We compared nutritional knowledge, eating attitudes and chronic dietary restraint scores among 17 men (10 with bulimia nervosa and 7 with anorexia nervosa) and 50 women (20 with bulimia nervosa and 30 with anorexia nervosa), who were consecutive patients at a major treatment center in Brazil. There were no differences in nutritional knowledge and concern with food between men and women. For both genders, chronic dietary restraint scores were higher among bulimics. Men with eating disorders had better eating attitudes scores than women. Anorexic men tended to have worse eating attitudes scores than bulimic men, while the opposite was observed for women, suggesting an interaction between gender and diagnosis.
Eating disorders (ED) are more commonly observed among women than men (Kjelsås, Bjørnstrøm, & Götestam, 2004), and many authors have demonstrated that the male/female prevalence ratio of ED varies from 1:6 to 1:10 (Andersen, 1995). Therefore, these disorders were considered gender-bound until recently. However, there is an increasing interest in men with ED nowadays. Results from epidemiological surveys show that men with ED are not so rare (Woodside et al., 2001), and many case reports can be found in the literature (Bräutigan and Herberhold, 2005, Carlat et al., 1997, Morgan and Marsh, 2006 and Tong et al., 2005).
Some authors have found that the presentation of ED among men is very similar to that among women (Lindblad, Lindberg, & Hjern, 2006). Woodside et al. (2001) compared clinical and psychiatric characteristics of 62 men with ED and 212 women with ED. The only significant differences observed were a higher prevalence of alcohol dependence and a lower prevalence of major depression among males. Other studies have also observed that men and women with ED are similar in regard to their physiologic and psychological characteristics (Anderson, 1984 and Touyz et al., 1993). Nevertheless, a review of the literature has shown that there are some differences between men and women with ED, such as body image concerns and practice of physical activity (Muise, Stein, & Arbess, 2003).
To our knowledge, no study comparing nutritional characteristics between men and women with ED has been conducted to date. Many authors have stated that it is important to have an in-depth knowledge of the nutritional characteristics presented by the patients with ED in order to design individualized and effective nutritional interventions (Alvarenga et al., 2005 and American Dietetic Association, 2001). Consequently, without knowing the nutritional characteristics of men with ED, it is not possible to design a nutritional treatment plan that is suitable and adequate for them. Thus, the aim of this study was to compare nutritional knowledge, eating attitudes and chronic dietary restraint scores among men and women with ED.
