Psychological well-being in eating disorders: a controlled study

Introduction: Few studies on ED have investigated psychological well-being understood as optimal functioning, even though its assessment resulted of clinical significance (Fava and Tomba, 2009). The aim of this study is to assess psychological well-being in ED compared to controls. Method: 245 female ED patients (28.25±9.67; 105 Bulimia, 57 Anorexia Nervosa, 83 Binge Eating Disorder, DSM-IV-TR) and 60 controls (28.95±10.46) were administered the following self-report instruments: Psychological Well-being scales (PWB), General Health Questionnaire (GHQ), Body Satisfaction Scale (BSS). χ2 and ANOVA were run to compare groups in socio-demographic variables. GLM and contrast analyses were applied to examine differences among ED groups and controls in PWB scales. Age, marital status, educational level, BMI, GHQ and BSS total scores were included as covariates in the model. Results: The four groups differ significantly in socio-demographic characteristics (age, level of education, marital status; p=0.001), GHQ score (p<0.001) and BSS (p<0.001). GLM showed significant differences between groups in all PWB scales (p<0.001). Once confounding variables were taken into account, PWB scales autonomy (p=0.016) environmental mastery (p<0.001), positive relations (p=0.006), and self-acceptance (p<0.001) remained significantly different among groups. Contrast analyses found that BN and BED patients scored significantly lower than controls in PWB autonomy (p=0.004), environmental mastery (p<0.001), and self-acceptance (p<0.001). Whereas AN women showed similar scores compared to controls in all PWB dimensions, except for positive relations (p=0.008) and self-acceptance (p<0.001). Discussion/Conclusions: Our results confirm that ED patients report an impairment in psychological well-being and its assessment may yield a more comprehensive evaluation in this clinical population.