Koski
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Approximately 10 percent of late adolescent and adult women currently report symptoms
of eating disorders. Although eating disorders do not solely strike women, they do display a
gender bias, with women comprising 90 to 95 percent of sufferers. While the physical side
effects of self-starvation, binge eating, and self-induced vomiting are obvious, eating disorders
also profoundly negatively affect sufferers’ self-image, job performance, interpersonal
relationships, and financial status. For many with an eating disorder, the future offers little
promise. One in five remain chronically ill (Academy for Eating Disorders n.d.). Anorexia
boasts the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric illness: approximately 10 percent (Gremillion
2003). Any disease so prevalent and pervasive is troubling. In the case of eating disorders, the
disproportionate number of women sufferers, coupled with an extremely poor prognosis, further
signals cause for alarm.
Bringing sociological analysis to bear on a realm largely dominated by clinicians, this
study uses participant observation to better understand eating disorder treatment. This study
focuses on one particularly accessible form of treatment: support groups. Psychologists
recognize that eating disorder sufferers are particularly well suited for group treatment. As
Polivy and Federoff express in the most recent edition of the Handbook of Treatment for Eating
Disorders
, "Their feelings of uniqueness, interpersonal distrust, low self-esteem, and
ineffectiveness, as well as their distorted views of nutrition and their bodies, are the sorts of
problems likely to be amenable to group treatments (1997, 462).” Research suggests that group
treatments are equally successful as individual therapy. Each yields 40 percent effectiveness.
However, psychologists have yet to identify the processes by which support groups yield positive
results (Polivy and Federoff 1997). Sociological research has proved fruitful in understanding
the processes by which support groups deliver benefits (Karp 1992; Katz 1993; Wolkomir 2001).
Considered in conjunction with psychological research highlighting the contribution of gender
roles in the etiology of eating disorders, recent sociological findings pointing to the mobilization
potential of self-help suggest that eating disorder support groups may be effective because they
encourage feminist identity development.
Literature Review
Self-help has prompted a flurry of sociological investigation. Much of this research is
rooted in the traditions of symbolic interaction (Karp 1992) and social learning theory (Cain
Convention