When eating disorders are linked to women's magazines, the usual suspects are those focusing on fashion and beauty.
But a new study published in the American Journal of Health Education found that a link may exist between health and fitness magazines and young women's eating disorders.
The exact nature of that association is not clear, said Steven Thomsen, one of the study's authors and an associate professor of communications at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah.
Thomsen, who conducts research on media and women's health issues, strongly cautioned that the study does not show that reading health and fitness magazines causes young women to develop eating disorders. The nature of eating disorders is complex and cannot be blamed wholly on the media, he said. More studies are needed, he said.
'Parents should not be alarmed if they see a lot of health and fitness magazines in their daughter's room,' he said.
But what they can glean from the study is that frequent reading of these magazines may be a clue to how a daughter thinks and feels about herself and her body.
The study of 498 sophomores, juniors and seniors at two Salt Lake City-area high schools found that girls who use some unhealthy weight-control practices were significantly more likely to be frequent readers of women's health and fitness magazines such as Shape, Fit and Oxygen. The researchers did not ask the girls precisely which magazines they read.
_About 11 percent of the girls said they used laxatives for weight control or loss.
_15 percent said they had taken appetite-control or weight-loss pills.
_9 percent said they made themselves vomit, and more than half said they restricted their calories.
_Among frequent readers of these magazines, those who restricted their calories outnumber nearly 2-to-1 those who did not.
_Of the girls who made themselves vomit, 80 percent were frequent readers of health and fitness magazines.
_Of those who used appetite suppressants and weight- control pills, 73 percent were frequent readers.
_Of those who used laxatives for weight loss or weight control in the past year, 60 percent were frequent readers.
'I'm not saying that magazines are doing bad things,' Thomsen said. 'But it's possible that teens are taking from magazines different messages than what the magazines intended.'
It's possible that girls who use unhealthy weight-control practices may be turning to such magazines for guidance on how they should look or how to lose weight.
Representatives of Shape and Fitness magazines did not respond to requests for comment on the study.
By having a frank _ sometimes awkward _ discussion with their daughter, parents might be able to get clues on whether she may be developing an unhealthy view of herself and her body and may be considering or using inappropriate weight-control measures.
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(Lisa Liddane is a health and fitness writer for The Orange County Register. Write to her at the Register, P.O. Box 11626, Santa Ana, Calif. 92711 or send e-mail to llliddane(AT)ocregister.com.)
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