An Analysis of Imagined Interactions With Pro-Ana (Anorexia)

Abstract

For individuals suffering from an eating disorder, the Internet is a place of encouragement and support. To date, however, no comprehensive research has been done to examine particular entries on blogs used by those individuals. Therefore, this study aimed to fill that gap. It focuses on what types of messages individuals communicate to pro-anorexia (Pro-Ana) website and what types of imagined interactions they have with others about their disorder. A total of 587 Pro-Ana blog entries were content analyzed. The results indicated that individuals with an eating disorder blog to talk about their illness, to ruminate about the conflict with their parents and peers who often disapprove of their actions, and to ask for advice. Food is the most cited theme in the blog entries. This supports the evolutionary perspective that food is always on their mind, something those with eating disorders try to control. A logistic regression analysis revealed that mental imagery in the form of imagining interaction with significant others was .50 times less likely to reflect mental illness issues and .24 times less likely to reflect binging problems when compared with entries that did not feature imaginary conversation with others. In terms of the interaction partners, most bloggers imagined talking with family members, followed by peers, professionals, and romantic partners, while a small number of entries reported having imagined interactions with Ana in terms of personification followed by coworkers, kids, or strangers.

Positive emotion and motivational dynamics in anorexia nervosa: A positive emotion amplification model (PE-AMP).

“…Those with AN may also engage in fantasies of believing themselves to be thinner, thus enabling them a temporary feeling of thinness (Myers & Biocca, 1992). Some evidence has shown that those with AN may even imagine interacting with their AN as a positive partnership (Mulveen & Hepworth, 2006; Sheldon, Grey, Vickery, & Honeycutt, 2015). Finally, work examining the role of media in AN has indicated that media displays of thinness can be used in rituals involving comparison wherein women display thin images from media as a way of motivating themselves to attain a specific, idealized appearance (Hermes, 1995; Thomsen et al, 2001).…”

“Imagine All the People”: Imagined Interactions in Virtual Reality When Public Speaking

“…Intrapersonal communication is the foundation to all other types of communication, and embedded in the hierarchy of interpersonal, small group, organization, societal, cultural, or mass communication (Honeycutt, 2015). The breadth of II scholarship has primarily investigated interpersonal interactions; however, several scholars have explored IIs in family (Rosenblatt & Meyer, 1986), health (Sheldon et al, 2015), intercultural (McCann & Honeycutt, 2006), and instructional contexts (Choi et al, 2015). IIs must be contextualized for domain specific communication.…”

“…The imagination allows for cognitive scripts that provide communicators with the ability for verbal and/or visual representations of past or anticipated communication behaviors. Verbal imagery involves imagining the dialogue, conversation, or message content, whereas visual imagery involves setting the scene and seeing the interaction (Sheldon et al., 2015). Verbal-only IIs are perceived as more emotionally intense and less similar to actual communication than mixed-imagery interactions; although fewer in frequency, IIs that incorporate visual imagery were perceived as more pleasant (Zagacki et al., 1992).…”

Exploring experiences of online ‘pro‐ana’ networks: An interpretative phenomenological analysis approach

“…Although some websites are dedicated to pro‐ana, several social networking websites also contain pro‐ana content, such as Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook (Branley & Covey, 2017; Juarascio et al., 2010). Common features of pro‐ana communities include the following: emotional and motivational support amongst users (especially support to lose weight), ‘thinspiration’ or ‘thinspo’ (inspiration to lose weight, particularly through images of thin, objectified women) and sharing tips to continue weight loss via eating disorder (ED) behaviours (Borzekowski et al., 2010; Ging, 2020; Juarascio et al., 2010; Sheldon et al., 2015; Talbot et al., 2017).…”

“…Overall, most research into pro‐ana analyses online content—potentially due to its public availability. This has illuminated the patterns of posts and interactions amongst pro‐ana users (Juarascio et al., 2010; Lai et al., 2021; Sheldon et al., 2015; Tong et al., 2013). Nonetheless, considering how desirable behaviours are constructed within online pro‐ana communities (Haas et al., 2010; Yeshua‐Katz, 2015), it is possible these posts are created to gain status in these communities.…”