Eating Behaviors: Prevalence, Psychiatric Comorbidity, and Associations With Body Mass Index Among Male and Female Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans

OBJECTIVE: There is a dearth of research examining eating behaviors, such as binge eating, among male and female veterans. The present study evaluated the prevalence of self-reported eating problems as well as associations with body mass index and psychiatric disorders among male and female Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. METHODS: Participants were 298 male and 364 female veterans (M = 33.3 +/- 10.6 years old) from the Women Veterans Cohort Study, a study of male and female veterans enrolled for Veterans Affairs care in New England or Indiana. Veterans self-reported on emotion- and stress-related eating, eating disorder diagnoses, and disordered eating behaviors. Diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder, and alcohol abuse were obtained from administrative records. RESULTS: Female veterans reported higher rates of eating problems than did their male counterparts. Women and men who engage in disordered eating had higher rates of post-traumatic stress disorder and major depressive disorder, and women who engage in disordered eating had greater rates of alcohol abuse than did female veterans without eating disordered behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: Disordered eating may be a significant issue among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, and veterans with eating problems are more likely to have comorbid mental health conditions that further increase their health risks

Where and With Whom Does a Brief Social-Belonging Intervention Promote Progress in College?

A promising way to mitigate inequality is by addressing students’ worries about belonging. But where and with whom is this social-belonging intervention effective? Here we report a team-science randomized controlled experiment with 26,911 students at 22 diverse institutions. Results showed that the social-belonging intervention, administered online before college (in under 30 minutes), increased the rate at which students completed the first year as full-time students, especially among students in groups that had historically progressed at lower rates. The college context also mattered: The intervention was effective only when students’ groups were afforded opportunities to belong. This study develops methods for understanding how student identities and contexts interact with interventions. It also shows that a low-cost, scalable intervention generalizes its effects to 749 4-year institutions in the United States