Orthorexia nervosa: pathological obsession with eating healthy food on adolescents

This bachelor's thesis deals with the concept of orthorexia nervosa. Although it has become a current issue, orthorexia nervosa has been so far studied relatively little and is not very well-known within the Czech context. Orthorexia nervosa can be characterized as a pathological preoccupation with eating healthy food. It is being debated if it is a new eating disorder or a syndrome of one of the existing disorders, with expert views being different. Therefore, the theoretical part of the thesis specifies the concept and offers a closer look into its prevalence, causes, effects and treatment options. The theoretical part also deals with adolescence, eating disorders and specifically chosen Self concepts, such as self-esteem and self-efficacy. The research part of the thesis takes the form of quantitative design. The empirical objective of the thesis is to discover the relationship between orthorexia nervosa and eating disorders and the relationship between orthorexia nervosa, self-esteem and self-efficacy within a target group of adolescents. The sub-objective is to verify the potential difference in orthorexia nervosa prevalence in relation to sex and type of secondary school. The research sample consisted of 397 students at a secondary technical school and a grammar school aged from 15 to 20. The research has been based on the ORTO-15 questionnaire, Eating Attitude Test (EAT-26), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) and General Self-Efficacy Scale (DOVE). The findings have proved that within the sample there is a statistically significant positive relationship between orthorexia nervosa and abnormal attitudes to food such as dieting, bulimia and food preoccupation and oral control. A statistically significant relationship between orthorexia nervosa and the chosen Self concepts has not been found. The findings have also shown that the prevalence of orthorexia nervosa is statistically higher in females than males and in grammar school students compared to secondary technical school students