by Rebecca Palmer

Created on: February 07, 2007   Last Updated: May 02, 2007

Despite popular belief, the etiology of an eating disorder is not solely based on the psychosocial effect of the media or popular culture. There is no denying that the thinness of pop-icons has the ability to influence some young women and does tend to exacerbate a negative body image (or underlying pathology). However, in recent years psychologists have discovered preexisting vulnerabilities such as personality traits, cognitive functioning, and even neurobiology that help explain why certain people fall victim to maladaptive eating. Anorexic women for example, seem to have a particular type of personality, degree of pathology and a neurobiological difference from the average female.

Anorexia nervosa (AN) is classified by a refusal to maintain body weight above a minimum average, a distorted body image and an intense fear of gaining weight even though clinically underweight (Hebebrand & Remschmidt, 1995). Symptoms of AN typically include severe appearance anxiety, extensive exercising, and intense caloric restriction (Davis et al., 1997). Anorexia nervosa is divided into two subgroups: restrictive AN (R-AN), and binging / purging AN (B/P-AN). R-AN expresses itself through severe caloric restriction as well as excessive exercising, while B/P-AN shows a restrictive caloric intake as well as occasional fits of uncontrollable eating and then purging (Treasure et al., 2003). While males do occasionally suffer from anorexia, women are more afflicted in the general population. Although generally onsetting in adolescence, girls as young as eight can suffer from the disorder (with occasionally weight preoccupation occurring in as young as five years old) (Lask & Bryant-Waugh, 2000). Some believe AN to be a spectrum disorder and to be the final point from volitional dieting to uncontrollable impulses and compulsions (as cited in Davis et al., 1997). The switch from volitional to compulsive is facilitated by individual variables of personality traits, cognitive structures and neurobiology.
Those suffering from AN often have a personality disorder (40-70%) as well; many of which fall into the range of a Cluster C disorder (avoidant, passive aggressive, obsessive compulsive, dependent) (Davis et al., 1997, Davis et al., 1998). Obsessive compulsive disorder and borderline personality disorder are among the most commonly found personality disorders, while avoidant personality and empathy disorders exist within AN sufferers to a lesser extent (Rastam et al., 1995). In addition

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