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Recurrent Binge Eating in Black American Women
Arch Fam Med. 2000;9:87.
My interest in eating problems among African American women dates back to my work at Yale University, where, together with Judith Rodin, PhD, I started an eating disorder clinic some 15 years ago. Among the women (and clients were almost all female) seeking help were a handful of African American women who described episodes of overeating. At the time, colleagues across the country thought it unusual to see women of color in an eating disorder clinic, but centers in urban areas with large populations of African American women find that African American women do come in with clinical presentations of bulimia nervosa or, more commonly, binge eating disorder. The data presented in this article are consistent with recent survey data based on Mexican American women and Native American women showing that eating disorder symptoms are far more common among these ethnic groups than was previously assumed.
Nevertheless, there is a strong perception among the lay public and, to some degree, among health care professionals, that eating disorders are limited to white women. Our study participants are well aware of this bias; they describe the need for sensitivity among health care providers to recognize eating disorders as a problem and indicate that they feel embarrassed to share with their families or close friends that they have what they consider to be a "white girls' problem." They describe a double layer of shame: shame because eating disorders are often seen (incorrectly) as the result of a woman's vanity run amok (starving herself to achieve a beauty ideal of extreme thinness), and shame because for an African American woman to experience this problem is seen as her having betrayed her cultural roots.
Our data show that research on eating disorders should involve diverse populations of women.
Ruth H. Striegel-Moore, PhD
Middletown, Conn
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