Distinguishing between healthy and pathological orthorexia: a cluster analytic study

This study represents a first attempt to explore the typology of female adults from a large non-clinical sample based on healthy orthorexia (HO) and pathological orthorexia (orthorexia nervosa, ON).

1245 female adults (Mage = 38.04, SD = 9.73) completed a set of questionnaires assessing orthorexic behaviors, intuitive eating, self-esteem, perceived social support as well as eating disorders, depressive and anxiety symptoms.

Cluster analysis based on HO and ON scores yielded 4 distinct groups: "Healthy orthorexia cluster" (HO), "Orthorexia Nervosa cluster" (ON), "Low Orthorexia cluster" (LO) and "In-between Orthorexia cluster" (IBO). The HO and ON clusters represented individuals with, respectively, healthy and pathological interest in healthy diet. The LO cluster represented those with no particular interest in healthy eating and the IBO cluster showed that ON and HO behaviors can be associated in some individuals. Among all clusters, the ON cluster displayed highest levels of ED, anxiety and depressive symptoms. Inversely, the HO cluster displayed highest levels of intuitive eating, self-esteem and perceived social support.

Altogether, findings from this study support the bidimensional structure of orthorexic eating behavior and further suggest that ON and HO behaviors can be associated in some individuals. Our findings further provide evidence for the assumption that ON and HO could be seen, respectively, as maladaptive and protective eating behaviors.

V, descriptive study.