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Aug. 7, 2012, 3:11 p.m.

Can you pick an eating disorder by a person's dietary preference?

At first glance it seems that you can. A cross-sectional study has found that individuals with a history of eating disorders are considerably more likely to have been vegetarian in the past, vegetarian now and primarily motivated by weight.

Furthermore, 68 per cent of those who had had an eating disorder perceived that their vegetarianism was related it.

"[The] results shed light on the vegetarianism-eating disorders relation and suggest intervention considerations for clinicians [such as investigating motives for vegetarianism]," the researchers wrote in The Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

The vegetarianism-eating disorders relation comes from various studies including one published in the Journal of Adolescent Health. Researchers found that the most common reason teens gave for vegetarianism (a loose term given that some still ate chicken or fish) was to lose weight or prevent gaining it.

"I'm not really surprised," says the dietitian Tara Diversi of the findings. "My area is eating disorders and I tend to see that in practice quite a lot . . . [taking a whole] food group out of the diet is a socially acceptable way to reduce food."

Dr Sloane Madden, co-director of The Eating Disorder Service at The Children's Hospital at Westmead, agrees. "I'm certainly not saying that being vegetarian equates with eating disorders . . . [but] it sits with a fixation around food and weight and calories," he says. "The motivation seems to be tied up with a belief that vegetables are lower in calories and healthier and more likely to facilitate weight loss."

It makes sense that some sensitive young minds may associate meat with physical as well as literal beefiness. But, as satisfying as it is to slap labels on life choices, it is rarely cut and dried.

The director of the Australian Vegetarian Society, Mark Berriman, says. "it does make sense insofar as young women seeking to reduce weight would perceive the reduction/elimination of animal fat as a significant step for them to take, making vegetarianism attractive".

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Diet of disorder? Save

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