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Eating Disorders

Help-Seeking for Disordered Eating: Barriers, Facilitators, and Psychological Functioning

(PS6-A25) Help-seeking for Disordered Eating: Barriers, Facilitators, and Psychological Functioning

Friday, November 17, 2023
4:00 PM – 5:00 PM PST
Location: Regency Ballroom, Level 7
There is a notable discrepancy between the prevalence of disordered eating and the proportion of individuals who seek treatment for it. As a result, empirical efforts to understand barriers to and facilitators of treatment-seeking, especially in an emerging adult population are needed given the typical onset of disordered eating during this period. Moreover, exploring possible correlates of help-seeking (e.g., anxiety, depression, emotion regulation) could highlight contributions of psychological factors, beyond personal preferences and attitudes, and inform prevention efforts among young adults. Fifty-four undergraduate participants (data collection ongoing; 66.7% females; 59.3% White; 59.3% freshman) completed measures of attitudes toward psychological help-seeking (Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale-Short Form), willingness to seek help in the future (General Help-Seeking Questionnaire), perceived barriers to and facilitators of help-seeking specifically for eating disorder concerns (developed for this study by research team), disordered eating (Eating Disorders Examination-Questionnaire; EDE-Q), depression (PHQ-9), anxiety (GAD-7), and emotion regulation (Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale-18; DERS-18). Preliminary findings highlighted that the most commonly noted barriers were as follows: not wanting others to worry about their problems (84.9%), thinking they can handle their own problems (67.9%), turning to friends when in need of help (66%), belief that they don’t need help (66%), and belief that they should solve their own problems (62.3%). Conversely, the top five facilitators endorsed were desire to get better (86.6%), presence of other mental health issue or emotional distress (73.6%), encouragement from friends and family to seek psychological treatment (62.3%), access to treatment services (62.2%), and eating/shape/weight concerns interfering with life roles (56.6%). Bivariate correlations indicated that willingness to seek help in the future was significantly associated with attitudes toward help-seeking (r = .27, p = .048), depression (r = -.50, p < .001), anxiety (r = -.46, p < .001), and emotion regulation (r = -.43, p = .001). Common themes across the most frequently endorsed barriers to professional help-seeking included denial of disordered eating/seriousness of disordered eating, and greater reliance on non-professional sources of help (e.g., self and friends). Future research should explore how these commonly endorsed barriers may be related to limited awareness of prognosis and seriousness of disordered eating symptoms among college students. Common themes across the most frequently endorsed facilitators included motivators (e.g., desire to get better, encouragement), access to services, and observed impairment caused by disordered eating or comorbid psychological problems. This has implications for university programs that seek to build a preventative rather than restorative help-seeking approach for disordered eating.