Higher disordered eating rates troubling among sexual minority youth: study

Sexual minorities are continuing to purge or take laxatives, use diet pills or fast to lose weight, while such behaviors among their straight peers have decreased, according to a new study from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.

"For lesbian and bisexual girls, the rate of disordered eating behaviors is actually increasing, which is alarming," said Ryan Watson, the study's lead author and a postdoctoral research fellow at the university's School of Nursing.

The study, based on data collected from surveys administered every two years at public high schools in Massachusetts between 1999 and 2013, was published this week in the International Journal of Eating Disorders.

The researchers found that, in 2013, lesbians were almost twice as likely to report purging and fasting for weight control than they were in 1999, jumping from a rate of 22 percent to 36.

The prevalence of purging among bisexual girls in 1999, at 33 percent, was higher than for lesbians but stayed nearly the same in 2013.

In comparison, 8 percent of heterosexual girls reported purging in 1999, but the rate went down to 5 percent in 2013.

Heterosexual boys had the lowest rates of these behaviors, and they declined even further over the years.

"While it's promising to see improvements in the rate of disordered eating behaviors among heterosexual youth, we cannot say there has been any definite reduction of these behaviors for sexual minority youth," said Watson.

The university's nursing professor Elizabeth Saewyc, the study's senior author, said the findings suggest that the factors that put lesbian, gay and bisexual youth at higher risk for eating disorders have not improved. Endi