Effect of Childhood Traumas on Eating Disorders: Systematic Review

Abstract

This systematic review is aimed at evaluating the relationship between eating disorders (ED) such as anorexia nervosa (AN), bulimia nervosa (BN), binge eating disorder (BED), a controversial and new concept in recent years; orthorexia nervosa (ON) and childhood traumas (CT). The purpose of this review is to systematically examine whether CT (emotional-physical-sexual abuse and emotional-physical neglect) has any impact on the development of the ED (anorexia-bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, orthorexia nervosa) in line with the literature. In this review, Turkish and English articles/dissertations published between 1990 and 2022 in the academic databases of Ebscohost, Proquest Dissertations, Science Direct, Google Scholar and PsycINFO were used to examine the effect of CT on the development of ED. Childhood traumas, eating disorders, aneroxia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, orthorexia nervosa, childhood traumas and childhood traumas and eating disorders, childhood traumas and orthorexia nervosa were used as keywords. From the articles/dissertations reached, those who did not have an efficacy study of childhood traumas on eating disorders/orthorexia nervosa and those published before 1990 and after 2022 were not included in the review. Each selected study focused on information on the effects of childhood trauma types on eating disorders and orthorexia nervosa. In line with the determined criteria, the methods, findings and results of the studies of 21 articles/dissertations were explained. It was determined that the types of CT (emotional, physical, sexual abuse and physical and emotional neglect) directly or indirectly predicted ED and were effective on the development of ED, but no effect on ON was observed. This conclusion sheds light on the need to increase studies on ON.