A Study on Online Intervention for Early Childhood Eating Disorders during COVID-19

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Mar 20;19(6):3696. doi: 10.3390/ijerph19063696.

Abstract

Eating disorders are among the most common clinical manifestations in children, and they are frequently connected with maternal psychopathological risk, internalizing/externalizing problems in children, and poor quality of mother-child feeding exchanges. During the COVID-19 lockdown, in person assessment and intervention were impeded due to the indications of maintaining interpersonal distancing and by limits to travel. Therefore, web-based methods were adopted to meet patients' needs. In this study N = 278 participants completed the SCL-90/R and the CBCL to examine the psychopathological symptoms of mothers and children (age of the children = 24 months); moreover, the dyads were video-recorded during feeding and followed an online video-feedback based intervention. Maternal emotional state, interactive conflict, food refusal in children, and dyadic affective state all improved considerably, as did offspring internalizing/externalizing problems and mothers' depression, anxiety, and obsession-compulsion symptoms. This study showed that video-feedback web-based intervention might be employed successfully to yield considerable beneficial effects.

Keywords: children; disordered eating; online intervention.

MeSH terms

  • Anxiety Disorders
  • COVID-19* / epidemiology
  • Child, Preschool
  • Communicable Disease Control
  • Feeding and Eating Disorders* / therapy
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Internet-Based Intervention*