How Common Are Eating Disorders? Incidence, Prevalence and Mortality Rates

Six month of blogging and I have yet to do a proper post on the prevalence of eating disorders. I think it is about time. I see all sorts of numbers thrown around, often depending on the purpose of the article and the author’s bias. Is it 1 in 1000, 1 in 100, 1 in 20 or maybe even 1 in 2? Who is right?

Well, it is a tricky question to answer.

The number depends on how the particular study was conducted. Here are some factors that may influence the final rates: the population being studied, the sample size, the definition of eating disorder, the methods used by researchers to identify and screen for individuals with eating disorders, the number of years over which data is collected, and so on. In other words, a lot! That’s why in order to get a better sense of the true numbers, I … Continue reading →

Eating Disorders: Do Men and Women Differ?

Given that eating disorders disproportionately affect women, it is not unreasonable to assume that men differ from women in clinical presentation, personality and psychological characteristics. My guess would be that they differ. My reasoning is this: males and females grow up facing different pressures and expectations. Given that, I’d think there would be (perhaps only slightly) different risk factors that predispose men and women to develop eating disorders. Thus, I’d think that different groups of men and women (i.e. with different personality characteristics, psychiatric comorbidities, and life experiences) would be susceptible to EDs. (Hopefully that makes sense.) To answer that question, Dr. D. Blake Woodside and colleagues compared men with eating disorders vs. women with eating disorders vs. men without eating disorders.

Why are females much more likely to suffer from eating disorders than males? It appears that (at least) two arguments have been put forth:

One argument has been

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