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Family experiences of living with an eating disorder: a narrative analysis

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posted on 2016-04-19, 15:24 authored by Anthony PapathomasAnthony Papathomas, Brett M. Smith, David Lavallee
Families are considered important in the management and treatment of eating disorders. Yet, rarely has research focused on family experiences of living with an eating disorder. Addressing this gap, this study explores the experiences of an elite 21-year-old triathlete with an eating disorder in conjunction with the experiences of her parents. Family members attended interviews individually on three separate occasions over the course of a year. In line with the narrative approach adopted, whereby stories are considered the primary means to construct experience, interviews encouraged storytelling through an open-ended, participant-led structure. Narrative analysis involved repeated readings of the transcripts, sensitising towards issues of narrative content (key themes) and structure (overarching plot). Family difficulties arose when personal experiences strayed from culturally dominant narrative forms and when family members held contrasting narrative preferences. Suggestions are forwarded as to how an appreciation of eating disorder illness narratives might inform treatment and support.

History

School

  • Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences

Published in

JOURNAL OF HEALTH PSYCHOLOGY

Volume

20

Issue

3

Pages

313 - 325 (13)

Citation

PAPATHOMAS, A., SMITH, B. and LAVALLEE, D., 2015. Family experiences of living with an eating disorder: a narrative analysis. Journal of Health Psychology, 20 (3), pp. 313-325

Publisher

Sage Publications Ltd (© The Authors 2015)

Version

  • AM (Accepted Manuscript)

Publisher statement

This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Publication date

2015

ISSN

1359-1053

Language

  • en

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