Subclinical anorexia nervosa

Abstract

SYNOPSISThe Eating Attitudes Test (Garner & Garfinkel, 1979) was administered to 578 students (446 females and 132 males) at a College of Technology and to 14 ‘control’ subjects fulfilling diagnostic criteria for anorexia nervosa. Although no male students scored highly, a total of 28 female students (6·3% of the female student sample) scored in the ‘anorexic’ range. These ‘high scorers’, together with a random control group of 28 ‘non-high scorers’, were subsequently Interviewed. Interview revealed that the symptoms of anorexia nervosa were common in the high scoring group but virtually absent in the student control group. It is concluded that a substantial proportion of post-pubertal females (approximately 5%) develop a subclinical form of anorexia nervosa. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to the aetiology, prevention and treatment of disturbances in eating behaviour.

The validity and 4-year test-retest reliability of the Brazilian version of the Eating Attitudes Test-26

“…The validity studies were conducted on samples of populations considered to be at higher risk for eating disorders, in which the possibility to detect disease cases was elevated (9)(10)(11)(12)14,16). This could consequently yield a higher positive predictive value.…”

“…Since then, the EAT has been widely used both in its complete and its short version (7), although, to date, few studies have been conducted to assess its psychometric properties (8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16).…”

“…For the present study, we conducted a literature review to identify all EAT studies fulfilling the following criteria: a) used in a community sample, b) standardized criteria for the diagnosis of anorexia and/or bulimia were adopted, and c) the study provided data to estimate the validity coefficients. Nine studies fulfilled these criteria (8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)) and all of them were conducted on samples of populations at risk for the development of eating disorders. A summary of these studies can be seen in Table 1 (except for the Eisler and Szmukler study (10) where it was possible only to estimate the positive predictive value).…”

The Epidemic of Anorexia Nervosa: Myth or Reality?

“…One of the first studies we found in this vein was published in 1987 and observed a rise in the number of first-time psychiatric admissions in England, between 1972 and1981. From the authors' analysis of the age-period-cohort effect, Williams and King (1987) concluded that this was not a significant increase in cases of AN.…”

Food preferences and choice among the Polish students

“…The different food intake and preferences by males and females may be related to such influences as cultural habits or fashion. As is the custom, females take much less food than males, eat less meat (FIDDES 1991) and limit the energy value of food (BUTTO & WHITEHOUSE 1991). Females usually have more pronounced aversions against many kinds of food (PILGRIM 1957).…”