Personality disorder is common among women with anorexia or bulimia

Innovations Report: Among the young women diagnosed as having anorexia or bulimia, 48.5% also suffer from a personality disorder. This is one of the conclusions of a study conducted by scientists at the Universitat Jaume I which intends to unveil whether there is any link between eating disorders and certain personality traits.

Finding an answer to this enigma may be of prime importance for several reasons. One of them is prevention since discovering a relationship between eating and personality disorders may help detect problems beforehand in people who are particularly vulnerable to developing anorexia or bulimia given certain traits of their personality.

Another reason is related to the treatment of these pathologies. Even though treatments are effective, the percentage of relapses is still high. Being able to unravel and understand how personality disorders influence the tendency to relapse can also help increase the treatment’s chances of success.

With these objectives in mind, the researchers at the Department of Basic and Clinic Psychology and Psychobiology analysed the personality of 150 young women aged 24 on average, who were distributed into three different groups. A first group was made up of young women diagnosed as having purging-type bulimia nervosa (60%) and purging-type anorexia nervosa (40%); a second group was formed by participants who, even though they were not ill, showed restrictive eating behaviours; finally, the third was a control group.

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