Help-Seeking for Eating Disorders in Female Adolescents

Pathways to help‐seeking in bulimia nervosa and binge eating problems: A concept mapping approach

“…6 Both Crisp 34 and Stewart et al 35 highlighted that people with eating disorders are perceived negatively by the general public, who hold the belief that eating disorders are self-inflicted and therefore not deserving of empathy. Of participants in this study who experienced both anorexia and bulimia, many indicated that they experienced greater distress when suffering from bulimia compared to anorexia.…”

“…Meyer 6 found that 49% of high-school students with disordered eating symptoms were not receiving treatment, while Drewnowski et al 7 observed that only 20% of college women identified with bulimia nervosa had sought help. Hay et al 8 reported that while 73% of women with an eating disorder in a primary care setting had sought help, 62% of these treatment seekers sought help from lay organizations such as Weight Watchers for a perceived problem with weight and 31.5% had sought natural therapies, such as acupuncture.…”

“…[11][12][13] Of participants in the National Eating Disorders Screening Program, 36% attributed their reluctance to seek treatment feeling they could manage the problem independently, 11 and similar findings have been reported in people with binge eating problems. 6 Fear of embarrassment, shame, and guilt have also been associated with treatment nondisclosure for people with eating problems, 14 and Meyer 6 identified fear of disclosure related to shame as a significant barrier to treatment for high school students with eating disorder symptomatology. Along with negative selfevaluation, fear of negative evaluation by others has been identified as a barrier to service utilisation for people with mental health problems.…”

Disordered Eating Cognitions as Predictors of Attitudes toward Seeking Professional Psychological Services

“…First, this finding may be in part due to college students' perception that having disordered eating cognitions itself is not a significant psychological problem. In fact, college students have a tendency to perceive that their disordered eating problems are not severe enough to warrant or merit professional psychological services regardless of their actual severity (Meyer 2001). Second, the absence of the association may reflect help-seeking preferences for disordered eating problems in non-clinical college samples.…”

“…Nevertheless, several factors contribute to barriers against seeking professional psychological services. These include a lack of knowledge of available services (Meyer 2001), a limited awareness of a need for counseling (Cachelin and Striegel-Moore 2006), a fear of social stigmatization (Hepworth and Paxton 2007), and a lack of confidence in psychological professionals or the likely effectiveness of treatment (Meyer 2005).…”