A research report submitted to the Faculty of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Masters of Arts,
(Clinical Psychology)
Johannesburg, 1995. / In recent years there has been great interest in studying the energy-restrictive
eating disorders within sociocultural contexts. Patterns of change in the
incidence and prevalence of these disorders appear to reflect social processes
involving gender issues and shared cultural values around the female body,
South African society is experiencing rapid sociocultural changes, and this
raises questions about disordered eating and values our own society.
This study investigated body figure preferences and attitudes and behaviours
related to eating and body weight. The sample consisted of 125 White pupils
and 61 Black pupils in three high schools in urban and periurban areas of
Gauteng, South Africa. The schools represent different socioeconomic
Environments. One is a private school and one is state school with partial
provincial subsidy in an affluent suburb, and one is a community school
which is subsidised mainly by donor funding and serves a periurban
Community.
Black and White pupils reported similar body ideals and levels of discrepancy
between their reported actual body figures and their ideal figures, but Black
pupils showed significantly greater tolerance of different body figures. both
thin and fat. Despite this increased tolerance. However, their scores on the
Eating Disorders Inventory were similar to those of the White pupils and
exceeded White pupils on perfectionism and maturity fears measures,
Amongst Black pupils in the three schools. EDI scores were similar but State
school pupils showed more body dissatisfaction and Community school
pupils showed more perfectionism; and maturity fear, This suggests that
pupils in more disadvantaged school environments are weight-concerned and
could still be at risk of disordered eating, the finding is contrary to
expectations that private school pupils would show the most disordered
eating and weight concern.
EDI scores were closely related to body figure preferences, and especially to
real-ideal discrepancy which was shown to be a simple but effective measure,
A high-scoring subgroup was isolated and this was found to include 14 Black
pupils and 22 White pupils, The findings have implications for preventive
efforts and for further research, / GR2017
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/21632 |
| Date | January 1995 |
| Creators | Davies, Sally |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | Online resource (85 leaves), application/pdf |
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