Cognitive bias in eating disorders: interpretation of ambiguous body-related information.
Three groups of women: eating disorder, body dysphoric controls, and nonsymptomatic controls, participated in an experiment testing hypotheses derived from cognitive-behavioral theories of eating disorders. In phase 1, participants encoded ambiguous information via instructions to imagine themselves in a variety of ambiguous situations that involved two types of information: body-related or health-related. On a subsequent memory task, participants in the eating disorder group and the body dysphoric control group recalled imagery of the body-related situations with a fatness interpretation and participants in the nonsymptomatic control group recalled imagery with a thinness interpretation. The three groups did not differ in their interpretation of the health-related situations. In phase 2, participants were instructed to imagine themselves in each body-related situation, but were explicitly instructed to imagine the scenes with either a positive or negative interpretation. Results indicated that the eating disorder and body dysphoric groups were able to change their interpretation of body-related information when instructed to do so.
Williamson
D A
DA
Louisiana State University, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, USA.
Perrin
L
L
Blouin
D C
DC
Barbin
J M
JM
D000328:Adult; D001828:Body Image; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D015928:Cognitive Behavioral Therapy; D001068:Feeding and Eating Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D019018:Imagery, Psychotherapy; D011939:Mental Recall; D013001:Somatoform Disorders / Q000523:psychology