Psychological characteristics of eating disorders as evidenced by the combined administration of questionnaires and two projective methods: the Tree Drawing Test (Baum Test) and the Sentence Completion Test.
The objective of this study is to examine psychological/psychopathological characteristics of eating disorders and their subtypes through a combined administration of questionnaires and projective tests. Three questionnaires (Eating Disorder Inventory - 2, Social Adaptation Scale, Southern California University Eating Disorder Inventory - Revised) and two projective tests (the Tree Drawing Test [TDT, Baum Test], and the Sentence Completion Test [SCT]) were administered to 126 female patients between the ages of 15 and 30 years, with eating disorders according to DSM-IV criteria at our outpatient clinic, and to 54 sex- and age-matched control subjects. The purging subtypes of eating disorders (anorexia nervosa - binge-eating/purging type [ANBP] and bulimia nervosa - purging type [BNP]) were clearly differentiated from the controls, both by the questionnaires and the projective tests. Compared with the controls, ANBP/BNP showed more problematic profiles across the three questionnaires, drew smaller and poorer trees in TDT to a more left location on the drawing paper, and gave fewer positive, and more negative responses in SCT. In contrast, few significant differences were found between anorexia nervosa- restricting type (ANR) and the controls, and between ANBP and BNP. As a trend, however, ANR was consistently located between the controls and ANBP/BNP across the whole questionnaires and projective tests.
Mizuta
Ichiro
I
Psychiatry, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka Japan. mizuta@psy.med.osaka-u.ac.jp
Inoue
Yoichi
Y
Fukunaga
Tomoko
T
Ishi
Ryohei
R
Ogawa
Asao
A
Takeda
Masatoshi
M
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001068:Feeding and Eating Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires