An Explanation of Anorexia Nervosa
D/E explanations of Anorexia Nervosa (24 marks)
Anorexia Nervosa (AN) is a type of eating disorder characterised by extreme loss of weight and anxiety associated with food and weight gain. The 4 major symptoms of AN are body weight 85% or less of normal weight for age and height, distorted perception of body image (thinness is vital to self-esteem), intense fear of being overweight or putting on weight and amenorrhoea (the loss of 3 consecutive periods).
There is the biological and psychological explanation to AN. The psychological explanation consists of the cognitive and psychodynamic approach. The cognitive explanation suggest AN is the result of faulty or maladaptive thought processes about self, the body and food. For example, there’s irrational obsession about how thin they look and their sense of self is based on how they control their eating. According to the cognitive approach, sufferers of AN display a number of cognitive errors/distortions associated with food. These cognitive errors are faulty assumptions and misconceptions about the self, the environment and the situation. Cognitive errors involve polarised thinking which is very black and white, someone with AN will either see themselves as a fat failure or a skinny success. Overgeneralization – coming to a generalised conclusion over one specific event or incident, someone with AN would think ‘I want to look good like I did when I was thin. Everything was ok then.’
Brush’s psychodynamic theory claims that AN originates in early childhood. An individual may become anorexic due to inadequate parenting by ineffective parents that do not respond appropriately to the child’s needs e.g. failing to feed the child when they are hungry. Brush argues that children of ineffective parents will grow up confused about their internal needs and to overcome this sense of helplessness, they take excessive control over their diet leading to AN.
The biological explanations to AN includes genetic, neural
Anorexia Nervosa (AN) is a type of eating disorder characterised by extreme loss of weight and anxiety associated with food and weight gain. The 4 major symptoms of AN are body weight 85% or less of normal weight for age and height, distorted perception of body image (thinness is vital to self-esteem), intense fear of being overweight or putting on weight and amenorrhoea (the loss of 3 consecutive periods).
There is the biological and psychological explanation to AN. The psychological explanation consists of the cognitive and psychodynamic approach. The cognitive explanation suggest AN is the result of faulty or maladaptive thought processes about self, the body and food. For example, there’s irrational obsession about how thin they look and their sense of self is based on how they control their eating. According to the cognitive approach, sufferers of AN display a number of cognitive errors/distortions associated with food. These cognitive errors are faulty assumptions and misconceptions about the self, the environment and the situation. Cognitive errors involve polarised thinking which is very black and white, someone with AN will either see themselves as a fat failure or a skinny success. Overgeneralization – coming to a generalised conclusion over one specific event or incident, someone with AN would think ‘I want to look good like I did when I was thin. Everything was ok then.’
Brush’s psychodynamic theory claims that AN originates in early childhood. An individual may become anorexic due to inadequate parenting by ineffective parents that do not respond appropriately to the child’s needs e.g. failing to feed the child when they are hungry. Brush argues that children of ineffective parents will grow up confused about their internal needs and to overcome this sense of helplessness, they take excessive control over their diet leading to AN.
The biological explanations to AN includes genetic, neural