THE PREVALENCE OF EATING DISORDERS AND EATING DISORDERED BEHAVIORS

Abstract

THE PREVALENCE OF EATING DISORDERS AND EATING DISORDERED BEHAVIORS IN SORORITIES LAUREL A ALEXANDER, B.A., WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY M.S., UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST Directed by: Professor Morton Harmatz In this study, the prevalence of bulimia, anorexia, and eating disordered behaviors in campus sororities was examined. Sorority women's scores on the Eating Disorder Inventory (EDI), the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT), and the Bulimia Test-Revised (BULIT-R) were compared with those ofwomen in athletic teams or dance companies and a control group of undergraduate women. It was hypothesized that sorority subjects would be more eating disordered than the control group. It was also expected that sorority subjects would differ from subjects in athletics and dance only on psychological dimensions of eating disorders, which would indicate that sorority women are at a higher risk for eating disorders for a qualitatively different reason than women in dance and athletic groups. These hypotheses were not statistically supported. However, nonsignificant trends indicated that sorority subjects did exhibit more eating disorders and eating disordered behaviors than the control group. Non-significant trends also indicated that subjects in athletic or dance groups were more eating disordered than sorority subjects. On psychological dimensions of eating disorders, the sorority and athletics or dance groups tended to vary only on the Ineffectiveness subscale of the EDI, which measures self-doubt and insecurity. The only statistically significant finding of this study was that sorority and nonsorority subjects varied in the sources of societal pressures they identified. Sorority women more often identified other women or themselves as the main sources of pressure to be thin and beautiful. Non-sorority women more often selected men or society in general. Future research is needed to explore the implications of the groups' differences in identified pressure sources and to determine whether the non-significant trends found in this study could be amplified with a larger sample from different campuses and the use of different measures.