3) the use of a proposed novel integrative formulation model in clinical settings.<br><br>Documents containing anonymised participant transcripts, signed consent forms and ethics approval certificate. This dataset is under embargo as the researchers did not explicitly include open repository storage in their participant consent forms. 2026-09-17T22:17:58Z Dataset Dataset 10.82444/warw.33915712.v1 https://figshare.com/articles/dataset/Data_for_Perceptions_of_the_Embodied_Self_and_Body_Image_Amongst_Young_Women_with_an_Acquired_Visible_Physical_Disability_in_the_UK_DClinPsych_thesis_jointly_awarded_by_Coventry_University_and_University_of_Warwick/33915712 CC BY 4.0 Restricted Access