AN EXPLANATION OF ANOREXIA NERVOSA

ABSTRACT

Anorexia Nervosa (AN) is a type of eating disorder characterised by extreme loss of weight and anxiety associated with food and weight gain. The 4 major symptoms of AN are body weight 85% or less of normal weight for age and height, distorted perception of body image (thinness is vital to self-esteem), intense fear of being overweight or putting on weight and amenorrhoea (the loss of 3 consecutive periods).

There is the biological and psychological explanation to AN. The psychological explanation consists of the cognitive and psychodynamic approach. The cognitive explanation suggest AN is the result of faulty or maladaptive thought processes about self, the body and food. For example, there’s irrational obsession about how thin they look and their sense of self is based on how they control their eating. According to the cognitive approach, sufferers of AN display a number of cognitive errors/distortions associated with food. These cognitive errors are faulty assumptions and misconceptions about the self,