OBJECTIVES:

To examine whether participants who watched an exercise-related segment of The Biggest Loser television program would have different explicit and implicit affective exercise-related attitudes than those of control participants.

METHODS:

University students (N=138) watched a clip of The Biggest Loser or American Idol, then completed a Go/No-go Association Task, a thought-listing task, and questionnaires measuring explicit attitudes, activity level, and mood.

RESULTS:

Participants who watched The Biggest Loser had significantly lower explicit, but not implicit, attitudes towards exercise than did control participants.

CONCLUSIONS:

There is a need to examine the influence of popular media depictions of exercise.