DClinPsy Portfolio Volume 1 of 3 - University of Hertfordshire ...

Consequences of disordered eating
Perhaps paradoxically, disordered eating behaviours have been found to increase an
individual’s risk of becoming obese, (e.g. Stice, Presnell, Shaw and Rohde, 2005); Field,
Austin, Taylor, Malspels, Rosner, Rocreet, Gillman and Colditz, 2003); Stice, Cameron,
Killen, Hayward and Taylor, 1999). Various biological and psychological mechanisms
were put forward to explain how dieting with disordered eating behaviours can
potentially result in an individual increasing their risk of obesity onset. These
mechanisms are described in detail in Stice, Cameron, Killen, Hayward, & Taylor (1999),
Blundell (1995) and Field et al, (2003) and have been summarised in the literature review
(above). To offer an example, girls who diet have been found to be 12 times as likely to
binge eat as girls who do not diet and to be overweight over time (Field et al, 2003). The
effects of becoming obese have considerable physiological, psychological and social
implications such as increasing one’s risk of high blood pressure, diabetes mellitus, and
coronary heart disease, as well as lower self esteem (Miller and Downey, 1999),
completion of fewer years of education, higher rates of poverty and lower marriage rates
(Dietz, 1998).
Thus, although traditionally obesity and eating disorders have been considered as distinct
conditions, findings that overweight adolescents are at a high risk of using unhealthy
weight control behaviours and bingeing and also that individuals can cross over from one
condition to another over time suggest that it may be useful to consider the broad
spectrum of disordered eating (Neumark-Sztainer, 2005a).
Conversely, adolescents who engage in disordered eating behaviours such as extreme
dieting can run the risk of losing large amounts of fat, amenorrhea, ketosis, and reducing
their body mass, lean muscle tissue and basal metabolic rate, as well as suffering fatigue,
irritability, insomnia, lack of concentration, and growth failure (Mallick, 1983). Longer
term effects of dieting include an increased risk of developing an eating disorder, (Patton
Selzer, Coffey, Carlin, and Wolfe, 1999).
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