Patients with Eating Disorders: The Structure of Comorbidity and Psychopathological Symptoms

Until now, studies concerning the morbidities and psychopathological behaviors associated with eating disorders (ED) have considered each subtype of such disorders separately, with the investigation of the differences between them being very much neglected. Furthermore, no study has ever applied techniques such as Multidimensional Scalogram Analysis -an iterative HOMALS algorithm which represents a modernized version of the study by Guttman (1941)- in order to shed light not only on the psychopathological behaviors associated to ED disorders, but also upon the complex structure of the symptoms underlying each different ED subtype. The present study was designed to address these points. One hundred and thirty five subjects participated in the study: fifty five patients (mean age of 17.8 years, 50 female) and eighty controls (mean age of 16.5 years, all female). Diagnoses were made by clinicians experienced in the area of eating disorders using the DSM-IV-TR diagnostic criteria. Comorbidity in terms of anxiety, depression, hostility, interpersonal sensitivity, obsessive compulsive symptoms, paranoid ideation, phobic anxiety, psychoticism, and somatization was assessed by the Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90); psychopathological eating behavior (Diet, Bulimia, Oral Control) was assessed by the Eating Attitude Test (EAT-40). From all the Multidimensional Scalogram techniques, HOMALS analyses were used. The results showed that there were different symptom structures not only between clinical and non-clinical population, but also in the different ED subtypes. These findings are discussed in terms of the uses of the information regarding correlations between symptoms within the field of clinical psychology and research.