Eating attitudes and weight concerns in female low birth weight adolescents

Studies of clinically referred patients have implicated low birth weight (LBW) as a possible risk factor for eating disorders. This study examines eating attitudes and weight concerns in nonreferred LBW female adolescents.

274 LBW girls (mean age 15.9) belonging to a prospective regional LBW birth cohort completed the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT-26) and items from the Eating Symptoms Inventory on weight perception and weight dissatisfaction.

Only 2.3% scored above threshold for eating disorder risk on the EAT-26. A total of 25% perceived themselves as overweight and 18.7% perceived themselves as underweight, while 63.4% desired to lose and 17.7% desired to gain weight. Girls who perceived themselves as overweight or desired to lose weight had higher mean EAT scores than those who did not.

Nonreferred adolescent girls born at LBW are not, as a whole, at risk for abnormal eating attitudes and negative perceptions of their weight.