Anorexia nervosa is a severe eating disorder that might result in the emergence of multiple complications. It is also characterized by the refusal to maintain the normal body weight, distorted view of weight and shape, amenorrhea, of fears of becoming overweight (Comer, 2013). However, regardless of the severe risks and long recovery process, numerous athletes or gymnasts, especially female ones, have this eating disorder or have a risk of acquiring it. Several factors can explain this negative tendency. First of all, female gymnastics is a highly competitive environment with strict demands on body parameters, such as weight and height (Kontele et al., 2022). Moreover, the average age of successful athletes becomes younger, meaning they have little time to enter the elite and start winning prizes (Kontele et al., 2022). As a result, they acquire numerous fears associated with their future career. Inappropriate nutrition and undesired body mass index changes are among the most common risks mentioned by professional athletes (Kontele et al., 2022). They become stressors impacting them at the unconscious level and triggering alteration of their mentalities.
In such a way, the pressure from the necessity to become successful is one of the major factors contributing to the emergence and development of eating disorders in athletes. The professional sport introduces severe demands to all gymnasts, while the rivalry becomes more significant. It means that less successful sportspeople can be replaced by their peers with better results and BMIs (Kontele et al., 2022). It contributes to the emergence of unconscious fear of eating and consuming nutrients. The scope of the problem is evidenced by its prevalence. Statistics show that elite female athletes have a higher eating disorder prevalence compared to non-competitive ones (Kontele et al., 2022). It shows that the necessity to win and the high price of a mistake cultivate fears among adolescents and might serve as the basis for the refusal to eat healthy amounts of food.
References
Kontele, I., Vassilakou, T., & Donti, O. (2022). Weight pressures and eating disorder symptoms among adolescent female gymnasts of different performance levels in Greece. Children, 9(2), 254.
Comer, R. (2013). Fundamentals of abnormal psychology (7th ed.). Worth Publishers.