1% of survey complete.

You will be participating in a study looking into the link between alexithymia, depressive symptoms as well as disordered eating behaviours. Alexithymia is a personality construct characterised by an inability to describe and identify one’s own emotions. The hypothesis of this experiment is that alexithymia can result in the formation of disordered eating behaviours when mediating factors, such as depressive symptamology, occur.

In this study you will be asked to complete three questionnaires each investigating a different factor. This study will use the Centre of Epidemiology Scale – Depression (CES-D), the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT-26), and the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20). Every item in each test is associated with a particular subscale (an attitude or behaviour pertaining to the factor studied), some of which may be slightly sensitive in nature such as the bulimia subscale in the EAT-26. Although some items in these questionnaires may seem personal it is guaranteed that all responses will remain confidential. As this study is looking at non-clinical sample please refrain from participating in this study if you have ever been diagnosed with an eating disorder, or a mood disorder. I apologise for this inconvenience.

One important note is that the EAT-26 is routinely used for the preliminary screening of eating disorders, however the scores from the questionnaire itself is not a sufficient basis for diagnosis, nor will it be used for such purposes. Although it is not possible to provide feedback regarding individual results to participants, these scores may hint at an existing health problem. If you feel concerned about such issues please visit an appropriate health professional. Again you must remember that these scores do not provide sufficient evidence for diagnosis, and are subject to a margin of error.

You have the right to withdraw from the experiment at anytime without explanation, any data you have provided up until that point shall be withdrawn and destroyed. You may also refuse to answer or choose to omit responses to some of the questions asked. If you have any questions regarding the study, or any questions regarding information on the informed consent sheet please feel free to contact me at 1118571@my.brunel.ac.uk . If you have any other questions about the study you may also contact my supervisor Dr. Terence Dovey (Terence.Dovey@brunel.ac.uk).