Association between body dissatisfaction and eating disorder symptomatology in professional dancers

Abstract

The aim was to investigate the association between body image dissatisfaction and eating disorder symptomatology in professional dancers in Brazil. A total of 127 dancers of classical ballet or contemporary dance modalities from professional companies in Brazil participated. Data were collected through a self-administered online questionnaire. Multiple logistic regression showed that dancers with anorexia nervosa symptomatology had 1.13 more odds of being dissatisfied with overweight and dancers with bulimia nervosa symptomatology had 1.28 more odds of being dissatisfied with thinness, in both cases demonstrating a desire for an extremely rigid ideal of thinness. Higher scores of eating disorder symptomatology are associated with greater odds of body image dissatisfaction in Brazilian professional dancers of classical and contemporary companies.