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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychol.
Sec. Eating Behavior
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1464651
This article is part of the Research Topic Eating Disorders and Eating Disorder Awareness View all 4 articles

Eating disorders and health literacy in Germany: Results from two representative samples of adolescents and adults

Provisionally accepted
Lars König Lars König 1,2*Rebekka Schröder Rebekka Schröder 1Tim Hamer Tim Hamer 1Ralf Suhr Ralf Suhr 1,2
  • 1 Stiftung Gesundheitswissen, Berlin, Germany
  • 2 Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Institut für Medizinische Soziologie und Rehabilitationswissenschaft, Berlin, Germany

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Eating disorders are associated with substantial burden for the affected individuals including negative health outcomes and increased mortality. So far, prevention programs for eating disorders have yielded mixed results concerning their efficacy. Therefore, more targeted prevention programs need to be developed. Health literacy has been identified as a potential influencing factor of eating disorders. This study aimed at exploring the relationship between likely cases of eating disorders and health literacy, alongside additional sociodemographic factors. Two large samples of adults (N=3011) and adolescents (N=1021) representative of the German-speaking population in Germany were recruited. Likely cases of eating disorders were identified using the SCOFF questionnaire. Health literacy was assessed with the HLS-EU-Q16 questionnaire. Sociodemographic information, including age, gender, social status and level of education, and subjective body image were obtained. χ 2 -tests of independence were calculated to determine the association between the investigated constructs.Results. Suspected eating disorders were more likely in female than male adolescents but were not related to gender in adults. Rates of suspected eating disorders increased with increasing age in adolescents and decreased with increasing age in adults. While levels of education were unrelated to suspected eating disorders, low social status was associated with higher rates of suspected eating disorders in adults but not adolescents. Inadequate or problematic health literacy and negative body image were associated with higher rates of suspected eating disorders compared to adequate health literacy and more positive body image.Discussion. Likely cases of eating disorders are related to health literacy and body image as well as sociodemographic factors. These constructs should therefore be addressed in future research to improve prevention programs.

    Keywords: Eating Disorder, Health Literacy, body image, Health, Representative, Germany, adolescents, adults

    Received: 14 Jul 2024; Accepted: 26 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 König, Schröder, Hamer and Suhr. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Lars König, Stiftung Gesundheitswissen, Berlin, Germany

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