Author: Shiran

“Our Results Are Unexpected, So The Participants Must Have Been in Denial”: Exploring a Worrying Trend in Eating Disorders Research

Shiran 7 Comments

Something I have come across several times when reading ED research studies is a disclaimer that research has been dutifully carried out, but the findings have to be viewed with some scepticism because the participants (and – more specifically – the participants with AN-R) were in denial when completing the self-report questionnaires.

In this post, I will to look at a couple of recent studies that flag-up this issue, to examine what is behind this disclaimer.

The first paper I will explore was published very recently by Gailledrat et al. and touches on body shape concerns in women with eating disorders. Participants were women with a diagnosis of AN or BN selected from a clinic in France. The researchers inform us that, “patients with an ED are much more concerned with their body image and weight than the rest of the population”. The authors do not provide any support for … Continue reading →

Finding What You’re Looking For? Exploring the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire

Shiran 8 Comments

If you’ve ever been assessed for an eating disorder in a clinical setting, there is a good chance you’ve completed the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q). The EDE–Q is a self-report questionnaire widely used in ED assessment and research. Clinicians and researchers calculate several different scores from patient or participant responses to the questionnaire:

  • A score on the global scale, which provides a measure of the severity of ED psychopathology
  • 4 sub-scales: eating restraint, eating concern, weight concern and shape concern

There are a number of cut-off scores that can be used to distinguish between clinically significant and non-significant cases. In this post, I will look at a few papers critiquing the use of the EDE-Q in clinical and research settings.

BACKGROUND

The EDE-Q was originally developed as an assessment tool for bulimia nervosa and binge eating and contains few, if any, questions that specifically assess anorexia nervosa symptomology. … Continue reading →