Links Between Maternal and Adolescent Attachment Style and Disordered Eating.

• In Event: Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Topic - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Research in both clinical and non-clinical samples shows that insecure attachment (measured via Adult Attachment Interview or parent-report) is associated with eating disorders (e.g., Ringer & Crittenden, 2007; Ward et al., 2000). These works suggest that disturbances in parent-child relationships and parents’ own insecure attachment may relate to adolescents’ social and behavioral anxiety, reflected in anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and non-diagnosed disordered eating habits (i.e., high caloric food consumption and overall food anxiety) (Faber & Dube, 2015; Ward et al., 2000; Zachrisson et al., 2010). However, a gap in this literature exists such that adolescent attachment style (i.e., self-reported anxiety and avoidance) has yet to be empirically associated with adolescent eating disorders (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2009). The purpose of this study is to investigate the relation between attachment insecurity (attachment avoidance and anxiety in both adolescents and their mothers) and adolescents’ disordered eating. Given previous work on gender differences in eating disorders, the current study will also investigate gender as a moderator of attachment insecurity and disordered eating.
METHOD: Participants were 153 adolescents and their mothers in the fifth and seventh waves of a larger non-clinical study about development of psychopathology (Masked for review, 2017) (W5 Mage = 14.83, W7 Mage = 16.84). At wave 5, both mothers and adolescents reported attachment style in the Experiences in Close Relationships Scale (ECR; Brennan et al., 1998), a 36-item self-report questionnaire that assesses attachment anxiety (fear of interpersonal rejection and abandonment) and avoidance (feelings of discomfort with intimacy or reliance on others). Two years later, adolescents completed the College Oriented Eating Disorders Screen (COEDS; Bucceri et al., 2005), a 7-item questionnaire assessing attitudes about eating and body comparisons, but not diagnostic symptoms (example: “I feel guilty or sad after I eat something fatty.”).
RESULTS: In the adolescent model, multiple regression analyses conducted in R v 3.6.0 revealed a significant association between adolescent attachment anxiety and adolescent disordered eating (b = 0.27, p < 0.001; see Figure 1). There were marginally significant relations between adolescent attachment avoidance and adolescent disordered eating (b = 0.16, p = 0.06). Maternal attachment anxiety (but not maternal avoidance) also had a marginally significant relation with adolescent disordered eating (b = 0.16, p = 0.08). Additionally, there was a marginally significant interaction (b = -0.15, p = 0.08) between adolescent attachment avoidance and gender predicting disordered eating. Simple slopes analyses demonstrated that there is a significant, positive association for girls (b = 0.14, p < 0.01) but not for boys (b = -0.01, p = 0.86; see Figure 2).
DISCUSSION: The current study suggests that adolescents’ attachment anxiety (and attachment avoidance and maternal attachment anxiety marginally) is associated with disordered eating patterns. Further, avoidance is related to disordered eating for girls only (although this interaction was only marginally significant). Discussion will focus on how the present study contributes to the growing literature on attachment and psychopathology.

Authors

• Martha Davis Straske, University of Maryland - College Park
  Presenting Author

• Megan Haley Fitter, University of Maryland - College Park
  Non-Presenting Author

• Gunleen Deol, University of Maryland, College Park
  Non-Presenting Author

• Amanda Trujilo, University of Maryland, College Park
  Non-Presenting Author

• Carl Lejuez, University of Connecticut
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jude A. Cassidy, University of Maryland - College Park
  Non-Presenting Author