Abstract
We hypothesized that women who are overweight, experiencing COVID-19-related stress, and with high body dissatisfaction would have significantly greater disordered eating than those of healthy weight, without stress, and with low body dissatisfaction. Participants (N = 1354 women; Mage= 31.89 years, SD = 11.14) filled in the Contour Drawing Rating Scale, the Emotional Overeating Questionnaire, the Eating Motivation Survey, the Mindful Eating Questionnaire, and a COVID-19-related stress measure and sociodemographic survey. The cluster analysis technique revealed four distinct clusters: (a) Cluster 1 (N = 314): healthy body weight, no COVID-related stress, and low body dissatisfaction (M = 1.19); (b) Cluster 2 (N = 131): overweight, no COVID-related stress, and high body dissatisfaction (M = 2.41); (c) Cluster 3 (N = 597): healthy body weight, COVID-related stress, and low body dissatisfaction (M = 1.27); (d) Cluster 4 (N = 312): overweight, COVID-related stress, and high body dissatisfaction (M = 2.84). Generally, our outcomes partially support our hypothesis, as higher levels of some types of disordered eating were observed in women who were overweight with COVID-related stress and high body dissatisfaction (Cluster 4) as compared with women with healthy body weight, no COVID-related stress, and with low levels of body dissatisfaction (Cluster 1). Our results indicate that both body weight status, as well as COVID-19-related stress and body dissatisfaction, may contribute to the intensity of disordered eating. During future epidemic-related quarantines, this may be an argument in favor of organizing support regarding emotional functioning, body image, and eating behaviors, particularly for the most vulnerable groups—including overweight and obese women.
Highlights
Introduction iationsThere have been a lot of data published recently on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on health [1,2,3]
We hypothesized that women who were overweight, experiencing COVID-19-related stress, and with high body dissatisfaction, would have significantly greater disordered eating than those of healthy weight, without stress, and with low body dissatisfaction
Referring to the most important findings, our results indicated that Cluster 4 had significantly greater disordered eating than Clusters 1 and 3 and these significant differences were found with regard to emotional overeating, health motive, and affecting regulation motive of eating, and to one aspect of mindful eating—recognition
Summary
Introduction iationsThere have been a lot of data published recently on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on health [1,2,3]. The situation has given rise to concerns for one’s own health [4,5], and many reports show how COVID-19 and restrictions related to it can affect both psyche and soma [2,6,7,8,9,10,11] Within this context, research findings have been published on, inter alia: (a) changes in eating behavior [12,13,14]; (b) the relationships between COVID-19-related stress, disordered eating (e.g., emotional overeating) [15,16,17], symptoms of eating disorders, and negative body image [18,19,20,21,22]; (c) the functioning of people who are overweight and have possible changes in body weight [13,23].
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