Eating disorders are widely recognising as being complex and often difficult to treat types of mental health conditions. There are also many different risk factors associated with developing eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa including:
- occupation
- athletic pursuit
- personality traits
- childhood experiences
Occupation and Male Anorexia Sufferers
Recent research studies have indicated that a large proportion of male anorexia sufferers are those working in areas where there is much emphasis or focus on appearance, food/catering sector or jobs traditionally identified as predominately occupied by females. Examples of such forms of employment include the following: modeling, fashion design, media work and particularly acting.
As a result male patients receiving treatment for anorexia have stated that the type of employment has been a significant factor in both triggering and maintaining the destructive eating disorder cycle.
Athletic Pursuit and Male Anorexics
As with female sufferers of eating disorders there are key forms of sport which have been recognised to greatly increase the likelihood of males developing serious eating disorders. Key sports where this is frequently seen to be the case include the following: gymnasts, marathon runners, ballet dancers, jockeys, rowers and wrestlers fighting in the feather-weight category.
Jockeys are certainly widely identified to be at a high risk of developing anorexia due to the intense pressure from hose-owners to win and the need to be a very low weight is a core part of competing in the sport.
Personality Traits and Men with Anorexia
Research studies undertaken in the 1990s have shown that male sufferers of eating disorder will often have extreme forms of personality traits, including antisocial and obsessive-compulsive traits. As a comprehensive support system is a crucial part of achieving and maintaining recovery from anorexia antisocial traits are likely to severely impact upon the individual's recovery.
Obsessive-compulsive traits may often involve the individual requiring perfect order in terms of arranging objects or furniture in their room just so or having everything looking immaculate and organised to exact specifications.
Childhood Experiences and Male Anorexia Sufferers
An individual's upbringing may have many different implications in terms of developing mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety disorders and eating disorders. Sufferers of anorexia often report feeling as if they were overly criticised or desperately needed to do everything perfectly or else risk being rejected. Painful childhood experiences such as bullying, abuse or bereavement may also increase the risk of developing anorexia.
Factors relating to education such as having to frequently change schools or attending a boarding school from a very young age are also believed to play a part.
Source:
Treasure et al. (2003) Handbook of Eating Disorders Chichester: John Wiley & Sons
Kate Le Page - Kate Henning-Le Page writes about eating disorders, body image and recovery issues. She specializes in anorexia recovery.
