Can Pro-Anorexia Websites Help Heal Some Eating Disorders?
They're widely considered harmful and restricted online, but "pro-ana" blogs may provide the kind of social support that some anorexics need to recover
Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/24/can-pro-anorexia-websites-help-heal-some-eating-disorders/#ixzz25DsrdlY0
Websites and blogs that support anorexia — known as pro-ana sites — have been widely banned online by the likes of Pinterest, Yahoo and Tumblr. For anyone who’s ever visited a pro-ana site, the reason is clear: the content exchanged in these online communities is often shocking. They use images of emaciated models and celebrities as “thinspiration” for vulnerable girls, and include frank discussions on the best methods for achieving extreme weight loss.
Anorexia is the most deadly of all psychiatric disorders, and pro-ana websites can be especially distressing to family members and friends of those who are suffering from it. But it is precisely because anorexia is so devastating — and so stigmatized — that such websites may be a boon to some of those who visit them. Like similar groups for addicted people who are not ready to give up drugs, they can provide a rare source of nonjudgmental support for people with eating disorders.
According to Daphna Yeshua-Katz, a doctoral student at Indiana University who co-authored a new study on pro-ana sites appearing in the journal Health Communication, a close look at these sites reveals certain benefits: behind the exhortations to achieve bodily perfection or to glorify an often-fatal psychiatric illness, there are communities of people, mainly women, who understand one another’s demons. These communities provide an anonymous, judgment-free place for sufferers to talk about their struggles with a highly stigmatized disorder for which few effective treatments are available.
(MORE: Defining Recovery in Anorexia — and Addiction)
For her new study, Yeshua-Katz interviewed 33 pro-ana bloggers. “Out of 300 bloggers we contacted, 33 were willing to be interviewed,” says Yeshua-Katz. She says that the highly controversial nature of the sites and the bloggers’ fears of their real identities being revealed kept many from participating. Because the sample was not random, the findings cannot be applied to all pro-ana bloggers, but they offer a rare insight into a hidden world.
“They were going online first of all to find support,” Yeshua-Katz explains, noting that having an eating disorder is a very isolating experience. As with drug addiction, people with anorexia typically cannot discuss their condition or their feelings about it with loved ones without immediately being challenged to change. “The Internet is a very good place for people to find support from similar others,” she says.
As one blogger told the authors: “There was no one in my life that I could speak to openly about what I was feeling and experiencing. I wanted to have a voice that I didn’t have to censor for fear of upsetting people I knew or having them judge me.”
The bloggers also saw their sites as a means of self-expression. “They wanted a venue where they could express themselves without judgment,” says Yeshua-Katz.
Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/24/can-pro-anorexia-websites-help-heal-some-eating-disorders/#ixzz25Dt9ARtr
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