Health Belief Model deterrents of social support seeking among people coping with eating disorders

Eating disorders have the highest mortality rates of any psychiatric diagnosis (Sullivan, 1995). Understanding what prevents people from seeking or accessing that which can help them manage these disorders is critical to improving eating disorder outcomes. This study identifies specific barriers and deterrents individuals living with eating disorders perceive when deciding if and when they will seek eating disorder-specific social support.

34 men and women living with eating disorders were recruited and interviewed regarding their experiences with managing their disorders, including reasons why they may forego seeking social support to help cope with these conditions.

Participant-reported reasons as to why they would forego seeking social support for the management of their eating disorders were framed against the five main constructs of the Health Belief Model. These include (a) perceived susceptibility to a health threat, (b) perceived severity of the health threat, (c) perceived benefit of protective health behaviors, (d) perceived self-efficacy with these protective behaviors, and (e) perceived barriers to performing these behaviors.

It could be argued that since this study does not focus solely on one type of eating disorder, such as anorexia or bulimia, the barriers to social support may differ depending upon the characteristics inherent to the specific disorders.

Findings can be used to inform and improve therapeutic interventions to produce better long-term outcomes among people struggling with eating disorders.