ABSTRACT
Focuses on the individual actor's perceptions of and experiences with eating disorders. Individuals’ personal struggles are linked to a myriad of situations that facilitate a reliance on eating disorders. To this end, the chapter is divided into four sections: stressors and triggers, coping responses, the function and meaning of eating disorders and identity transactions. The final section of this chapter addresses how eating disorders are perpetuated by individual women through the identity transactions they engage in and it concludes with a model that identifies specific dimensions of identity transactions and the contexts in which they operate, which offers an explanation of how eating disordered behavior is sustained.
