Eating symptomatology and personality in first-generation Latin-American immigrants versus Spanish native-born bulimia nervosa patients

We sought to determine whether differences would be found in eating symptomatology and personality attributes between Latin-American immigrants to Spain and Spanishborn Bulimia nervosa (BN) patients. Method: The participants included 20 first generation Latin-American immigrant and 20 native-born Spanish BN inpatients. Assessment: Measures included the EAT-40, EDI-2, TCIR, and motivational stage of change, as well as other clinical and psychopathological indices. Results: Clinical history was independent of the participants' origin, except for a higher incidence of family history of alcohol dependence among immigrants (p=0.048). Immigrant patients felt less hindered by their disorder (p=0.011) than the native cohort. Although most psychopathological measures showed no significant between-group differences, immigrants reported significantly lower means in the Ineffectiveness (p=0.046) and Body Dissatisfaction (p=0.028) subscales of the EDI-2. No substantial between-group differences were found for personality. Among the immigrants, 62% and 38% presented with pre-migration and post-migration onset of their ED, respectively. No significant differences in eating symptomatology were detected between pre and post migration onset subgroups. Conclusions: The higher scores on the EDI-2 Body Dissatisfaction and Ineffectiveness subscales in Spanishborn BN patients may reflect a greater influence of Western thin body image ideals in this group. The occurrence of post-migration BN in a significant minority of LatinAmerican immigrants to Spain emphasizes the role of acculturation problems in the predisposition to an ED.