Family characteristics of binge-eating disorder patients

Binge-eating disorder (BED) has been described and proposed as a new eating disorder diagnosis. Although studies have examined the characteristics of the family members of patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) and bulimia nervosa (BN), little is known about the characteristics of family members of BED patients. The Family Environment Scale (FES) was administered to 88 patients with a DSM-III-R diagnosis of an eating disorder (23 AN, 45 BN, 20 BN + AN), as well as 43 patients with BED as defined by DSM-IV criteria. Statistically significant differences were found among the groups on the cohesion, expressiveness, and active-recreational subscales of the FES by analysis of variance (ANOVA). On the cohesion subscale, significant differences were noted between AN and BED, p < .019, with AN scoring higher than BED. On the expressiveness subscale, significant differences were noted for BED and BN, p < .016, with BN scoring higher than BED. On the active-recreational subscale, there were significant differences for BED versus BN, BED versus AN, and BED versus AN + BN (p < .0001), with BED scoring lower than all other groups. Comparison of BED data to existing normative data yielded significant differences on the cohesion, expressiveness, conflict, independence, intellectual-cultural, active-recreational, and control subscales, with BED patients scoring higher than controls on the conflict and control subscales and lower than controls on all others. These data represent the first study of family characteristics of BED patients utilizing DSM-IV criteria, and provide a beginning understanding of family factors that may be useful in treatment.