Background: Appearance concerns are of increasing importance in young men's lives. We investigated whether muscle dissatisfaction is associated with psychological symptoms, dietary supplement or anabolic steroid use, or physical activity in young men.
Methods: As a part of a questionnaire assessment of health-related behaviors in the population-based FinnTwin16 study, we assessed factors associated with muscle dissatisfaction in 1245 men aged 22-27 using logistic regression models.
Results: Of men, 30% experienced high muscle dissatisfaction, while 12% used supplements/steroids. Of highly muscle-dissatisfied men, 21.5% used supplements/steroids. Mean body mass index, waist circumference, or leisure aerobic activity index did not differ between individuals with high/low muscle dissatisfaction. Muscle dissatisfaction was significantly associated with a psychological and psychosomatic problems, alcohol and drug use, lower height satisfaction, sedentary lifestyle, poor subjective physical fitness, and lower life satisfaction.
Conclusion: Muscle dissatisfaction and supplement/steroid use are relatively common, and are associated with psychological distress and markers of sedentary lifestyle.