Browsing by Subject "perhesysteemin toimivuus"

Objectives. Eating disorder symptoms are common among adolescents and have been found to impair the quality of life and to be risk factors for full-blown eating disorders. Family’s influence on adolescent well-being is notable, but among disordered eating studies results have been controversial. Most studies have examined clinically notable eating disorders and focused only on girls. The objective of this study is to investigate whether family functioning in childhood predicts problematic eating behavior in adolescent girls and boys in the normal population. Methods.The data in this study consisted of adolescents who participated in the 12- and 17-year follow-ups (N = 171, girls 60.2%) of the longitudinal study of GLAKU. Family functioning was assessed by mothers using a Family Assessment Device (FAD; 7 scales) when the participants were 12, and the adolescents’ problematic eating behavior was self-reported using an Eating Disorder Inventory-2 (EDI-2; drive for thinness, bulimia and body dissatisfaction) when they were 17. In addition, adolescents answered two more questions concerning their satisfaction with their height and muscularity. The associations between family functioning and problematic eating behavior were examined with ordinal, logistic, and linear regression models. Results and conclusions. Impaired problem solving skills in the family were associated with the adolescent’s stronger drive for thinness. In addition, dysfunctional roles in the family increased the adolescent’s probability to report drive for thinness that was above the clinical cut-off. A novel finding in the study was gender’s impact on the association between family functioning and problematic eating behavior. As communication in the family became weaker, risk of dissatisfaction with one’s height increased, but only among girls. Family functioning is one potential mechanism in the development of problematic eating behavior and it should be considered while developing measures of support.