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Schema and parental bonding in overweight and nonoverweight female adolescents

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: 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.

DESIGN: Cross-sectional study.

SUBJECTS: 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).

MEASUREMENTS: The following self-report measures were completed: the Parental Bonding Inventory,1 the Young Schema Questionnaire-short version,2 the Eating Attitudes Test,3 the Beck Depression Inventory4 and the Eating Disorder Belief Questionnaire.5

RESULTS: 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.

CONCLUSIONS: 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.

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Correspondence to H M Turner.

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Turner, H., Rose, K. & Cooper, M. Schema and parental bonding in overweight and nonoverweight female adolescents. Int J Obes 29, 381–387 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0802915

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