Specific Dietary Practices In Female Athletes And Their Association With Disordered Eating

PURPOSE: Health and weight management benefits may influence athletes’ decisions regarding specific dietary practices. Eating disorders/disordered eating (ED/DE) are highly prevalent in the athletic population. The purpose of this study was to determine if following specific diets correlated with a greater likelihood of responding positively to ED/DE screening tools compared to not adhering to a diet. METHODS: 1000 female athletes (15-30 yrs) were asked to complete a comprehensive health and wellness survey. Athletes were asked to specify their diet and completed 3 ED/DE screening tools: the Brief Eating Disorder in Athletes Questionnaire, the Eating Disorder Screen for Primary Care, and self-reported current or past history of ED/DE. We hypothesized that athletes adhering to specific diets were more likely to score positively on ED/DE screening tools than those not following a diet. The most common diets were included in the analyses: vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, gluten free, low carbohydrate, low dairy, and ≥2 diets. Athletes following diets for health issues (e.g. Celiac disease) were excluded. Descriptive statistics were calculated for all study measures and Chi-square testing was performed to assess relationships between athletes’ dietary practices and their responses to ED/DE screening tools. RESULTS:234 of 1000 female athletes reported adherence to specific diets; 766 reported no diet adherence. 69 of the 234 athletes were excluded due to medically-related dietary practices or vague dietary descriptions. 133 athletes reported following 1 of the diets and 32 athletes reported following ≥2 diets. Of the diet-adherent athletes, 67.9% responded positively to ≥1 of the 3 ED/DE screening tools. Athletes practicing vegetarian, vegan, low carbohydrate, low dairy, or ≥2 diets were more likely to respond positively to ≥1 ED/DE screening tool vs. athletes without dietary restrictions (70.0%, 77.8%, 79.5%, 60.0%, and 65.6%, respectively vs. 41.8%; p≤0.048). CONCLUSION: Specific diet adherence in female athletes is associated with greater likelihood of positive screening for ED/DE using survey self-report. Health practitioners should consider further ED/DE questioning of athletes reporting specific diet adherence in order to enhance nutritional knowledge and help treat and prevent ED/DE.