Abstract
The relationship between the tendency for developing eating disorders and self-evaluation of everyday life and body shape by non-clinical adolescent girls was investigated. High school girls (n = 336) completed the Eating Disorder Inventory (EDI; Garner, Olmstead, & Polivy, 1983), and a questionnaire inquiring about their current weight, ideal weight, everyday life, sleep, eating, fatigue, and overall life satisfaction. The participants were classified according to the scores of the EDI into four groups; Anorexic-Bulimic (AN-BN) tendency, Anorexic (AN) tendency, Bulimic (BN) tendency, and Healthy. The results suggested a high prevalence of eating disorder tendencies in non-clinical schoolgirls. The groups AN-BN, AN and BN differed in the overall life satisfaction, in self-evaluation of the body shape, and in the ideal body shape. The AN-BN and AN groups scored significantly higher on the “ Ineffectiveness” subscale of the EDI, in comparison to the Healthy group. They also differed in sleep time, and self-evaluations about sleep and fatigue. Behavioral characteristics of their everyday life schedules indicated more extroverted activities such as talking with friends in the eating disorder tendency groups in comparison to the healthy group.
