Schema and parental bonding in overweight and nonoverweight female adolescents

Abstract

To investigate whether family functioning and cognitions in a group of overweight female adolescents differ significantly from those in a group of normal weight female adolescents. Cross-sectional study. In all, 23 overweight female adolescents (mean age: 17.6 y, mean body mass index (BMI: 27.8 kg/m2), and 23 normal weight female adolescents (mean age: 17.7 y, mean BMI: 20.2 kg/m2). The following self-report measures were completed: the Parental Bonding Inventory, the Young Schema Questionnaire-short version, the Eating Attitudes Test, the Beck Depression Inventory and the Eating Disorder Belief Questionnaire. Overweight female adolescents reported more negative self-beliefs and greater belief in schema relating to emotional deprivation, fears of abandonment, subjugation and insufficient self-control. They also perceived their fathers as being significantly more overprotective and significantly less caring. Within this group perceived level of maternal care correlated negatively with negative self-beliefs and schema. Overweight female adolescents show some of the cognitive features associated with the development of an eating disorder. However, positive parent-child relationships may serve to protect overweight adolescents from developing clinical eating disorders and from psychological distress later in life.