Female Adolescents with Eating Disorders, Parental Psychopathological Risk and Family Functioning

Abstract

Epidemiological studies on adolescents with eating disorders demonstrate a high prevalence of disordered eating behaviors, with a higher prevalence of eating disorders among girls. Several studies have recently demonstrated an association between female adolescents' eating disorders, parental psychopathological risk, and an impaired family functioning with poor quality of the relationships among family members. On the basis of these premises, we conducted a cross-sectional study initially recruiting 243 families of female adolescents affected by anorexia nervosa (Group A), bulimia nervosa (Group B), and binge eating disorder (Group C) (average age 14-17) to assess their psychological profile (SCL90-R), specific representations of their family functioning (FACES-IV), and the possible effect of adolescents' psychological profiles and parents' psychopathological risk on family functioning. Our results indicate that adolescents and parents in Groups A, B, and C show an unequivocal psychopathological profile; in particular, adolescents with anorexia present the most severe psychopathological risk. Further, our results show that adolescents and their parents differ in their perception of their family functioning. More specifically, adolescents with anorexia perceive their family as highly disengaged, poorly interwoven, and rigid, in addition cohesion and communication qualities are perceived as low. Interestingly, parental psychopathological risk predicts adolescents' specific perception of their family functioning. These findings may guide clinical interventions as they suggest that distinct maternal psychopathological symptoms can be associated with a variety of clinical configurations in their offspring, whereas paternal psychopathological risk may be present in adolescents suffering from all forms of eating disorders.

Family profiles in eating disorders: family functioning and psychopathology

“…In addition, Vidović et al60 suggested that families of adolescents with bulimic diagnosis have a significantly more dysfunctional family background compared to patients diagnosed with AN. The families of bulimic adolescents represented their families as less cohesive, poorly coherent, and badly organized and reported the presence of high levels of family conflict and distress 46,61. Finally, families of adolescents diagnosed with BED showed higher scores of cohesion and flexibility, and similar to families with daughters suffering from AN, they described their family as enmeshed and characterized by poor communication.…”

“…On the other hand, we used the normative scores for the Italian population for both measures. Furthermore, we did not assess parental psychopathological risk, which could give important information on the development of adolescents’ EDs 46,69–71. In addition, the homogeneity of the sample, in terms of cultural, geographical, and socioeconomic status, limits replication of the study in other countries or cultures.…”

“…Moreover, Kivisto et al45 found that adolescents who perceived higher family enmeshment also demonstrated greater emotional dysregulation in several domains, such as negative global appraisals of distress tolerance and a stronger increase in subjective negative mood. In a recent study, we investigated the differences in perceptions of family functioning of adolescents with EDs and their parents in a developmental psychopathology framework 46. This study found that different perceptions of family functioning and peculiar psychopathological vulnerabilities were associated with the diagnosis of ED of adolescents 47–49…”

<p>Does the Interplay of Callous-Unemotional Traits and Moral Disengagement Underpin Disruptive Behavior? A Systematic Review</p>

“…It is probable that for these adolescents a vicious circle in which affective and cognitive processes maintain a moral and interpersonal disinvestment, exacerbates their problems during the development. [74][75][76] For these reasons, both these constructs can be important targets of intervention, but more effort should be put to understand how they operate together to prevent antisocial careers.…”

Associations between Family Weight-Based Teasing, Eating Pathology, and Psychosocial Functioning among Adolescent Military Dependents

“…Furthermore, in line with the previous literature [23,67,68,73], WBT was also associated with depressive symptoms, poorer self-esteem and impaired social functioning. In addition, data demonstrate that greater family dysfunction is linked with exacerbated risk for psychopathology and eating disturbances among youth [74,75]. Specifically, children in families characterized by rigidity, disengagement, and low cohesion may be most susceptible to eating disorders.…”