Talk:Orthorexia nervosa

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This article and this whole concept is so biased and not based on scientific evidence. Perhaps eating the flesh of once-living animals, when there are healthy alternatives, is an eating disorder? This is junk psuedo-science and I am one of many who do not believe it belongs on wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.192.26.252 (talk) 04:58, 30 December 2007 (UTC)



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This article was nominated for deletion on June 9, 2005; the consensus was to keep. For discussion, please see Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Orthorexia nervosa.

Since the full term for the condition is orthorexia nervosa, should it be moved to an article with that title? Anyone? --Frecklefoot 18:07 21 May 2003 (UTC)

Done. Kent Wang 22:27, 9 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I removed the following; it didn't seem directly relevant to orthorexia as a medical condition, only indirectly relevant. Maybe it could be moved to another page:

Others say that many scientists are divorced from ethics... and that one cannot be too rich or too thin. They cite statistics that nonagenarians and centenarians are usually thinner than average, placing less stress on organs.

7000 vegan MD's have numerous articles on overweight in relation to animal products. http://www.pcrm.org

I also removed the following line, because thinnes isn't the major problem with orthorexia, there are other concerns:

As a result, the sufferer may become as hazardously thin as those suffering from anorexia.

Contents

[edit] Totally disputed

One MD decides to name a "condition" based on "excessively healthy eating = mental disease" unsupported by any studies or medical consensus, and this is the apparent basis of the article. To the extent I might be inclined to include this material it should be merged into eating disorders and even so it seems rather marginal at best. Whig 16:49, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • The NPOV tag in this instance is innappropriate as at no point in it's current incarnation does the article accuse or imply through language or tone that "excessively healthy eating = mental disease" (your quotes). It simply reports on the ongoing scientific study of the phenomena without judging anyone or anything. As time progresses and more evidence is published for or against, then such information can obviously be added. Disaggreeing with the existance of the subject of an article does not make it POV, and as, so far, there has been one objection to it, it is not "Totally disputed." --Jeffrey O. Gustafson 17:56, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • There's a great risk of trying so hard to provide a neutral description of a topic, that you lend credence to a fraud, and perform a great disservice to people looking for information. The article mentions that a study has been performed, in 2004, but doesn't tell us what the results were. That's a little fishy, no? And the man who invented this eating disorder is selling a book to combat it ... alterior motive? FireWeed 23:01, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
    • It's a bit of a stretch to call this an "ongoing scientific study." Scientific figures try to introduce pet theories all the time. FireWeed 19:35, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

'Unhealthy obsession with eating healthy'?

Since food is by far the primary determinant of good health, can there even be such a thing as an unhealthy obsession with health?

Allow me to introduce you to Andrew Lin. - Jersyko talk 19:04, August 16, 2005 (UTC)
There can be an unhealthy obsession with anything, and generally this is obsessive-compulsive disorder. The MD who invented this prank tells us "orthorexics" have starved themselves to death, which is as dubious as you can get. If a person refuses to eat bacon, then they'll eat bread and broccoli to avoid death from starvation. Anybody who feels so compelled to "be pure" that they would risk a very slow, painful death, has more serious issues to deal with than their choice of diet. FireWeed 23:01, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What the article needs

Conspicuously missing is the reason why Bratman claims this condition is a disease. The article is otherwise unintelligible and gathers the above type of comments from those who think it is simply calling people who eat healthily crazy. Could whoever wrote this to start with please add the key info? Thanks alteripse 23:04, 27 November 2005 (UTC)


Actually, I don't claim it's a disease. I invented the word as a kind of "tease therapy" for my macrobiotic and rawfoodist patients who took their diet too seriously. My book -- which mostly no one reads -- is rather funny and light and amusing. However, several years after the book went essentially out of print I began to hear about people who were dying from a more extreme form of health food obsession than I even knew existed. This is rare, but awful for the person who's wasting away and can't stop it, and who doesn't have anorexia but rather something related to it. Whether that's a form of obsessive compulsive disease or a variant of exercise-addiction, I don't know. I'm not an eating disorders specialist. Sbratman (talk) 23:17, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
My guess is there should be a distinction between people who eat healthily, and people who are obsessed with healthy eating, to the point that such fixation affects their life negatively. ( Say by causing undue stress. ) However, as obvious as this seems to me, I'm not going to edit a "scientific" encyclopedia article to clarify it based on my guess. That would be very unscientific of me.  ;-P FireWeed 19:37, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The term "nervosa" means fixation. So people, like me, who just enjoy eating healthy food, are not orthorexic. It has to cross some line into obsession. Where to draw that line? Like all such divisions, there's no clear answer. Sbratman (talk) 23:17, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Why the concept is not accepted

Bratman did not back up his concept with any research. His concept is not neutral. Some of his statements indicate that he wanted to write a parody!

Please cite an instance of Bratman stating that his intention was to write a parody. Skinwalker 16:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
Not a parody, exactly. But I wasn't trying to invent a disease, either. I was trying to tease overly serious health food maniacs into relaxing a little. Sbratman (talk) 23:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

... Bratman hasn't done clinical tests or studies, but insists he isn't trying to create a medical disorder that would belittle the serious problems involved with other eating disorders. "I invented the word orthorexia as a tease. I don't really believe it's as bad as anorexia, but the word has shock value to get people to reexamine their values," Bratman says during a telephone interview from his home office in Fort Collins, Colo. "It's like workaholism. Nobody thinks it's as bad as alcoholism. But like workaholism, people mistake it as a virtue." http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/08.02.01/eating1-0131.html

Thus the term is not accepted neither by the research community nor by the medical community. It is worhless for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes and it is dangerous to label people. The concept is not critized by experts, because they feel eating healthy would be fine in all cases. The concept is not accepted because it is not funded on sound research like for example the concept of bulimie or anorexia nervosa!

It's being investigated now, and at some point it might or might not become an accepted diagnosis. For reasons entirely unclear to me, most of the scientific interest has occurred in Italy and Turkey. In Turkey, they've adjusted the meaning a bit: "orthorexia," to them, means just "interest in health food, whereas "orthorexia nervosa" means a fixation on it.Sbratman (talk) 23:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
The study cited in the article found a 6.9% prevalance of orthorexia, as they defined it. Please explain why a peer reviewed paper does not constitute "sound research".
unfortunately there is one study - but wait until the research community has discussed the paper! It very much depends on how you define "orthorexia". I do not believe that they think that it might be possible that 6,9% of the population counts calories and vitamins 3 hours a day. One study is weak evidence nevertheless, it does not prove anything. Compare to anorexia or bulimie, there are hundreds of studies.
Night eating syndrome, a fairly recently recognized eating disorder ( 7 years ), affects between 1 and 2 % of the population. And as a disorder would seem to include some amount of "orthorexia nervosa" - in fact, without this component, people suffering from NES would not be suffering. The idea that 7 % of the population suffers from orthorexia is absurd. FireWeed 19:43, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree. It sounds absurd to me too. The scale they used seems to be very, very overbroad.Sbratman (talk) 23:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Are you aware of any expert dieticians or other physical/mental health professionals who have criticized this study, or Bratman's hypothesis? If so, please cite them, so we can include it in the article for balance. We cannot include editorial commentary in encyclopedic articles. WP:NPOV states:

Lots of dieticians, eating disorder specialists, etc., seem to take it seriously. But that doesn't mean it's a real disease. It seems to be pretty much trendy at the moment. Before I closed my website to email, I was inundated with emails from journalists wanting to know about it. Many countries too: Germany, Brazil, Chile, Sweden, UK ... But the fact is, orthorexia is NOT a scientific diagnosis. It's just a popular culture term at the moment. I think there's about a 50/50 chance that it will some day be a DSM term. Someone else besides me will have to do that. I'm not an eating disorder specialist, and I really don't have an investment in what happens with it.Sbratman (talk) 23:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
"A good way to help building a neutral point of view is to find a reputable source for the piece of information you want to add to wikipedia, and then cite that source. This is an easy way to characterize a side of a debate without excluding that the debate has other sides."
I have no problem with including anti-orthorexia information, but we must find reliable sources to back it up. Skinwalker 16:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
the concept is not discussed in the scientific community. Go and ask a psychiatrist.

There are many reasons why people can get too fussy about food. This is well known in psychology and psychatry. But Bratman does not have any expertise on these fields. He simply ignores all differential diagnosis. He just describes things that he observes in himself and other people.Thus merges together very different things:

  • some observations he presents as symptoms are no sypmtoms at all, like buying too much healthy food or eating organic.
  • some symptoms might be first signs of psychose or borderline syndrome.
  • only few of his observation could indicate eating disorders - perhaps the classical anorexia.
  • wrong self-therapy of people that are seriously ill

I suggest to give much more stress to the fact that the term is not accepted by the scientific community! There are very good reasons to reject it. Scientific ressources must be named!

It's not really _not_ accepted. It's just not a DSM diagnosis at this time. Mostly what I've run into is "oh, that's interesting." Many disease names exist on a provisional basis long before they become official. Not that I'm really certain that it _will_ become official. I'm agnostic on it.Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I agree that scientific sources should be used, ideally on an exclusive basis. Skinwalker 16:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Newspapers and online portals that copy from each other do not count for resources.

It is absolutely NOT acceptable that term is presented in a way that people believe it is a medical condition like bulimie or anorexia!

Why not? Please review WP:NPOV and WP:NOR. Thanks! Skinwalker 16:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Dear Skinwalker: the concept is not accepted by academics like other disorders. Thus it cannot be presented in that way! Please stop deleating my contributions! I always try to consider your objections.

I agree with Anonymous; this article is presented as if Orthorexia nervosa were an actual medical term for an actual condition, which it's not. There are serious, irredemable flaws here:
  1. This "disorder" was "discovered" without help from the scientific method. It's pseudoscience pure and simple.
I agree that this concept is NOT in the category of anorexia and bulimia. First and most important, it is not an official diagnosis. Second, it is clearly far, far less dangerous than those.Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
That is entirely your opinion. Find a credible outside source that defines it as pseudoscience, and we can discuss it as pseudoscientific. Skinwalker 23:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Pseudoscience has a strict definition, that Orthorexia fits. The reference you're demanding is difficult to find because orthorexia is not notable enough for any credible doctor to debunk it. FireWeed 23:15, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Would you be kind enough to link to a few credible articles listing the Theory of Deadly Initials as pseudoscience? FireWeed 23:54, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't think it's pseudoscience; I never claimed that it was an established diagnosis. It's a descriptive expression, like "workaholism." The analogy is close, in that use of a disease name is employed for expressive purposes. Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  1. Lack of any peer review of Orthorexia. No psychologist or doctor takes the idea seriously. The fact that no scientist has spent (wasted) any time on a supposed disorder that was invented almost a decade ago tells us something important. Just as no scientist has spent any time proving the moon exists. Others, like night eating syndrome have been given attention, because those concepts warrent it.
I think this is just wrong. A number of scientists have taken the concept seriously. Whether they've gotten anywhere with it is another story.Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
As of today, there are several peer reviewed articles listed at Pubmed that discuss orthorexia. The rest of this comment is strikingly similar to the No True Scotsman argument. Skinwalker 23:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
  1. Orthorexia nervosa is not listed in the DSM-IV, which is the current version.
The DSM is not the final authority in psychological disorders. For example, the DSM specifically excludes men from being diagnosed with anorexia nervosa, since a criterion for diagnosis is the cessation of menstruation. This omission has been criticized, since there are men that objectively suffer from anorexia, and there are quite a few other obscure disorders that the DSM ignores. If you look at the Veganism talk archives, I argued against discussing orthorexia on that article since it is not in the DSM, but we can and should neutrally discuss it on its own page. Skinwalker 23:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
  1. The concept is absurd on its face. If there's a shred of truth here, it could be described as people with obsessive compulsive disorder turning their attention to their diet. If so, that's already covered by OCD.
I agree that it might turn out to be best described as a form of OCD.Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I still think you're taking out your displeasure with the term on this article, which neutrally reports on the controversy surrounding the term. Skinwalker 23:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
In short, orthorexia should not be presented as a medical condition, because that's not what it is.
Are you a doctor, perchance? Just curious... Cheers, Skinwalker 23:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
My wife is. FireWeed 23:17, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Being one myself, and the inventor of the term, I agree: it's not a medical condition. It might or might not be one in the future. Right now, it's only a descriptive term. However, it's increasingly widely used, and it is a subject of study. So it's in an intermediate stage from pure hot air (my original use of the term) and something more substantial. Sbratman (talk)
FireWeed 19:09, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vegetarians are (all) mentally ill?

"The subject may avoid certain foods, such as those containing fats, preservatives, or animal products." Hopefully I can voice my objection without sparking a debate on the merits of vegetarianism. What matters are that these people represent a sizable group. According to time Magazine 10 million Americans are practicing vegetarians and 20 million have flirted with the idea in the past.[1] As a percent, England is more "veggy" than the United States. Then we have Krishnas, immensely popular in India, who avoid meat.

Are we really to believe that tens of millions of people world-wide suffer a psychological eating disorder, one that doesn't exist according to the scientific community? Without even looking into whether avoiding animal products is healthy or unhealthy, the numbers are far too many to call this a pathology.

Now, still quoting the Time article, The American Dietetic Association, a pretty centrist group, has proclaimed that "appropriately planned vegetarian diets are healthful, are nutritionally adequate and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases." George Bernard Shaw complained in his 90s that the one problem he suffered from vegetarianism was longevity - not being able to die. On the whole, it seems that well-planned vegetarianism is healthy, which, again, seems to make it impossible to call an "eating disorder."

FireWeed 20:04, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you should meditate on the meaning of "well-planned". Cheers, Skinwalker 23:58, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps you could stop talking in riddles? You've been an outspoken critic of veganism on wikipedia and have reverted constructive edits of mine with no explanation - please, don't just be bold, but be clear, too. Thanks. FireWeed 05:43, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
Let me be clear, then. There is little doubt that a well-planned vegetarian diet results in the health benefits described in the Time magazine article you cited. You are, however, conflating the concept of orthorexia with vegetarianism as a whole. As I'm sure you know, there is a wide spectrum of vegan/vegetarian dietary notions, ranging from the scientifically based to those that are not very well-planned at all. I am not so much a critic of veganism as I am a skeptic of sweeping, uncritical claims of health benefits that are not supported by evidence-based medicine.
The concept of orthorexia is certainly controversial, and the article notes it. I don't believe that controversy, however, amounts to pseudoscience, particularly since there are peer-reviewed articles that discuss the concept. There is also a fair amount of anecdotal evidence that supports the concept, although I don't trust anecdotal claims very much in any field. I suspect you are taking out your displeasure with the concept on this article, which reports in a neutral manner on orthorexia and cites skepticism of the term among dieticians. The simple fact that you don't like the term doesn't mean that the wikipedia article about it is biased.
While it may not be germane to this discussion, you may want to take a look here[2]. This article is written by a long-term vegetarian who describes the use of pseudoscience in the vegan/raw community. I apologize for being elliptical in my earlier post. I have grown tired of arguing with True Believers, but I have written this reply in order to give you the benefit of the doubt. Cheers, Skinwalker 23:34, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
I see. When you asked me to "meditate" on the meaning of well-planned, it was an opportunity to change the subject. True believers is a red herring.
I'm confused. An opportunity to change the subject to what? Skinwalker 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
The trouble has little to do with whether a vegetarian diet is actually more ( or less ) healthy; there are at least a hundred million of them world wide, and probably vastly more. Vegetarianism is a practice that has survived thousands of years, at least in India. By definition this is not a random pathology - it's an enduring part of the human condition.
Again, well planned vegetarian and even vegan diets are not pathological, and are not considered pathological by the dietetic community. The concept of orthorexia points out that a small subset of "healthy eaters", be they vegetarian or otherwise, display obsessive symptoms that impact their quality of life through factors like stress (as you note above) and malnutrition. Skinwalker 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
Further, if you look at real eating disorders, the people who suffer them generally describe the overwhelming compulsion to eat a certain type of food in a certain situation - as difficult to resist as heroin or crack cocaine. Avoiding foods which are unhealthy most certainly does not fit the pattern. And is quite distinct from anorexia - the near inability to eat anything, regardless of its nutrition value.
There was a lot of debate on the veganism page some time ago about the inclusion of a section on eating disorders. The main gist - which a lot of pro-vegan editors had trouble understanding - is that veganism or vegetarianism does not cause eating disorders, but these diets can be selected by people with existing eating disorders to camoflauge their pathology. Personally, I am not convinced that orthorexia qualifies as an eating disorder like bulimia or anorexia, but our job as encyclopedists is to neutrally report on sometimes controversial topics, and I believe that this article as it stands accomplishes that. Skinwalker 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
Woody Harrleson, from Cheers and from the marijuanna movement, made a documentary about organic products and their incorporation into modern life. There's a scene where somebody asks one of his co-travellers and co-stars ( who observes a raw-only diet ) if she misses cooked bread. The woman replies that she does miss it when she walks by a bakery, but doesn't want to get cancer of the intestines. There's no evidence whatsoever to suggest that cooked food is carcenogenic, and a great deal to the contrary. This woman's zealousness embarasses her entire community. I won't for a second argue that pseudoscience doesn't exist in vegans ... in fact, from the ones I've met, I have reason to be sad. One claims evolution as her religion, but doesn't understand the mechanics of evoltution. I'm not trying to argue that vegetarianism is an inherently better diet - only that I don't believe it could be reasonably considered an eating disorder. You're right that it's our job as editors to present a neutral and complete view on controversial subjects, and let the reader make an informed descision. I just don't believe the article as it stands does that. FireWeed 23:19, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
You are of course correct that there exists plenty of pseudo-science in the vegan community, and far more in the raw foods only community. And I'm correct to point out that it's currently snowing in Seattle. Both have the same value in terms of the objection I'm trying to raise here. FireWeed 22:23, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
I included the link not because it had anything to do with our current discussion, but because of your demonstrated interests in pseudoscience and vegetarianism. I thought you would find it interesting. Cheers, Skinwalker 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
Oh, I found it very interesting, I just seem to have read it out of context. It seemed as if you were calling me a True Believer as a way to dismiss my criticism here. Apologies. FireWeed 23:19, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Does this page belong on Wikipedia at all?

A comment left on my talk page:

Hello Fireweed. If you don't think this article is encyclopedic, you could always take it to AfD! The long and twisted history of the article does not (in fact) seem to reflect much progress. And even hoaxes require notability to deserve an article. (They have to fool a lot of people, see WP:HOAX). I don't agree that Orthorexia nervosa should be a 'See also' on Junk science. Perhaps it should simply be deleted. EdJohnston 06:09, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

You are of course welcome to nominate this article for AFD, but it has already survived a previous AFD (see link at the top of the talk page) with an overwhelming consensus to keep. Cheers, Skinwalker 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I saw that, which is the main reason I'm not going to AFD this article. ( That, and in general I don't believe it's helpful to remove information from an encyclopedia, except in the most extreme cases. While I don't believe in what's presented here, others, like you, seem to believe that what's reported is valid. I think you're generally wrong, but my own believe isn't enough to try and remove your and others' good faith work. ) However, I put a link to this article on the pseudoscience page, under the "in health care" section, as I believe this is a concept that claims to be scientific yet doesn't follow the scientific method, and wanted to share the reaction I got privately, to provide context.
For the record, I think that anything can be carried too far, to an obsession that hurts the individual. This seems to be where the age-old saying "Everything in moderation" comes from. But I also believe in the scientific method, and that eating disorder has a clear scientific and medical defintion that hasn't been demonstratably met here. FireWeed 23:24, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree with you this hasn't reached the scientific level of one of the major psychiatric conditions (not that those are terribly scientific, but we're talking relative status). On the other hand, it's somewhat more than nothing, and it's not identical to ordinary OCD. Keep in mind I'm primarily talking about a type of obsession with health food that is unpleasant to the person his- or herself (eg, ego dystonic), and that feels both detrimental and impossible to stop. Sbratman (talk) 23:53, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "A first scientific study on the subject was published in 2004..."

It would be incredibly helpful if somebody could summarize the results of this study? Thanks. FireWeed 23:45, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

One of the criteria for Junk science is "Recommendations based on studies published without peer review. " Google turns up two results when searching for this study. One is obvious spam, the other is in a foreign language and requires membership. Clearly, this purported "scientific study" has had no peer review. Claiming that a study has been done, without telling us what that study found, is dishonest. The writer was trying to validate the concept as actual science, by "name dropping" of the word science - a lot like "weasel words." If the study isn't available to satisfy WP:Verifiability AND is only mentioned to lend credibility to a subject that obviously needs some, it must go. SeattleChronic 20:08, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Your statements are demonstrably untrue. The journal "Eating and Weight Disorders" is peer-reviewed, is published in english, and makes its article abstracts available online free of charge[3]. Please review the instructions for authors, which state that all manuscripts are sent out to two referees and are reviewed by the editorial board as well. I have as yet been unable to access the full articles, but here are the abstracts:

Orthorexia nervosa: validation of a diagnosis questionnaire. * Donini LM, * Marsili D, * Graziani MP, * Imbriale M, * Cannella C. Istituto di Scienza dell'Alimentazione, Universita degli Studi di Roma La Sapienza, Rome, Italy. lorenzomaria.donini@uniroma1.it AIM: To validate a questionnaire for the diagnosis of orhorexia oervosa, an eating disorder defined as "maniacal obsession for healthy food". MATERIALS AND METHODS: 525 subjects were enrolled. Then they were randomized into two samples (sample of 404 subjects for the construction of the test for the diagnosis of orthorexia ORTO-15; sample of 121 subjects for the validation of the test). The ORTO-15 questionnaire, validated for the diagnosis of orthorexia, is made-up of 15 multiple-choice items. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: The test we proposed for the diagnosis of orthorexia (ORTO 15) showed a good predictive capability at a threshold value of 40 (efficacy 73.8%, sensitivity 55.6% and specificity 75.8%) also on verification with a control sample. However, it has a limit in identifying the obsessive disorder. For this reason we maintain that further investigation is necessary and that new questions useful for the evaluation of the obsessive-compulsive behavior should be added to the ORTO-15 questionnaire.

Orthorexia nervosa: a preliminary study with a proposal for diagnosis and an attempt to measure the dimension of the phenomenon. * Donini LM, * Marsili D, * Graziani MP, * Imbriale M, * Cannella C. Istituto di Scienza dell'Alimentazione, Universita degli Studi di Roma La Sapienza, Italy. lorenzomaria.donini@uniroma1.it AIM: To propose a diagnostic proceeding and to try to verify the prevalence of orthorexia nervosa (ON), an eating disorder defined as "a maniacal obsession for healthy foods". MATERIALS AND METHODS: 404 subjects were enrolled. Diagnosis of ON was based on both the presence of a disorder with obsessive-compulsive personality features and an exaggerated healthy eating behaviour pattern. RESULTS: Of the 404 subjects examined, 28 were found to suffer from ON (prevalence of 6.9%). The analysis of the physiological characteristics, the social-cultural and the psychological behaviour that characterises subjects suffering from ON shows a higher prevalence in men and in those with a lower level of education. The orthorexic subjects attribute characteristics that show their specific "feelings" towards food ("dangerous" to describe a conserved product, "artificial" for industrially produced products, "healthy" for biological produce) and demonstrate a strong or uncontrollable desire to eat when feeling nervous, excited, happy or guilty.

Can you please explain, now that it is established that these articles are peer-reviewed and constitute proper scientific citations, why they do not belong in this article? I will try and find the full text of the articles in the coming days (may have to pay a visit to the local state med school library) and better summarize the conclusions of these studies. Cheers, Skinwalker 23:32, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Now that it is established that these articles are peer-reviewed and constitute proper scientific citations, they belong here. However, the simple mention that a "scientific study" has been performed, with no mention of its outcome, methodology, or anything else about it, as the article stood for weeks or months, was clearly inappropriate for an encyclopedia. FireWeed 23:45, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Good. Since you agree that these articles are relevant, I have incorporated summaries of their conclusions into the page. I would still like to find the full articles, since abstracts typically do not tell the full story. My university proxy server, unfortunately, does not allow me access to this specific journal.
Since we now have discussion independent of Dr. Bratman on the disorder, I have tweaked the article somewhat to remove some of the "Dr. Bratman says", "Dr. B asserts" phrases, and I have based the symptoms and diagnostic sections on the studies rather than Dr. Bratman. Cheers, Skinwalker 18:43, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A view based on psychology and science

Anorexia nervosa is an ANXIETY disorder. So bulimia, pica, and so on. Note that the anorexic doesn't avoid food based on its health value; she avoids all food whenever possible. This isn't a bad decision, it's an example of a person who can't control anxiety, despair, and guilt related to her body image. The bulimic doesn't vomit only unhealthy food - again, we have an example of a person whose anxiety pushes them to the brink of starvation.

What's described in this article is clearly not an anxiety disorder. We're reading about people who make a logical choice, perhaps based on faulty logic or bad information, but clearly choose their diet based on their faculties, on logical analysis, rather than on anxiety. Therefore, "orthorexia" cannot be an eating disorder.

Further, what's described here is a healthy behavior that more people should adopt. It's possible for an individual to take any behavior too far, but such cases would be examples of obsessive compulsive disorder, much like the person who locks his door, walks halfway to his car, and then returns to check the door and ensure that it's really locked. This is why you'll find little to no scientific peer review. We don't waste our time on nonsense, as it would encourage the impression that science as a whole takes this type of snake oil seriously. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.216.188.164 (talk) 19:30, 22 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] A suggestion

Since the article gives the appearance that a medical condition is being discussed, i think the article would do well to clearly note how the AMA weighs in on the issue (or has/does not weigh in). Don't get me wrong, I would not trust the AMA (a self-serving trade union to be sure) with my own life/health, but how they view this "concept should be mentioned. Of course once the AMA gets an idea for how much more money they can make off of it no doubt they will state it's a disease for which they hold the cure! Oh well...Mr Christopher 00:10, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the AMA wouldn't be the governing body in this case -- it would be the American Psychiatric Association, through their influence on the DSM IV. But the APA doesn't randomly go around issuing opinions of this kind. There are numerous psychiatric concepts floating around that haven't made it into the DSM IV. Some never will; others will in time. It's rather less precise, and less unanimous, a field than, say, heart disease. Sbratman (talk) 23:47, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia page ownership

I thought everyone owned Wikipedia knowledge at once, and no one in particular? That's obviously not the case, as one user has done 60 % of the editing to this page based on the edit history, and will not tolerate anything being listed here that doesn't conform to the Skinwalker point of view. This is why Wikipedia is so worthless; when one person is allowed to take ownership of an article purporting to share knowledge, and is allowed to push a certain point of view and censor any facts disputing this the article suddenly becomes worthless, and all of Wikipedia is cast in doubt.

I want the $50 back I donated to the wiki foundation during their pledge drive. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.22.219.128 (talk) 17:19, 6 May 2007 (UTC).

There is no evidence of ownership behavior on this article. The most recent page of the history shows at least 13 or 14 people editing the article, and not all in agreement with each other in their approaches. I see a dynamically evolving article that has improved over time. --Parzival418 Hello 18:34, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What's "healthy food"?

I think that an interesting point of discussion for this article would be what the patient diagnosed with orthorexia nervosa would consider to be "healthy food". Are they mostly vegetarians? Or even vegans? Does a significant amount of them eat only raw food? —msikma (user, talk) 19:43, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

When I first invented the term, I mostly had people following macrobiotics in mind, along with, to a lesser extent, rawfoodists, fruitarians (and breatharians), and people overly obsessed with food allergies. These days, macrobiotics has declined a lot. Raw foodism, conversely is bigger. Also, there are people who follow a lot of rather random healthy diets (or so it seems to me).Sbratman (talk) 23:55, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I would assume that the foods they eat are verry healthy. They probably do not exercise diversity: they might exclude physical exercise from their schedules, or they may be so well acquainted with the health benefits of one food substance that they rely on only that one substance to provide for all of their health needs. Don't quote me on this though. Zbrown52 (talk) 19:02, 10 June 2008 (UTC)