The following is an excerpt of the intervention methodology. For more information, please see the full text of the article on the publisher's website or through your institution's library.

Participants One hundred fifty-six self-reported normal weight (body mass index 18.5 to 24.9 kg/m²) college students between the ages of 18 and 23 were recruited [...].

Study Design Participants were randomly assigned to one of three experimental groups (Direct condition n = 38; Imagined condition n = 41; Vicarious condition n = 38; Control condition n = 39). [...] Following the manipulation, all participants were instructed to complete questionnaires measuring explicit weight bias, behavioral intentions to engage with obese people, and intergroup anxiety. [...] Following contact, participants described their experiences as a manipulation check and were debriefed.

Direct contact condition. [...] Upon arrival s/he, along with an obese confederate (Caucasian, female, age 21, BMI kg/m² = 30.5) who was posing as another participant in the study, was instructed to engage in a natural conversation by using three lists of questions that become increasingly intimate and in-depth. [...]

Imagined contact condition. [...] participants randomized to the imagined contact condition were instructed to imagine the following for one minute: [Verbal Stimulus A]. [...]

Vicarious contact condition. Participants randomized into the vicarious contact group were instructed to watch a 3-min video of an interpersonal interaction between two friends. The video portrayed the obese confederate interacting positively with a normal weight actress. [...]

Control condition. Participants completed all measures online, did not engage in any interaction tasks, and were not required to come into the lab.

Measures

Weight bias. The Obese Person Trait Survey is a 20-item scale that measures stereotypical traits about obese persons. Participants estimated the percentage (0 to 100) of obese people who possesses a particular trait (e.g., lazy). [...] Additionally, to examine explicit weight bias, this study used the dislike scale from the Antifat Attitudes Questionnaire. This scale consists of 10 items measuring participants’ level of dislike for overweight individuals [...]. Participants answered on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. [...]

Behavioral intentions to interact with outgroup members. To assess intentions to have contact with outgroup members (i.e., obese people) in the future, participants were given four questions [...]. Responses were from 1 (not at all) to 9 (very). [...]

Intergroup anxiety. Intergroup anxiety was assessed using a measure modified from Stephan and Stephan (1985). [...] Participants responded to a 4-point Likert scale ranging from not at all to very [...].

Contact perceptions. To ensure that participants attended to the experimental manipulations, they were asked to respond to the following (open-ended) question, “Please share your responses to the contact experience you just (had, imagined, or watched).” [...] Additionally, participants were asked to indicate how positive, meaningful, awkward, realistic, and friendly they believed the interaction they had, imagined, or watched was on a Likert scale from 1 (not at all) to 5 (very). Lastly, in the imagined contact conditions, participants were asked to report any stereotypes about the person they imagined interacting with, and if so, to describe what these stereotypes were (also open-ended).