Original article
A Prospective Study of Overeating, Binge Eating, and Depressive Symptoms Among Adolescent and Young Adult Women

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2011.10.002Get rights and content

Abstract

Purpose

To investigate the temporal relationship between depressive symptoms and overeating and binge eating among adolescent and young adult females in the United States.

Methods

We investigated incident overeating, binge eating, and depressive symptoms among 4,798 females in the Growing Up Today Study, a prospective cohort study of adolescents and young adults throughout the United States. Participants who reported at least monthly episodes of eating a very large amount of food in a short amount of time in the past year, but not experiencing a loss of control, were classified as overeaters. Those who reported a loss of control while overeating were classified as binge eaters. Depressive symptoms were assessed with the McKnight Risk Factor Survey. Participants were followed between 1999 and 2003. Generalized estimating equations were used for lagged analysis with time-varying covariates. Analyses were adjusted for age, age at menarche, body mass index, and follow-up time.

Results

Females reporting depressive symptoms at baseline were two times more likely than their peers to start overeating (odds ratio [OR] = 1.9; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.4, 2.5) and binge eating (OR = 2.3; 95% CI = 1.7, 3.0) during the follow-up. Similarly, females engaging in overeating (OR = 1.9; 95% CI = 1.1, 3.4) or binge eating (OR = 1.9; 95% CI = 1.2, 2.9) at baseline were two times more likely than their peers to develop depressive symptoms during the follow-up.

Conclusions

These results indicate that it is important to consider depressive symptoms in overeating and binge eating prevention and treatment initiatives targeting adolescent and young adult females.

Section snippets

Sample

The GUTS is an ongoing prospective cohort study of 9,039 female and 7,843 male offspring of women in the Nurses' Health Study II [15]. GUTS cohort members were aged 9–14 years when the cohort was established in 1996. Consent to invite the children to participate was obtained from their mothers. Return of a completed baseline questionnaire was considered assent by the child. GUTS participants have been mailed questionnaires every 12–24 months since 1996. The questionnaires are revised before

Statistical analysis

To assess the temporal relation between depressive symptoms and overeating and binge eating, two sets of statistical models were run. In initial analyses, overeating and binge eating at baseline, defined as 1999 for the 1999 through 2001 time interval and as 2001 for the 2001 through 2003 time interval, were included as separate predictors in a model predicting incident depressive symptoms at follow-up, defined as 2001 or 2003 for the aforementioned time intervals. In other statistical models,

Results

The demographics of the study population in 1999, 2001, and 2003 are presented in Table 1. In 1999, the mean age of the females was 14.9 (standard deviation: 1.6) years. Between 1999 and 2003, the prevalence of overeating and binge eating more than doubled in this nationwide cohort of adolescent and young adult females: the prevalence of overeating increased from 1.5% to 3.7% and that of binge eating increased from 2.4% to 5.7%. During the same period, the prevalence of overweight increased

Discussion

The results of our study support the existence of two distinct prospective pathways between depressive symptoms and overeating and binge eating: depressive symptoms predict the onset of overeating and binge eating during 2 years of follow-up, and overeating and binge eating predict the development of high-depressive symptoms during 2 years of follow-up. Moreover, the relative strength of both prospective relationships appears similar.

The findings that depressive symptoms at baseline were

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the GUTS team of investigators for their contributions to this article and the thousands of young people across the country participating in the Growing Up Today Study. They also thank Laura Pierce for her technical assistance.

This research was supported by research grants from the National Institutes of Health (DK59570 and MH087786). H.H.S. was supported by a grant from the National Cancer Institute (CA098566), and S.B.A. was supported by the Leadership Education in

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