Eating disorder symptomatology and body mass index are associated with readers’ expectations about character behavior: evidence from eye-tracking during reading

Ralph-Nearman, Christina; Filik, Ruth

Abstract

Objective: Many theories have been put forward suggesting key factors underlying the development and maintenance of eating disorders, such as: unhealthy food-related cognitive biases, negative body attitude, and perfectionism; however, underlying cognitive processes associated with eating disorder symptomatology remain unclear. We used eye-tracking during reading as a novel implicit measure of how these factors may relate to eating disorder symptomatology.
Method: In two experiments, we monitored women’s eye movements while they read texts in which the characters’ emotional responses to food-, body image-, and perfectionism-related scenarios were described. Participants’ eating disorder symptomatology was then assessed.
Results: Both studies suggest that moment-to-moment processing of characters’ emotional responses to perfectionism-, and to a lesser extent, body image-related information was associated with participants’ eating disorder symptomatology, thus supporting theories in which these factors are key to developing and maintaining eating disorders.

Citation

Ralph-Nearman, C., & Filik, R. (2018). Eating disorder symptomatology and body mass index are associated with readers’ expectations about character behavior: evidence from eye-tracking during reading. International Journal of Eating Disorders, 51(9), 1070-1079. https://doi.org/10.1002/eat.22961

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Sep 4, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Oct 12, 2018
• Publication Date: 2018-09
• Deposit Date: Oct 9, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 1, 2019
• Journal: International Journal of Eating Disorders
• Print ISSN: 0276-3478
• Electronic ISSN: 1098-108X
• Publisher: Wiley
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 51
• Issue: 9
• Pages: 1070-1079
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/eat.22961
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1154099
• Publisher URL: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/eat.22961