Sway of Parental Annulment on Food Frustration - Research Paper Example

Research Report Impact of Parental Invalidation on Eating Disorder Name University/Affiliation/Institution Abstract The etymology of eating disorder (ED) has been attributed to several factors and complex interaction of biological, genetic, behavioural, social and psychological factors. One of the most compelling ones includes parental control and behaviour, often encompassing the parental invalidation (Soenens et al., 2008). The way in which an individual is treated by their parents often becomes a contributing factor that influences self-worth and perception of self-confidence. This research work is an attempt to find the correlation between the parental invalidation and eating disorder. The parental invalidation is known to be a strong influence that directs toward low self-worth and negative attitude towards life and career, which in turn is closely related to the inception of eating disorders. The correlation between these two variables has been found by using primary data gathered from 190 respondents. Introduction Parental invalidation often includes rejection of emotion, mockery, minimization of feelings, punishment and distress. All of these actions act as strong stimuli that are responsible for lowering self-confidence and self-worth. It has been empirically proven that the individuals with low self esteem are victim of eating disorders (Buckholdt, Parra, & Jobe-Shields, 2014). The term self-esteem has often been defined as a trait associated with the individuals’ overall self image, concern about body weight and shape, attitude towards life and peers, self control and discipline (Soenens et al., 2008). Eating disorder as defined by NIH (2015) is a mental disorder caused by disturbances in daily life, which leads to either under-consumption or over-consumption of food, which eventually leads to physiological disorders like anorexia nervosa or binge eating disorder. Researchers mention that, Anorexia Nervosa (AN) is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes an eating disorder, characterized by a refusal to eat food, in order to maintain an adequate and desired healthy body weight. Anorexia nervosa involves neurobiological, psychological, and social components which all contribute to the complexity of the disorder. Although this condition mainly affects women, it sometimes also affects the males. Background As per one of the statistical records obtained from one of the researches, it has been found that, in 10% of the cases it can also affect males. Diagnostic criteria for anorexia nervosa includes the patient are refusing to increase their body weight above certain level. They do not want to increase their weight further, just because of the fact that they will turn fat. Some of the women also have an intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat. It has been noticed that in this disorder, women have absence of at least three consecutive menstrual cycles. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM IV) has two specific diagnoses of eating disorders mentioned, which are anorexia nervosa (AN) and bulimia nervosa (BN). The criteria of anorexia nervosa include individuals who are dedicated to achieving thinness through extreme dietary restrain and criteria for weigh loss results in body weight of less than 85% of what is expected for weight and height or a Body Mass Index of less than 17.5. There are significant changes in an individual’s mood, psychical health, and social health in patients with AN (Bamford & Mountford, 2012). Bulimia Nervosa includes the same features as anorexia however the distinguishing feature of BN is the recurrent episodes of binge eating where an individual consumes large amounts of food and experiences a lack of control of over-eating. However, he does compensate for the binge eating, but by self-induced vomiting, laxative abuse, through fasting, and through performing excessive exercise. Patients with eating disorders not otherwise specified either do not quite meet the criteria for either bulimia or anorexia or they present a combination of the two. Findings and Analysis The responses gathered from the participants have been analyzed using Pearson correlation. The variables are as follows: Invalidation by Father & Invalidation by Mother Global Self worth Career or Job Competence Academic Ability Friendship Intimacy The correlations between the invalidation by parents and global self worth, career or job competence, academic ability, friendship and intimacy have been measured. Pearson correlation has been used to find the relation between the variables which have been depicted in the table below. Table 1: Pearson Correlation Source: Created by Author The table shown above describes the correlation analysis between the variables. The invalidation by mother and father are the contributing factors that impact the variables self worth, career or job competency, academic ability, friendship and intimacy. The relation with the invalidation by mother has been tested below. The correlation value between the invalidation by mother and the global self worth is negative in nature as the correlation value is negative (-.180). The significance level has been measured to be .013, which is less than .05. This indicates that the correlation is statistically significant. At the same time, the correlation value between the invalidation by father and global self worth is also negative (-.151), which indicates that they are also negatively correlated. The significance value 0.38 is also less that .05 which makes the correlation statistically significant. However, the correlation with the invalidation by mother is stronger owing to a smaller significance value 0.13. Secondly, the correlation between the invalidation by mother and career/job competence is negatively correlated with a correlation value of -0.91. However, the level of significance measured is 0.21 which is more than 0.05, so this correlation is statistically insignificant. On the other hand, the invalidation by father is also negatively correlated with a correlation value of -.193, but is highly significant. This is because, the level of significance measured is 0.008, which is much less than 0.05. Thus, invalidation by father has a significant negative influence on the career/job competence as compared to invalidation by mother. Thirdly, the relationship between the invalidation by mother and academic ability is negative in nature, as the correlation value is measured to be -.088. However, the significance value 0.229 is much more than 0.05, so this correlation is statistically insignificant. At the same time, the correlation between the invalidation by father and academic ability has yielded a negative value but is statistically insignificant as the significance value .170 is much more than 0.05. Thus, both the variables are insignificantly correlated to the academic ability. Fourthly, the correlation value between the invalidation by mother and friendship is negative, with a correlation value of 0.-158. The correlation is also statistically significant as the significance value .030 is smaller than 0.05. At the same time, the invalidation by father is also negatively correlated with friendship, as the correlation value is -.214 and the significance value is 0.003, which indicates that these two variables are closely related as it is much less than 0.5. Finally, the analysis has showed that the correlation between intimacy and invalidation by mother is negative with a correlation value of -.114. However, it is statistically insignificant as the value of significance 0.117 is more than 0.05. At the same time, the intimacy is also negatively correlated with invalidation by father with a value of -.118, but is insignificant as the significance value 0.104 is more than 0.05. The correlation between the variables indicates that not all the proposed factors are trigged by the invalidation by parents. Moreover, the father and mother have different impact on the individual which can be attributed to the relationship between them. It has been revealed that the perception of self worth or self esteem of an individual is more influenced by the mother than the father. Thus, the invalidation by a mother puts more negative impact on the self worth. However, it has been found that when it comes to career and job competency, the influence of invalidation by father is more than that of the mother. This indicates that fathers are responsible for shaping the career of their ward. On the other hand, the influence of mother’s invalidation does not have any significant impact on the career of an individual. The ability to perform in the academic field is however not significantly correlated to any of the parent’s invalidation. As explained by Bean et al. (2003), this can be attributed to the fact that the academic ability is not related to the relationship between the individual and the parents. It has been mentioned that although the self esteem is affected by the parenting style but their studies remain unaffected. Thus, it can be stated that the academic is solely dependent on the individual only. On the other hand, the friendship and intimacy building ability is dependent on the parental behavior. It has been revealed from the study that an individual is unable to create a good relationship with their respective friend circle if they are exposed to invalidation by father. In this case, the invalidation by mother, although significant, is not as influential as the father’s invalidation. However, when it comes to the attitude of the individual, to develop intimacy with their romantic partners, both the parent’s behavior is influential. The invalidation of the parents reduces their ability to create intimate bond with their romantic partners, which in turn negatively impacts their family building attitude. Discussion The data analyzed above clearly indicates that the invalidating behavior of the parents is largely responsible in influencing several psychological attributes of an individual. These attributes include perception of self worth, job competency, and the ability to develop friendship and intimacy. An individual whose emotions are often rejected and subjected to physical or mental punishment tend to exhibit negative manifestation in those attributes (Brockmeyer et al., 2013). A prolonged exposure to parental invalidation can eventually push an individual to borderline personality disorder. It is characterized by negative or pessimistic emotional characters and can led to other psychiatric disorders like eating disorder, insomnia, indigestion, fluctuation in body weight, etc (Haslam et al., 2008). These symptoms are often associated with the stress occurred from being exposed to invalidating parental behavior. The eating disorder can be triggered by lack of self worth and pessimistic attitude towards life. An individual diagnosed with eating disorder can be segregated into two categories, one leads to excess consumption of food or calories and the other leads to lack of proper diet or food consumption. Over-eating or the Binge Eating Disorder is often triggered by stress, where the individual feels the urge to eat uncontrollably. The activity of over-eating acts as an effort to reduce the stress, foster mental relief and offer self-reward (Goodheart, Clopton, & Robert-McComb, 2011). As the stress level increases, the consumption of food also increases and it is usually characterized by high calorie intake. It leads to obesity, high blood pressure and cholesterol. On the contrary, lack of self worth or self esteem can lead to anorexia nervosa. It is characterized by excessive low consumption of food (Krause, Mendelson & Lynch, 2003). An individual with low self esteem often attempts to fill the mental void by trying to ensure that their body is in attractive shape (Kelly, Vimalakanthan & Carter, 2014). The lack of acceptance among parents eventually makes an individual feel unwanted in the society. This as a result triggers a tendency to improve their appearance to gain acceptance. Eating less food is therefore adopted as an attempt to stay in shape. This usually leads to poor health, lack of stamina, malnutrition and low blood pressure (Obeid et al., 2013). It can be stated that the parental behavior associated with invalidation causes lack of self-worth or self-esteem and often leads to stress causing from lack of acceptance in the society owing to their inability to form social interaction like friendship and romantic intimacy. Moreover, the inability to gain career competence is also a major reason for stress. Thus, the parental invalidation triggers negative emotions which in turn lead to eating disorders and other associated physiological disorders. Treatments and Recommendations The Cognitive Base Therapy approach is often the most common preferred therapy for treating eating disorders. It has been found to be effective in helping college women to reduce chaotic binge eating. It also helps them in controlling their weight and shape. It also includes counseling sessions, wherein the patients are encouraged to gradually become their own therapist by setting homework and coming up with behavioral experiments together and encouraging them to identify challenges and modify unrealistic cognitive behaviors related to eating, shape, and weight (Bamford & Mountford, 2012). There is another therapy named, Cognitive Emotional Behavior Therapy (CEBT), which is a subdivision of CBT. This therapy has been gaining increasing interest among clinicians treating patients with anorexia. The aim of CEBT is to enable patients with anorexia to understand the experience and expression of emotions, so that they can identify and challenge their beliefs and attend to the response to their emotions in a more flexible manner (Corstorphine, 2006). DBT is an intervention approach that integrates mindfulness and acceptance strategies associated with Zen traditions and traditional cognitive behavior therapy. The model of DBT views emotional deregulation as emerging from a combination of genetic vulnerability to intense emotional experiences. Counselors regard these as the core characteristic deficits in an individual’s mental health. Narrative therapy focuses on the development of an anti-eating disorder lifestyle and values. This therapy helps the patients to develop those characteristics that will help them overcome the issues of eating disorders. There are certain underlying values that will make people fearless of becoming fat. However, at the same time will also make them realize the importance of a healthy diet, which they need to take in order stay healthy for the life time (Lock et al., 2005). This approach is not based on an essentialist view or that of human “nature” or its possible defects that can be diagnosed and then “treated.” Instead, narrative therapy views problems that clients present as stories that they have about themselves and their situations that are drawn from mainstream culture and available resources. Narrative therapists work in detangling the person from the problem, despite the uphill battle constructed by cultures that were to identify the person as the problem. If we compare all the three therapies, more or less all three are same. They differ actually in the approach or in the methodology, and hence, we need to distinguish them all. But, conceptually, all of them are working on the fundamentals of removing fear of eating disorders, and making people think positive. People rather than getting frightened from food, are actually confused on how to overcome this disorder. Conclusion The behavior of the parents towards their children acts as a major influencing factor in shaping their mental health. The individuals who are constantly exposed to invalidation from their parents can lead to lack of self worth, stress and even manifestation of strong pessimistic behavior. It has been revealed from the study that the attributes like self worth, job competency, ability to form friendship and romantic intimacy is negatively impacted by the invalidation of the parents. This as a result eventually triggers several interrelated mental disorders, one of which is eating disorder. The individual exhibits characteristics like excessive eating causing obesity, high cholesterol and blood pressure or extremely low consumption of food causing malnutrition, low blood pressure, etc. Thus, it can be stated that the parental behavior involving invalidation causes eating disorders which are physiologically harmful for the individual. References Bean, R. A., Bush, K. 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