Immediate Effects of Body Checking Behaviour on Negative and Positive Emotions in Women with Eating Disorders: An Ecological Momentary Assessment Approach

Abstract

Results are contradictory to the assumptions of the cognitive-behavioural model, as body checking does not seem to reduce negative emotions.

Body checking in non‐clinical women: Experimental evidence of a specific impact on fear of uncontrollable weight gain

“…For example, future studies might record the number of body checks that were actually carried out by the participants, or might use reminder alarms to trigger those behaviors. These findings appear to support the negative impact of body checking (Kraus et al, 2015;Shafran et al, 2007), demonstrating that this safety behavior results in the worsening of a core fear in eating disorders . However, an alternative interpretation is that it is not the behavior of body checking that triggers the fear of uncontrollable weight gain, but that it is the activation of related body-checking cognitions (Mountford, Haase, & Waller, 2006) that results in that fear being exacerbated.…”

“…This association might relate to the symptom-maintaining nature of body checking, where those with more severe shape concerns were more vulnerable to the effects of shortterm checking. The present findings cannot be compared directly with those ofKraus et al (2015), as those authors used a non-experimental approach and measured impact on mood. However,Kraus et al's results do indicate the value of considering mood as an outcome variable in future studies of the impact of body checking.…”

“…They showed that those who examined themselves critically (“high body checking condition”) became more dissatisfied with their bodies after the checking, relative to those who made neutral appraisals. In contrast, the Kraus et al () study showed that body checking was associated with more negative mood. Though Kraus et al used a more ecologically valid approach, they did not use an experimental design.…”

“…It can consist of many different behaviors (e.g., pinching flesh, using weighing scales, using different clothes to identify size changes, repeated use of mirrors), each of which is likely to magnify body imperfections (Fairburn, Shafran, & Cooper, 1999). It is strongly associated with negative body image and mood, in both correlational and causal studies (Kraus, Lindenberg, Zeeck, Kosfelder, & Vocks, 2015;Shafran, Lee, Payne, & Fairburn, 2007). Body checking is also likely to be associated with a wider range of negative eating attitudesparticularly the fear of uncontrollable weight gain that arises from not undertaking the more objective method of weighing to determine any bodily changes .…”

Sociocultural influences of parents on body dissatisfaction in adolescents

“…1 Body image is generated by internal (biological and psychological) and external (cultural and social) factors, and it develops, changes, or maintains through this complex network of interactions 2 . Body image consists of two essential elements: perceptive and subjective.…”