1. Objectifs

Intentions :
«The first objective of this paper was to evaluate the prevalence of subclinical forms of ED [eating disorder] (sED) among adolescent girls.» (p. 185)

Questions/Hypothèses :
«We expected a relatively high prevalence of sED in adolescent girls because more than 50% of adult outpatients with an eating disorder do not meet DSM [Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders] criteria for either AN [anorexia nervosa] or BN [bulimia nervosa] and are given the eating disorder not otherwise specified diagnosis (EDNOS) (Button et al., 2005; Fairburn et al., 2007; Mitchell et al., 2007; Ricca et al., 2001; Turner and Bryant-Waugh, 2004).» (p. 185)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
«All participants were part of a prospective and longitudinal study entitled ’The Longitudinal Study of Kindergarten Children in Quebec’. […] The longitudinal study focuses on the 798 girls assessed at 16 years (15.7±0.5) in 1996–1997, for whom complete data regarding eating disorders was available.» (p. 186)

Instruments :
«A French version (Breton et al., 1998) of the “Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children-version 2” (DISC-2) was administered to 833 girls by trained interviewers (Shaffer et al., 1996).» (p. 186)

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

One of the key findings of the study is that «[…] suffering from separation anxiety [SA] disorder (onset usually in childhood) may represent a risk factor for the development of sAN-R [subclinical anorexia nervosa — restricting subtype] during adolescence. Strober and his team (2007) found that relatives of probands with AN had a 1.5 times greater risk of separation anxiety disorder compared with relatives without any lifetime psychiatric illness. Our results are in accordance with previous studies that found an association between a clinical AN diagnosis and lifetime SA (Godart et al., 2000). Anxiety symptoms of GA [generalized anxiety] occurred significantly more among girls suffering from sBN than the comparison group. This is in accordance with the fact that first-degree relatives of bulimia sufferers were noted to be prone to GA, suggesting that such tendencies have familial origins (Lilenfeld et al., 1998).» (p. 189 and 191)