Eating disorder symptoms and online searching behavior

Prnjak, Katarina. (2018). Eating disorder symptoms and online searching behavior. Diploma Thesis. Filozofski fakultet u Zagrebu, Department of Psychology. [mentor Lauri Korajlija, Anita].

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Abstract

The objective of this study was to determine what topics searched on the Internet can successfully distinguish women who are at risk from those non-risk for an eating disorder development. The connection between three subscales of perfectionism and frequency of online searching for eating disorders related topics has also been examined. Research was conducted online with convenience sample consisting of 228 women. After completing sociodemographic data, participants fulfilled CSS questionnaire for cyberchondria, SCOFF questionnaire for eating disorders, APS-R for perfectionism and short check-list measuring the frequency of certain topic searched on the Internet. Results indicate that risk and non-risk women, according to SCOFF, can be differentiated by searching terms related to food, diets, exercising, body appearance and eating disorders. Discriminant analysis showed that area most successful in a classification of participants into two groups is food. Subscales of APS-R (the Standards, Discrepancy, and Order) were used in the hierarchical regression analysis for prediction of online searched topics frequency. Only Discrepancy subscale, measure of maladaptive perfectionism, appeared as a significant predictor. This relationship is mediated by eating disorder symptoms on SCOFF screener. These findings suggest that women with higher risk of eating disorder development more frequently use the Internet for searching weight-loss methods, especially those related to dieting and food in general.

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