Prevalence of Eating Disorders and Their Association with Social Media Addiction among Youths

Abstract

Eating disorders and excessive attachment to social media are a matter of great concern among youths. This study assessed the prevalence of eating disorders and their association with social media addiction among youths. A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 350 participants aged 14-25 years. Two pre-validated tools were used, i.e., the Eating Attitude Test and the Social Networking Addiction Scale. SPSS was used to analyze the data. Out of the 350 students, 42% had probable eating disorders, and 41.7% had social media addictions. The findings revealed that the chances of having eating disorders were significantly higher among youths who lived in separate places, smoked, and had a family history of eating disorders (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.05). Furthermore, the dieting domain displayed notably higher scores for youths living separately (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.05) and smokers (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.01). Moreover, the scores for bulimia and food preoccupation were significantly higher among participants who were married (<i>p</i> = 0.038), were smokers (<i>p</i> = 0.027), and had a family history of eating disorders (<i>p</i> = 0.001). Higher scores in the oral control domain were reported by females (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.05) and severely obese youths (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.01). Moreover, social media addiction was significantly higher among students aged 18-21 (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.01). Spearman's correlation revealed that social media addiction has a weak positive relationship with eating disorders (<i>r</i> = 0.133, <i>p</i> ≤ 0.01), particularly bulimia and food preoccupation (<i>r</i> = 0.173, <i>p</i> ≤ 0.001). This reflects the need to address the harmful consequences of social media addiction that might raise the likelihood of developing eating disorders, particularly bulimia nervosa.