Objective: Adolescents with anorexia nervosa (AN) often show increased levels of exercise and physical activity. Psychological models suggest that physical activity in AN might attenuate momentary negative affect. However, this has not been directly tested in adolescents with AN, and it remains unclear whether this is a distinct mechanism of physical activity in AN compared with healthy controls (HCs). Method:In a 1-day ecological momentary assessment, 32 adolescent inpatients with AN and 30 HCs responded to hourly questions on momentary affect while wearing an actigraph to objectively assess physical activity.Results: Linear mixed models identified that adolescents with AN experienced more aversive tension, more negative affect, and less positive affect throughout the day than HCs. Preliminary evidence for a momentary association of higher levels of physical activity with positive affect were found for both groups, whereas higher levels of physical activity were associated with less negative affect in adolescents with AN only. When correcting for multiple testing, interactions did not hold statistical significance. Discussion:Our results indicate a down-regulation effect of physical activity on negative affect for AN and a more general up-regulation effect of positive affect. However, our sample size was small, and replication of our findings is needed. K E Y W O R D Sanorexia nervosa, aversive tension, eating disorder, ecological momentary assessment, emotion regulation, physical activity
Objective: Adolescents with anorexia (AN) and bulimia nervosa (BN) often struggle with emotion regulation (ER). These difficulties have predominantly been assessed across emotions, without considering adaptive and maladaptive ER separately. We compared adolescents with AN or BN to healthy adolescents (HCs) regarding the adaptive and maladaptive ER of three emotions.Method: A treatment-seeking sample of 197 adolescents (atypical/full-threshold AN: N = 118, atypical/full-threshold BN: N = 32; HC: N = 47) reported emotion-specific ER with the FEEL-KJ questionnaire. Mixed models were calculated for adaptive and maladaptive ER to assess differences between emotions (anxiety, anger, and sadness) and groups (AN, BN, and HC).Results: Main effects of emotion (p < .001) and group (p < .001) were found, but no interaction effects were found (p > .05). Post hoc tests showed lower maladaptive and higher adaptive ER for anxiety than anger or sadness (p < .001). AN and BN reported lower adaptive (p < .001) and higher maladaptive ER than HCs (p < .001).BN showed the highest levels of maladaptive ER (p = .009).Discussion: The differences between AN and BN in adaptive and maladaptive ER should be considered. Furthermore, investigating differences in ER of other emotions in eating disorders might be promising.
Objective: Adolescents with anorexia (AN) and bulimia nervosa (BN) often exhibit emotion regulation difficulties. Most studies assessed these difficulties across different emotions and did not differentiate between adaptive and maladaptive strategies. Hence, we investigate whether adolescents with AN or BN differ from healthy adolescents (HC) in (mal-)adaptive emotion regulation regarding anger, anxiety and sadness. Methods: 118 adolescents with AN, 32 with BN and 47 HC self-reported emotion regulation strategies for anxiety, anger and sadness. Mixed models for adaptive and maladaptive strategies with factors emotion and group were calculated. Results: Significant main effects of emotion (p ≤ .001) and group (p ≤ .001) emerged, but no significant interaction effects of emotion × group (p ≥ .09). Post-hoc comparisons revealed more adaptive and less maladaptive strategies for anxiety compared to anger and sadness (p ≤ .002). Furthermore, adolescents with AN and BN reported less adaptive (p ≤ .001) and more maladaptive strategies than HC (p ≤ .001), with BN applying most maladaptive strategies (p = .009). Discussion: Differentiating between AN and BN with regards to adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies may be warranted. Future studies might investigate whether adolescents with AN and BN differ in their emotion regulation regarding other emotions.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.