THE INTELLECTUAL-FUNCTIONING OF ADOLESCENTS WITH ANOREXIA-NERVOSA ANDBULIMIA-NERVOSA

The aim of this study was to investigate the intellectual functioning of a large group of eating disordered adolescents in order to test two hypotheses, viz, that the intellectual functioning of eating disorder ed adolescents conforms to the normal distribution, and that eating di sordered adolescents do not perform better in verbal abilities than in nonverbal abilities. Standard intelligence tests were applied to 190 consecutive out-and inpatients with eating disorder diagnoses. The res ults were compared with those of a group of patients with other disord ers, similar in age, sex, SES, and year of admission. The IQ of the ea ting disordered patients was significantly higher than that of patient s in the comparison group. Patients in the comparison group and bulimi c patients, but not anorexic patients, showed better nonverbal than ve rbal intellectual performance.