Symposia
Eating Disorders
Claire Cusack, M.A.
Doctoral Student
The University of Louisville
Louisville, Kentucky
Marita Cooper, PhD
Research Postdoctoral Fellow
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Paz Galupo, PhD
Professor
Towson University
Towson, Maryland
Limited eating disorder (ED) research focuses on trans and nonbinary individuals (TNB), despite increased ED prevalence within this population. Experiencing gender minority stressors is associated with increased risk for psychopathology in TNB individuals, specifically ED symptomatology. As those experiencing minority stress may be more likely to engage in avoidance-based coping, there has been increasing attention toward the role of rumination for gender diverse individuals. Rumination is a cognitive avoidance strategy used to regulate affect, where individuals excessively think about personal past events and failures; yet ruminative thought patterns maintain or exacerbate psychopathology. Further, rumination may be activated by stress and has been implicated in ED severity. As TNB individuals are often exposed to daily violence and discrimination due to others’ reactions of their gender identities (referred to as minority stressors), ruminating on eating-specific content, as well as gender-related content, may be useful in understanding the maintenance of ED psychopathology for TNB individuals. This study investigated whether levels of rumination (both gender-related and ED-specific) mediated the relationship between minority stressors and ED psychopathology.
Method: An online, community sample of 242 TNB adults completed measures on minority stressors, gender-related rumination, ED-specific rumination, and ED psychopathology. The Preacher-Hayes’ approach was used to test a parallel mediation model, with gender-related and ED-specific rumination as potential mediators.
Results: Gender minority stress explained 64.0% of the variance in EDE-Q scores, p < .001, f2 = 1.81. Gender-related rumination did not mediate the relation between gender-based prejudice and ED psychopathology, Indirect B = -0.00 [95% BCa CI: -.01, .00]; however, ED-specific rumination was significant, indicating complementary mediation, Indirect B = .01 [95% BCa CI: .00, .02].
Conclusion: Future research should assess other underlying mechanisms to better conceptualize the relations between gender-based prejudice and ED psychopathology. Clinical implications will be discussed.
Keywords: disordered eating, eating disorders, minority stress, nonbinary, rumination, transgender