Symptoms of psychosis in anorexia and bulimia nervosa.

Despite evidence from case series, the comorbidity of eating disorders with psychosis is less investigated than their comorbidity with anxiety and mood disorders. We investigated the occurrence of symptoms of psychosis in 112 female patients diagnosed with DSM-IV eating disorders (anorexia nervosa=61, bulimia nervosa=51) and 631 high school girls in the same health district as the patients: the items of the SCL-90R symptom dimensions "paranoid ideation" and "psychoticism" were specifically examined. No case of co-morbid schizophrenia was observed among patients.

Aggressiveness, anger, and hostility in eating disorders.

Objective: Despite evidence of a link between the behavioral and cognitive dimensions of aggressiveness and eating disorders, only few studies have tested this relation empirically.

Methods: A total of 112 female patients with anorexia nervosa (n = 61) or bulimia nervosa (n = 51) and 631 young girls attending 7 high schools in the same health district as the patients (northeast Italy) were invited to fill in a set of self-report instruments including the Eating Attitudes Test, the Bulimic Investigatory Test of Edinburgh, the Body Attitudes Test, and the Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire (AQ).

Results: In both healthy controls and patients, scores on the measures of eating disorder symptoms were positively related to the scores on the AQ: the strength of the association did not differ between healthy controls and patients.