Associations between Schizotypal Facets and Symptoms of Disordered Eating in Women

Research has suggested that schizotypy – a personality organisation representing latent vulnera-bility for schizophrenia-spectrum disorders – may be elevated in women with symptoms of dis-ordered eating. However, studies have not fully considered associations between symptoms of disordered eating and multidimensional schizotypy. To overcome this limitation, we asked an online sample of 235 women from the United States to complete measures of symptoms of disor-dered eating (drive for thinness, body dissatisfaction, and bulimic symptoms) and multidimen-sional schizotypy. Correlational analyses indicated significant associations between drive for thinness and bulimic symptoms, respectively, and most schizotypal facets. Body dissatisfaction was significantly associated with only two schizotypal facets. Overall, the strength of correla-tions was weak-to-moderate. Regression results indicated that only the schizotypal feature of ex-cessive social anxiety was significantly associated with all risk for disordered eating factors. These results are consistent with aetiological models of disordered eating that highlight so-cio-affective difficulties as risk factors for symptoms of disordered eating.