The authors interviewed 12 female participants about the intersection of their spiritual beliefs and eating disorder symptoms. Three main themes emerged from the data: (a) spiritual beliefs as helpful, (b) choice not to ask for spiritual help, and (c) guilt.

Body dissatisfaction predicts eating disorder symptomatology for some women but not for others. To better understand this disparity, the authors interviewed 7 college women who reported body dissatisfaction and no engagement in eating disorder symptoms. The authors identified 4 factors that may protect body-dissatisfied women from engaging in eating disorder symptoms.

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Due to a dearth of qualitative research on the experience of friends, nonparental family members, and romantic dating partners of those struggling with eating disorder symptoms, we undertook a phenomenological inquiry into this issue. After interviewing 12 participants who had a friend, family member, or romantic dating partner with eating disorder symptoms, we identified four main themes: (a) compassionate emotions toward the individual with eating disorder symptoms with a subtheme of concomitant emotions of frustration and/or anger, (b) sharing the burden of concern for the struggling individual, (c) intervening with boundaries, and (d) detrimental impact of the eating disorder on the relationship with the struggling individual and the participant’s own body image and/or eating behaviors.