Race, Ethnicity, and Eating Disorder Recognition by Peers

Abstract

We investigated racial/ethnic stereotyping in the recognition and referral of eating disorders with 663 university students. We explored responses to problem and eating disorder recognition and health care referrals after subjects read a vignette concerning a patient of a different race/ethnic background presenting with eating disorders. A series of three 4 × 3 ANOVAs revealed significant main effects for eating disorders across all three outcome variables. There were no significant main effects across the four different race/ethnicity conditions and no significant race by condition interactions. Lack of general eating disorder recognition and health care referrals by student participants were found.

[Supplemental files are available for this article. Go to the publishers's online edition of Eating Disorders for the following free supplemental resource: online appendix containing vignettes 1–3, as described in the “Methods” section].

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by a grant from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Department of Psychology to the first author. Other support was provided from National Institute of Mental Health grants (3R01MH082732; PI: Bulik; and K23-MH087954; PI: Reyes-Rodríguez).