LEC 6 - Eating Disorders

Question 1

What is an eating disorder?

Answer 1

• Severe disturbances in eating that result from obsessive anxiety about gaining or losing weight
• Intense phobias about losing/gaining weight

Question 2

What is a binge eating disorder

Answer 2

People don’t meet typical ED criteria
FORMS Q’s:
How do we differentiate disorders?
How is culture relating to mental health problems?
How is culture a social determinant of mental illness?

Question 3

Anorexia Nervosa Comobidity

Answer 3

Depression, anxiety, OCD, body dysmorphic disorder
Is it different from OCD?
–> BDD?

Question 4

Anorexia and Suicide

Answer 4

o Can die from complications but most likely will be suicide
o Might represent a form of chronic suicide?
- Is it a cry for help??

Question 5

Bulimia Nervosa

Answer 5

Episodes of binge eating and “inappropriate compensates”
- High rates of Comorbidity

Question 6

Bulimia (Compensation)

Answer 6

binge creating shame and then they act out (throw up, laxatives, excessive exercise)

Question 7

Bulimia (Binge)

Answer 7

eating an amount far more than is typically normal, having no control over stopping

Question 8

Problems accompanying Anorexia

Answer 8

• Sexual difficulties and disinterest
• Lack of impulse control
• Health problems
• Overall difficulties (hair, skin, kidney function)

Question 9

Anorexia VS Bulimia

Answer 9

A: Extreme Diet
Below normal weight
Comforted by rigid self-control
Denial of disorder

B: Binge eating
Normal weight
Distressed by lack of control
Aware of problem (ashamed)

Question 10

Etiological Theories

Answer 10

Social: want to live up to societal norms
Interpersonal: suggests that eating disorders are products of specific
family environments
Evolutionary: becoming thinner to attract mates

Question 11

Montreux Clinic

Answer 11

Peggy Claude-Pierre claimed that her round the clock inpatient
program had 90% success rate through nothing but unconditional love
- No qualifications
- Many died at Montreux
- Patients physically restrained, no leaving clinic, communication with outside was censored

Question 12

Epidemiology

Answer 12

• Anorexia and bulimia 10x more common in women
• Middle, upper middle class
• High concordance with other disorders
• Age of onset increasing at both ends of the spectrum
• Common in western societies (beauty standards? diet culture?)

Question 13

Eating Disorders In Men

Answer 13

Men have a higher threshold of what is thin than women
- Men are less likely to recognize the problem and feel more stigmatized
because of it

Question 14

Pro-Ana and Pro-Mia

Answer 14

Online communities who argue that these issues are not mental
disorders but a lifestyle choice
- Aim to provide a non-judgemental mutual support forum for their
lifestyle choice

Question 15

Wannarexia

Answer 15

Term used by those with diagnosed eating disorders against those trying to “develop’ the disorder because they see it as glamorous

Question 16

Body Dysmorphic Disorder

Answer 16

Categorized along with the OCD related disorders, NOT an eating
disorder
- Described as repetitive behaviours in response to perceived defects in
the body, often grossly exaggerated or imagined
- Obsessions over this body part are so severe that they cause immense distress