Master of Public Health Capstone Experience
Shame and Isolation: A pilot qualitative analysis of social experience
narratives from women with eating disorders
Josh Havassy
Capstone Mentor: Dr. Jeanne Grisso
April 2010
Though eating disorders are widely referred to in media and popular culture, there persists a
significant misunderstanding regarding what the experience of having an eating disorder can truly
consist of. Specifically, eating disorders are almost always thought of in regards to food and weight.
And while food and weight play roles, eating disorders can affect nearly every other facet of one’s
life. So to broaden our understanding of eating disorders, the principle objective of this project was
to describe experiences of having an eating disorder in a situation that does not inherently involve
food or weight; specifically, preparing for a social event. Additionally, we aimed to generate
hypotheses for future research investigating the social/interactive parts of life with an eating
disorder.
Thusly, we collected narratives; stories from women with eating disorders describing what
they thought, felt, and did as they prepared to attend a large social gathering. We then used these
narratives in two ways: we ran a series of qualitative analyses on them to tease out common themes,
especially regarding shame and isolation, and we incorporated them into a workshop format
designed to educate people about the breadth of eating disordered experiences.