Development and validation of a multifactorial treatment outcome measure for eating disorders

The purpose of this investigation was to develop a brief self-report invent ory which could be used to evaluate treatment outcome for anorexia and buli mia nervosa. The Multifactorial Assessment of Eating Disorders Symptoms (MA EDS) was constructed to measure six symptom clusters which have been found to be central to the eating disorders: depression, binge eating, purgative behavior, fear of fatness, restrictive eating, and avoidance of forbidden f oods. The factor structure of the MAEDS was found to be stable and it was f ound to have satisfactory reliability and validity. Normative data were col lected so that raw scores could be converted to standardized scores. While still in the experimental stages, the MAEDS shows promise as a valid and ec onomical measure of treatment interventions for anorexia and bulimia nervos a.