Major Depression and Avoidant Personality Traits in Eating Disorders

Abbate-Daga, Giovanni; Gramaglia, Carla; Bailer, Ursula F.; Bergese, Sergio D.; Marzola, Enrica; Fassino, Secondo

doi:10.1159/000324761

Cited by 17 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 18 publications

(22 reference statements)

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“…In AN-BP patients it could be also observed a higher prevalence of demoralization, even if not significant. These findings are in line with previous data in literature reporting a more frequent comorbid depressive symptomatology and anger dyscontrol in this subtype of AN [65,66]. …”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Psychosomatic syndromes and anorexia nervosa

et al. 2013

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BackgroundIn spite of the role of some psychosomatic factors as alexithymia, mood intolerance, and somatization in both pathogenesis and maintenance of anorexia nervosa (AN), few studies have investigated the prevalence of psychosomatic syndromes in AN. The aim of this study was to use the Diagnostic Criteria for Psychosomatic Research (DCPR) to assess psychosomatic syndromes in AN and to evaluate if psychosomatic syndromes could identify subgroups of AN patients.Methods108 AN inpatients (76 AN restricting subtype, AN-R, and 32 AN binge-purging subtype, AN-BP) were consecutively recruited and psychosomatic syndromes were diagnosed with the Structured Interview for DCPR. Participants were asked to complete psychometric tests: Body Shape Questionnaire, Beck Depression Inventory, Eating Disorder Inventory–2, and Temperament and Character Inventory. Data were submitted to cluster analysis.ResultsIllness denial (63%) and alexithymia (54.6%) resulted to be the most common syndromes in our sample. Cluster analysis identified three groups: moderate psychosomatic group (49%), somatization group (26%), and severe psychosomatic group (25%). The first group was mainly represented by AN-R patients reporting often only illness denial and alexithymia as DCPR syndromes. The second group showed more severe eating and depressive symptomatology and frequently DCPR syndromes of the somatization cluster. Thanatophobia DCPR syndrome was also represented in this group. The third group reported longer duration of illness and DCPR syndromes were highly represented; in particular, all patients were found to show the alexithymia DCPR syndrome.ConclusionsThese results highlight the need of a deep assessment of psychosomatic syndromes in AN. Psychosomatic syndromes correlated differently with both severity of eating symptomatology and duration of illness: therefore, DCPR could be effective to achieve tailored treatments.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Psychosomatic syndromes and anorexia nervosa

et al. 2013

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“…This association is supported by previous researches showing that individuals with purging symptomatology are more likely to show comorbid disorders and greater clinical severity [30, 31]. Also our group in previous studies found a correlation—although not related to diagnosis—with purging symptomatology [5]. …”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

“…ED patients with a personality profile characterized by high HA and low RD, SD, and C represent a subgroup of patients likely to experience feelings of inferiority, inadequacy, unhappiness, anxiety, and dependence [5, 31, 55–57]. It is well known that ED patients with MD represent a substantial group of patients with specific and semi-independent clinical features and that these features require aimed treatments [46, 58].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, a substantial part of individuals affected by an ED is likely to be affected also by a mood disorder, and the current comorbidity varies from 12.7 to 68% in AN and is about 40% in BN [1]. Major Depression (MD) is the most prevalent comorbid mood disorder in ED patients, and the severity of depressive symptomatology seems to be related to the ED one [2–5]. …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Indeed anxious/preoccupied behaviors, mood intolerance, and dysthymic traits have been reported in ED patients [5, 9, 10]. Studies conducted with the Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI) [11] have found that ED individuals both in the acute phase [9, 12, 13] and after remission [14–16] performed higher scores of Harm Avoidance (HA) and low scores of Self-Directedness (SD) than healthy controls.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Eating Disorders and Major Depression: Role of Anger and Personality

Abbate-Daga

Gramaglia

Marzola

et al. 2011

Depression Research and Treatment

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This study aimed to evaluate comorbidity for MD in a large ED sample and both personality and anger as clinical characteristics of patients with ED and MD. We assessed 838 ED patients with psychiatric evaluations and psychometric questionnaires: Temperament and Character Inventory, Eating Disorder Inventory-2, Beck Depression Inventory, and State-Trait Anger Expression Inventory. 19.5% of ED patients were found to suffer from comorbid MD and 48.7% reported clinically significant depressive symptomatology: patients with Anorexia Binge-Purging and Bulimia Nervosa were more likely to be diagnosed with MD. Irritable mood was found in the 73% of patients with MD. High Harm Avoidance (HA) and low Self-Directedness (SD) predicted MD independently of severity of the ED symptomatology, several clinical variables, and ED diagnosis. Assessing both personality and depressive symptoms could be useful to provide effective treatments. Longitudinal studies are needed to investigate the pathogenetic role of HA and SD for ED and MD.

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