Body Image Disturbance in Children and Adolescents with Eating Disorders

Author(s):  
Tanja Legenbauer ◽  
Pia Thiemann ◽  
Silja Vocks

Body image is multifaceted and incorporates perceptual, affective, and cognitive components as well as behavioral features. Only few studies have examined the character of body-image disturbance in children/adolescents with eating disorders. It is unknown whether body-image disturbances in children/adolescent with eating disturbances are comparable to those of adult patients with eating disorders. Body-image disturbance might differ quantitatively and qualitatively according to the cognitive developmental status and the age of the individual. This paper provides an overview of the current evidence for body-image disturbance in children/adolescents with eating disorders, and how they compare with those adults with eating disorders. Current evidence indicates that older adolescent patients show similar deficits as adult patients with eating disorders, in particular for the attitudinal body-image component. However, evidence for a perceptual body-image disturbance in adolescent patients, in particular anorexia nervosa, is not conclusive. Reliable statements for childhood can hardly be made because clinical studies are not available. Investigations of body-image disturbance in children have focused on the predictive value for eating disorders. Limitations of the current evidence are discussed, and future directions for research and therapy are indicated.

Author(s):  
Aaron J. Blashill ◽  
Tiffany A. Brown ◽  
Patrycja Klimek

Eating disorders are serious mental health disorders that are associated with significant medical and psychiatric comorbidities, and they have one of the highest mortality rates of any psychiatric disorder. Although considerable research has demonstrated that sexual minority males represent a high-risk group for eating disorders and body image disturbance, less research has been conducted on evidence-based practice for this population. This chapter describes the prevalence of body image disturbance and eating pathology/disorders among sexual minority men. Next, it reviews leading theoretical models that explain these concerns among sexual minority men, including objectification theory, tripartite theory, and sexual minority stress theory. It then discusses clinical interventions and prevention programs tailored to sexual minority men and briefly reviews leading treatment packages for eating pathology in the general population. A case example of enhanced cognitive–behavioral therapy with a hypothetical sexual minority male patient is presented. The chapter concludes with future directions.


2010 ◽  
Vol 41 (8) ◽  
pp. 1651-1663 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Vocks ◽  
D. Schulte ◽  
M. Busch ◽  
D. Grönemeyer ◽  
S. Herpertz ◽  
...  

BackgroundPrevious neuroimaging studies have demonstrated abnormalities in visual body image processing in anorexia and bulimia nervosa, possibly underlying body image disturbance in these disorders. Although cognitive behavioural interventions have been shown to be successful in improving body image disturbance in eating disorders, no randomized controlled study has yet analysed treatment-induced changes in neuronal correlates of visual body image processing.MethodAltogether, 32 females with eating disorders were randomly assigned either to a manualized cognitive behavioural body image therapy consisting of 10 group sessions, or to a waiting list control condition. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, brain responses to viewing photographs of one's own and another female's body taken from 16 standardized perspectives while participants were wearing a uniform bikini were acquired before and after the intervention and the waiting time, respectively.ResultsData indicate a general blood oxygen level dependent signal enhancement in response to looking at photographs of one's own body from pre- to post-treatment, whereas exclusively in the control group activation decreases from pre- to post-waiting time were observed. Focused activation increases from pre- to post-treatment were found in the left middle temporal gyrus covering the coordinates of the extrastriate body area and in bilateral frontal structures including the middle frontal gyrus.ConclusionsResults point to a more intense neuronal processing of one's own body after the cognitive behavioural body image therapy in cortical regions that are responsible for the visual processing of the human body and for self-awareness.


1995 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 317-334 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katharine A. Phillips ◽  
Jennie M. Kim ◽  
James I. Hudson

2003 ◽  
Vol 36 (5) ◽  
pp. 239-246 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. De Panfilis ◽  
P. Rabbaglio ◽  
C. Rossi ◽  
G. Zita ◽  
C. Maggini

1982 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 715-722 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirja Kalliopuska

Body-image disturbances are studied by the Draw-A-Person test given to the anorexia nervosa group of 32 and a control group of 30. The Machover scoring system was used. Two new scales were also constructed, the index of disturbed body image and the unity index of the body image. Machover's method differentiated groups from each other statistically significantly including the new ones: the unity index of body image made by Kalliopuska and Siimes in 1980 and Kalliopuska's index of disturbed body image in 1981. Factor analysis of items gave six factors: severe body-image disturbance, body-image adequacy, hostility, regression, unsureness and faltering in body image, and ego-identity problem. Body-image projections varied greatly as the nature of anorexia nervosa is multidimensional.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jakub Onysk ◽  
Peggy Seriès

AbstractEating disorders are associated with one of the highest mortality rates among all mental disorders, yet there is very little research about them within the newly emerging and promising field of computational psychiatry. As such, we focus on investigating a previously unexplored, yet a core aspect of eating disorders – body image preoccupation. We continue a freshly opened debate about model-based learning in eating disorders and perform a study that utilises a two-step decision-making task and a reinforcement learning model to understand the effect of body image preoccupation on model-based learning in a subclinical eating disorder population, as recruited using Prolific. We find a significantly reduced model-based contribution in the body image disturbance task condition in the eating disorder group as compared to a healthy control. We propose a new digital biomarker that significantly predicts disordered eating, and body image issues.


Author(s):  
Melissa Henry ◽  
Ali Alias

Abstract: The implications of functional loss following cancer is an area of psychosocial oncology that is rarely ventured. This is especially true in the context of limb and sensory losses, which have important repercussions on the patient’s well-being, namely as the individual is required to reassess and redefine his or her identity in face of these adversities. This chapter explores the implications of these losses via the intersection of the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health with key oncological attributes of body image disturbances that seek to render explicit psychological mechanisms underlying impairments, limitations, and restrictions. Emphasizing the use of a standard framework for the assessment of functioning is essential, especially in understudied areas. Through this perspective, further insight is provided for the methodological and biopsychosocial assessment of functioning and body, and implications for clinical inquiry and practice are proposed for the advancement of cancer survivor care.


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