Disorders In Athletes

There are many potential downfalls when athletes take the road to sporting achievement. In pursuing excellence, athletes take many risks. These risks are often well managed and calculated but non the less they are still risks (Currie & Morse, 2005). Researchers have examined the apparent nature of athletes developing eating disorders(ED), acknowledging it to the list of risks that need to be addressed. Athletic competition often increases the prevalence of sports pressure that encourages the visibility of an ideal body promoting body dissatisfaction (Thiemann et al., 2015). The World Health Organization(WHO) have defined ED as the incidence of abnormal eating behaviors, these can be further classified as anorexia and bulimia nervosa (World
These authors recognized an increased importance in analyzing the unique health concerns that came from athletic women and how this has increasingly developed over time. The study displayed many similarities to Thiemann et al (2015) article where it addressed the issue of creating subgroups in order to specifically identify which women are more inclined to display disordered eating behaviors. In addition, it aimed to determine the behavioral and physiological responses of women who participate in athletic activities (Reinking & Alexander, 2005). Groups were divided into 3, non-lean- sport athletes, non-athlete’s and finally non-lean sport athletes. Lean sports incorporated sports that place a particular aesthetic or competitive value on leanness. Non-athletes were considered to be athletes who participate in less than 3 hours of exercise a week. The method of the study was composed of a Questionnaire, EDI-2 and a self-report. The findings presented an overall lower score in body dissatisfaction in lean sport athletes (23.5%), this matched the assessment made prior by Thiemann et al (2015). This data suggests that lean sport athletes are at higher risk of disordered eating then non-lean
This became very relevant where it showed statistical significance between the different categories of sports and fitness. A limitation of the report was the difference in age gap between lean athletes and non-lean athletes. This age barrier plays a key role in the athletic ability of participants, where younger individuals are more likely to achieve a higher degree of fitness (Shepherd, 2005). Moreover, this greater athletic ability may act as a potential bias in the study as non-athletes were identified to be older in age. Accompanying, another limitation to the study is the clarification of what they observed to be a ‘non-lean sport’. This became highly detrimental to the article as they failed to outline the cohort involved. Some past articles recognized ‘lean sport’ as long distance running, swimming, dance, gymnastics and diving, where as other studies such Jeanne (2007) included all field athletes to be classified in the lean division. Furthermore, exhibiting a clear difference in what a lean sport is to different studies and highlighting the lack of classification given by Reinking & Alexander