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

An explanation could be that these females regardless of objective size, display
inflexibility in terms of cognitive fusion whereby they may think ‘if I don’t look like X
supermodel my body is not perfect/good enough’. They then take this thought as the truth
that they need to behave in accordance with (i.e. engage in disordered eating in a vain
attempt to become ‘perfect’).
A significant mean difference was however found in relation to depression which was
found to be higher in the underweight group in comparison to the healthy BMI
group. However the underweight group although more depressed, were not more at risk
of an eating disorder, in fact the underweight group had the lowest distribution of high
EDR (with only 4.7% of the underweight group in the high EDR group, 11.5% of the
healthy and 21.4% of the overweight was in the high EDR group). Thus if more girls with
a high EDR were underweight this finding would have been in accordance with research
that has found an association between depression and eating pathology (e.g. Stice, et al,
2001). The finding that depression was associated with being underweight could be due
to biological influences (i.e. serotonin dysregulation found in mood disorders, which may
also influence weight (Jimerson, Lesem, Kaye, Hegg, and Breweerton, 1990). As the
underweight group did not have a higher EDR it appears that these girls have higher
levels of depression without engaging in disordered eating. This result would need to be
considered further before reaching any conclusions as it is paradoxical and counter to the
growing literature suggesting an association between obesity and depression not an
underweight BMI (Roberts, Deleger, Strawbridge, and Kaplan, (2003).
Furthermore, as regards the lack of correspondence between EDR in relation to BMI, this
is likely to be because the adolescents were from a non-clinical group whereby
underweight girls would not be underweight due to an ED. Instead, being underweight is
more likely to be due to maturation and genetics, not disordered eating.
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