A socio-sports model of disordered eating among Brazilian male athletes

Abstract

The objective of this study was to develop a socio-sports model of disordered eating (DE) in Brazilian male athletes. Three hundred and twenty one athletes over 12 years of age from 18 different sports modalities were investigated. The Eating Attitudes Test (EAT-26) was applied to evaluate DE. The Body Shape Questionnaire (BSQ) was used to evaluate athlete dissatisfaction with body fat levels. The Muscularity Concern subscale of the Drive for Muscularity Scale (DMS) was used to evaluate athlete dissatisfaction with muscularity levels. To investigate the influence of sociocultural factors on body image, the Sociocultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire-3 (SATAQ-3) was applied. Body fat was estimated by skinfold measurement. Demographic data were collected (competitive level and training regimen). Structural equation modelling was conducted to analyse the relationships between research variables and the factors that mediate them. The results indicated that the sociocultural factors and body fat dissatisfaction adhered to socio-sports model of DE (X2 = 18.50, p = .001, RMSEA = .069, GFI = .97, AGFI = .91, TLI = .93). The BSQ accurately predicted the relationship between SATAQ-3 and EAT-26 (R2 = .08, p = 0.001) scores. A direct relationship between the SATAQ-3 and EAT-26 (R2 = .07, p = 0.01) and BSQ (R2 = .10, p = 0.001) scores was identified. No relationship was found between structural equation model and Muscularity Concern (R2 = .02, p = 0.14), competitive level (R2 = .01, p = 0.19), training regimen (R2 = .03, p = 0.11) or body fat (R2 = .02, p = 0.14). The results suggest that sociocultural factors and body fat dissatisfaction follow the socio-sports model of DE in Brazilian male athletes.