Roberto Olivardia, PhD

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362 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 15 Jul

Roberto Olivardia, PhD’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Speaking of Psychology · Social media, looksmaxxing, and why men struggle with body image, with Roberto Olivardia, PhD · 15 Jul 2026 podcast

compulsively lift weights or do exercise, and their body's in so much pain that they start taking opiates.

And I've worked with many men with muscle dysmorphia who develop opiate dependencies to deal with the chronic pain from working out so much.

And then that obviously becomes its own issue and problem.

And the other piece is I ask patients, how much of your self-esteem

an identity rests upon the way you look.

And there's nothing wrong with having some part of our self-esteem for some people be like, hey, you know, I like the way I look and my appearance, but it cannot be a dominant factor because we both know, Kim, like, I mean, the things that really are going to create our identity and last us through life are those crystallized factors.

Our intelligence, our sense of humor, the way we relate to people, those things pretty much stay consistent throughout our life.

The one thing I can guarantee that will change is the way you look.

How I look today is going to be very different than how I look 20 years from now and what my body can do.

Can't stop the clock.

You can't stop the clock.

And that is frightening to a lot of these men who often have, again, this sort of high perfectionistic kind of traits and need to control things.

And

You can only do so much and control the body so much.

So when people encroach in those territories, that's when we know we have a problem.

As opposed to someone who just might be a fitness enthusiast and it's just part of their lives and they have active social lives, they're healthy, they're sleeping well, eating well, then it's not an issue.

So yes, muscle dysmorphia can absolutely affect women.

I mean, it predominantly affects men.

And part of that is because socioculturally, that muscularity is sort of much more promoted towards boys and men.

But absolutely, I've worked with women who also have muscle dysmorphia.

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