“Pretty hurts”: Acceptance of hegemonic feminine beauty ideals and reduced sexual well-being among Black women

•Black women face pressure to fulfill hegemonic beauty standards.•Hegemonic beauty ideal endorsement is associated with Black women’s reduced sexual well-being.•Sexual well-being is operationalized as sexual attitudes, behaviors, and affective cognitions.•Thin-ideal internalization is related to Black women’s appearance beliefs and sexual well-being. Although women are expected to idealize and achieve hegemonic feminine beauty standards such as being slender and lighter skinned, few studies have examined how women’s investment in achieving these restrictive feminine appearance ideals may influence their sexual attitudes and behaviors. Even less is known about Black women. We surveyed 640 Black college women to test hypotheses that endorsement of hegemonic beauty ideals would be positively associated with four dimensions of negative sexual affect (sexual guilt, shame, emotional distancing, and self-consciousness) and negatively associated with two dimensions of sexual agency (sexual assertiveness and satisfaction). Correlation and regression analyses showed that hegemonic beauty ideal acceptance was linked with greater sexual guilt, shame, emotional distancing, and sexual self-consciousness in addition to lower levels of sexual assertiveness and satisfaction. Findings highlight how endorsing restrictive, hegemonic standards of beauty is associated with Black women’s reduced sexual affect and sexual agency.