Attachment Styles and Eating Disorders

1845 Words4 Pages

Attachment Styles and Eating Disorders

There have been many studies over the years regarding attachment styles and eating disorders. This is due to the incidence of eating disorders increasing in numbers among young women in industrialized countries. This rise has been seen in the last three decades. Eating disorders are prevalent among young women but also include some young men as well. The studies used for this review pertained to women only. Researchers have demonstrated the correlation between anorexia nervosa and bulimia in regards to attachment styles in many instances. This review of the literature on attachment styles and eating disorders focuses on the following six items.

1. How did the investigators measure the topic of attachment styles and eating disorders?

2. Who were the participants in the studies involved?

3. What were the designs of the studies used?

4. What were the results?

5. Summary

6. Implications

How Did Investigators Measure the Topic of Attachment Styles and Eating Disorders?

Five influential articles were reviewed for information regarding attachment styles and to determine the relationship to eating disorders. Various questionnaires were used for each study. Latzer, Hochdorf, Bachar, and Canetti (2002) used the Adult Attachment Scale and Family Environment Scale. This particular study sought to show that the family environment of eating disorder individuals would hypothesize the following three things:

1. The family environment of eating disorder individuals would have lower levels of cohesiveness, expressiveness, encouragement of personal growth and maintenance than families of normal controls.

2. The attachment styles of individuals with eating disorders would be shown as less ...

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