Eating disorder symptomatology and body mass index are associated with readers' expectations about character behavior: Evidence from eye‐tracking during reading

Abstract

Many theories have been put forward suggesting key factors underlying the development and maintenance of eating disorders, such as: unhealthy food-related cognitive biases, negative body attitude, and perfectionism; however, underlying cognitive processes associated with eating disorder symptomatology remain unclear. We used eye-tracking during reading as a novel implicit measure of how these factors may relate to eating disorder symptomatology. In two experiments, we monitored women's eye movements while they read texts in which the characters' emotional responses to food-, body image-, and perfectionism-related scenarios were described. Participants' eating disorder symptomatology was then assessed. Both studies suggest that moment-to-moment processing of characters' emotional responses to perfectionism-, and to a lesser extent, body image-related information was associated with participants' eating disorder symptomatology, thus supporting theories in which these factors are key to developing and maintaining eating disorders. Interestingly, the moment-to-moment processing of characters' emotional responses to food-related scenarios was not related to eating disorder symptomatology. These findings provide novel insights into cognitive processes underlying eating disorder symptomatology, as well as demonstrating the utility of more natural implicit measures.