Personality and eating disorders: A longitudinal study on a non-clinical sample of adolescents.

The present longitudinal study is aimed at analyzing how adolescents change their dysfunctional attitudes towards their body and eating behaviors in relation to personality characteristics across a six-month time span. Via multiple regression analyses we investigated whether MMPI-A Obsessiveness, Low Self-Esteem, Depression, Family Problems and Concern for health are temporal antecedents of EDI-2 eating disorders, and vice versa. Our main findings revealed a bidirectional relationship between eating attitudes and personality. In fact, Obsessiveness, Low self-esteem, Depression, and Family problems significantly predicted changes in different dysfunctional eating attitudes, but also EDI-Interpersonal distrust and Ineffectiveness predicted changes in different MMPI-A scale scores. All together, findings suggest that personality development in adolescence is sensitive to attitudes towards eating and body appearance, and vice versa.