Is Bullying a Contributing Factor to Teenage Eating Disorders - Essay Example

Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 3 Introduction 4 2. Background 4 3. Definition of key terms5 1.3.1. Eating disorder 5 1.3.2. Bullying 6 2.0. Literature review 6 2.1 Comparative figures  6 2.2 The impact of eating disorders and bullying 7 2.3 Complexity of eating disorder as a public health issue  8 3.0. Bullying in UK 9 3.1. Bullying Trends 9 3.2. Statistics 9 3.4. Research on Bullying and Eating Disorders 10 3.5. Prevention of bullying 11 4.0. Conclusion 12 References List 12 Abstract Bullying may significantly contribute to eating disorders among teenagers. Though the eating disorder is a combination of several complex factors, research indicates that bullying is prevalent among people with poor eating habits. Fact has it that bullying results to posttraumatic stress and even suicide, it must not be surprising that it is linked to the eating disorders. As teens mature, they undergo through wide range of physical and psychological issues including the body image awareness. During this stage, most of them become extremely cautious of their physical appearance and how they are perceived by others. The eating disorders like bulimia and anorexia may develop as a result of bullying. Bullying instils feelings of insecurity and low self esteem as they try to conform to what is considered acceptable by people around them. This paper investigates whether bullying contributes to eating disorders among the teenagers. The paper comprises of four sections. The introduction section gives the background and definition of key terms relating to the topic. The second part is the literature review. The author has reviewed the comparative figures, impact of the bullying disorders and bullying, and complexity of eating disorders and public health issues. Section three reviews bullying in UK; the trends, statistics, current research and preventive measures, while section four is the conclusion. Is Bullying a Contributing Factor to Teenage Eating Disorders Introduction Bullying entails the use of threat, force or coercion that aggressively imposes domination on others repeatedly. This may involve physical assault, emotional, cyber or verbal harassment based on differences in class, religion, race, sex, reputation, or appearance among others. On the other hand, eating disorder entails the abnormal eating habits characterized by excessive or insufficient intake of food to the detriment of mental or physical health of an individual (Nelson 2008, p. 32). 1.2. Background Teenagers live in a world characterized by a lot of pressure to conform to the perspective of the society on ideal weight. When combined with other factors in life, this may set a background for the eating disorders. This threatens the ability to learn as well as affect their physical health (Harris et al. 2004, p. 24). Bullying forms an increasingly difficult challenge among most people in the world. According to the British press, most of the teenagers diagnosed of eating disorders reported that bullying contributed significantly to the problem. Most teenagers develop eating disorders because of many reasons. Mostly, pressure from the outside sources forms one of the contributing factors. A survey carried out during National Anti-Bullying Week found out that bullying is a significant player in their eating disorders. Bullying affects self esteem, which is a major contributor to the eating disorders (Harris et al. 2004, p. 25). A study carried out in London showed that social problems were the most responsible for eating disorders like bulimia and anorexia. Bullying results in a nosedive of a persons self esteem. The truth of the fact that bullying affects self esteem may be undoubted as such behaviours happen mostly in shadows. While it remains inherently difficult to control bullying, its devastating effects warrant the attempt (Herrin 2007, p. 57). 1.3. Definition of key terms 1.3.1. Eating disorder An eating disorder refers to a psychiatric illness involving intense fear of gaining weight or extreme desire to become thin. Such fears may be too much to compel a person to eat too little food or use compensatory methods like vomiting and laxatives in weight control. Onset of the eating disorder occurs mostly during adolescence or at preadolescence stage. Currently, eating disorders can be classified as bulimia nervosa or anorexia nervosa (Bellenir 2005, p. 45). Anorexia nervosa: this is characterized by refusal to eat adequate food despite a feeling of hunger in order to maintain the weight. This involves intense fear of gaining weight despite being underweight. Teens suffering from anorexia may exercise and go without food excessively. This may also involve taking pills or forcing oneself to vomit in order to force the weight downwards (Bellenir 2005, p. 46). Bulimia nervosa: this involves reoccurring and frequent episodes of binge eating with large consumption of a lot of foods high in calories, fats, carbohydrates or sugars with a feeling of lack of control by the person consuming them. The compulsive purge establishes, and the person feels helpless in weight control. The complications for the eating disorder include poor physical health, major chemical and metabolic damages to the body (Nelson 2008, p. 30). 1.3.2. Bullying Bullying is the unprovoked and sustained aggression towards someone with the intention of hurting them (Nelson 2008, p. 31). 2.0. Literature review 2.1 Comparative figures  The study carried out in 2013 among 600 respondents indicated that teenagers reported that they are being bullied, parents reported cases of their children being bullied in the past one year, some teenagers reported taking part in bullying others, while other respondents have been witnesses of bullying taking place. The results of the studies are as shown in Table 2.0. Table 2.0: Bullying Statistics in UK Variable Frequency Percentage Bullied teenagers 342 57 Parents reported bullying 180 30 Teenagers bullying other 54 9 Witnesses of bullying 24 4 Total 600 100 Statistics indicate that 1 in 2000 boys and 1 in 250 girls experience anorexia nervosa. About five times the numbers suffer from bulimia nervosa. Such disorders develop during adolescence making the sufferers unable to reach academic potential and family expectations. The adverse methods used in weight control remains notable and fatal at other times. It has been noted that anorexia causes the highest number of death rates as a result of uneven treatments resulting from scarce skills and experience in preventing the disorder. Many people suffering from the disorder may experience negative attitudes from the clinical staff that are inexperienced, and this instills fear for the treatment rather than helping out the situation. There have been increased eating disorders among teens, and it is estimated that over 15 percent of teenagers in England suffer from eating disorders. The psychological issues have been cited as the major causes for the disorders, especially as the children adopted to the various life emotions. Most obese children suffer mostly from bullying and low self esteem (Harris et al. 2004, p. 24). 2.2 The impact of eating disorders and bullying The health choices among young people include changes in eating habits, substance use and changes in adolescence. These results in health inequalities during the developmental phase and translates into other health problems in the future. Research findings indicate that reinforcement in young people is critical especially in early years of development to ensure that all the problems regarding health are handled appropriately. Eating disorders encompass a range of syndromes leading to physical, social and psychological malfunctions. While acute complications of the disorders provoke the concern of health promotion, bulimia and anorexia nervosa are the two most critical eating disorders with substantial long term social and physical sequelae. Impact of the eating disorder may be considerable with the family members caring for the person with weight problems for a considerable period. Often, family members suffer as they plan on how to support the affected relative (Harris et al. 2004, p. 25). In acute stages of anorexia nervosa may be characterized by anxiety and adverse moods, with emotional disturbance. This increase alongside social difficulties and physical problems. This may entail the inability of personal care, withdrawal symptoms and social problems. These affect quality of life of a person and interrupt the educational goals. Depression commonly results with statistics indicating over 63 percent prevalence. Teenagers with anorexia nervosa have high risks of bone fractures and endocrine system may be affected. This negatively affects the reproductive organs due to bone mineralization and polycystic ovaries resulting in incomplete pubertal development and occurrence of secondary sexual characteristic. The disorder also affects the reproductive hormones and increases the cortical levels. On the other hand, bulimia anorexia causes erosion of teeth enamel and distortion of entire dentition. The self esteem issues affect the social relationships among children. The alternating weight loss and weight gain expose the teenager to risks of coronary diseases. Bullying among the teenagers may be a major cause for the disorder as adults and teachers may not be in a position to understand them better, especially when it involves name-calling or teasing. This potentially makes make most children unhappy and instills in them a feeling of low self esteem as the children believed that they should be bullied. This may be a potential cause for other problems in life like depression, resentful feelings and lack of self-confidence (Herrin 2007, p. 56). 2.3 Complexity of eating disorder as a public health issue  The severe stresses in life and bullying have been implicated in the aetiology for bulimia and anorexia nervosa. Over 70 percent of the cases are triggered by bullying and other severe events in life. The stresses results mostly from problems of family and friend relationships. A controlled study of anorexia in teenagers suggested that severe negative life events occur prior to the occurrence of the disorder. Mostly, particular attention has been focused on childhood experiences with bullying forming a potential predisposing factor resulting in perfectionism and impulsivity. In perfectionism promotes a relentless pursuit of ‘thin ideal’. This has been implicated as a maintenance factor for bulimic pathology by encouraging the rigid dieting and underlying the binge-purge cycle. The Meta analysis for the prospective studies portrays perfectionism as a predisposing factor for general eating pathology. On the other hand, impulsivity occurs due to problems of impulse control rendering an individual vulnerable to the uncontrollable binge eating episodes (Bhugra & Kamaldeep 2003, p. 46). 3.0. Bullying in UK 3.1. Bullying Trends Bullying results in the long term effects to the bullied persons, with the eating disorders as one of the potential effects. A study in UK during the Anti Bullying Week in 2013 among 600 teenagers showed that at least 90 percent admitted that bullying at school affected their eating patterns. In UK, the low weight patients are managed under outpatient setting until when the BMI falls below 13kg/m2. The inpatients services in UK aim at long term admissions for full weight recovery. There has been the Mental Health Act of 1983, Parental Authority and Children Act of 1989 to intervene in curbing the eating disorders. The country has made considerable efforts in delivering the intervention across its citizens (Shannon 2007, p. 26). 3.2. Statistics The national bullying survey in 2013 indicated that 57% of the teenagers were being bullied. and about 30 percent of the parents reported that their teenagers were bullied within the past 12 months. 9 percent of the teenagers bullied others while 4 percent witnessed some teenagers bullying others. The figure 2.0 Below illustrates the percentage contribution of bullying in UK. Figure 2.0: Bullying Statistics in UK In UK types of bullying vary. These include physical, verbal, relational and cyber bullying. Physical bullying may involve physical hitting of the child, pushing or placing any physical pull or push on them. Verbal bullying involves calling them names, commenting on their sex, races or religion, unkind jokes and foul language. The relational bullying involves passing nasty gossip of the act of being left out. This is especially common among teenagers. Cyber bullying entails harassment campaigns conducted through communication devices such as mobile phones or internet. This affects about 75 percent of teenagers. Social networks form major avenues for this kind of bullying (Shannon 2007, p. 27). 3.4. Research on Bullying and Eating Disorders The Beat research has shown that the connection between eating disorders and bullying has been on the increase in UK. Over 60 percent of teenagers have been diagnosed of eating disorders as a result of bullying. However, over 40 percent reported that bullying began at less than 10 years of age. According to the CEO of the Beat, the increase in the link between bullying and eating disorders is because young people, especially teenagers, have high susceptibility to low self esteem as a result of bullying, and low self esteem relates to poor eating habits in most cases (Parritz 2014, p. 91). The research has shown that low self esteemed persons turn to poor eating habits in an effort to control and manage the stresses. Simply, others get solace in eating disorders, with most of them desiring to withdraw from their friends. Most of the respondents even after recovery suffers from rigidity in meal times (Parritz 2014, p. 91). 3.5. Prevention of bullying The effects may appear differently from one teenager to another based on the background of the teenager. In UK, bullying has been reported. The effect has been felt in learning institutions with cases of poor eating habits, poor performance, lack of confidence and low self esteem among others. Such problems have been propelled even after bullying stops. More than 50 percent of bullied people reported of physical hurt, with 3 percent of them reporting attacks using a weapon. The survey in UK has indicated that the bullied teenagers will always keep quiet trying to put up with the consequences rather than sharing it. It is prudent that teachers and parents become keen to note any bullying going on, or any teenager who has been bullied, especially the sudden change in eating habits and other disorders related with eating (Page & Tana 2007, p. 67). Bullying should be taken seriously. The increased levels of bullying in UK have been alarming, especially with involvement of young people. The government should be in place to ensure that the formulated anti-bullying policies are executed effectively. Any reversal of the trends must be initiated by educators, coaches and parents by being keen to note any signs of the disorder and bullying. Bullying must be brought to an end (Onnis 2012, p. 36). 4.0. Conclusion From analysis carried out in this paper, bullying has been shown to be on the increase in UK with teenagers who are being bullied doing everything at their capacity to avoid the bullies. This may involve avoiding playgrounds, skipping lessons and skipping lunch; mainly they seek psychological and physical safety. Most of the bullied teenagers will skip food to control the uncontrollable and negative factors affecting their lives, with most teenagers arguing that they get a sense of empowerment whenever they have been compelled by anyone to feel completely disempowered. Eating disorders have been linked with low self esteem, and in such cases, parents, educators and coaches must be keen to note any effects of eating disorders and bullying among teenagers. Therefore, it can be concluded that bullying is a contributing factor to teenage eating disorders. References List Bellenir, K. (2005). Mental Health Disorders Sourcebook: Basic Consumer Health Information about Mental and Emotional Health and Mental Illness, including Facts about Depression, Bipolar Disorder, and Other Mood Disorders. Detroit, MI, Omnigraphics. Bhugra, D., & Kamaldeep, B. (2003). Eating Disorders in Teenagers in East London: A Survey. European Eating Disorders Review 11(1), pp. 46-57. Harris, M., Marian, E., & Edward, J. (2004). Helping Teenagers with Eating Disorders. Nursing 34(10), pp. 24-25. Herrin, M. (2007). Parents Guide to Eating Disorders. Carlsbad, CA, Gürze. Nelson, T. (2008). Whats Eating You?: A Workbook for Teens with Anorexia, Bulimia, and Other Eating Disorders. Oakland, CA, New Harbinger. Onnis, L. (2012). Family Relations and Eating Disorders. The Effectiveness of an Integrated Approach in the Treatment of Anorexia and Bulimia in Teenagers: Results of a Case-control Systemic Research. Eating and Weight Disorders - Studies on Anorexia, Bulimia and Obesity 17(2), pp. 36-48. Page, R., & Tana, S. (2007). Promoting Health and Emotional Well-being in Your Classroom. Sudbury, MA, Jones and Bartlett. Parritz, R. (2014). Disorders of Childhood: Development and Psychopathology. Belmont, Wadsworth. Shannon, J. (2007). Adolescent Health Sourcebook: Basic Consumer Health Information about the Physical, Mental, and Emotional Growth and Development of Adolescents. Detroit, MI, Omnigraphics. Read More