SELF ESTEEM, EMOTIONAL DYSREGULATION AND ABNORMAL EATING ATTITUDE AMONG UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

Abstract

The present study was designed to find relationship among self-esteem, abnormal eating attitude and emotional dysregulation and find moderating role of emotional dysregulation on abnormal eating attitude and self-esteem. The sample of research comprised of university students (N=250). The hypothesis predicted that there will be a negative relationship of self-esteem with both emotional dysregulation and abnormal eating attitude. Moreover there will be a positive relationship between abnormal eating attitude and emotional dysregulation. Emotional dysregulation was hypothesized to play the role of moderator in the relationship between self-esteem and abnormal eating attitude. Another objective was to find mean differences in study variables with respect to gender. The findings show that there was negative relationship of self-esteem with emotional dysregulation (r 2=.05, p<. oo1) and abnormal eating attitude (r2= .01, p<.001). Boys tend have higher self-esteem as compared to girls. Male have lower level of abnormal eating attitude and emotional dysregulation.

Some recommendations based on result of this research were to include forms of Interventions that could improve emotional dysregulation and abnormal eating attitude in university students.

In future research could employ longitudinal designs to investigate the temporal relationships between emotional dysregulation, self-esteem, and abnormal eating attitudes. Expanding research to include diverse populations, such as clinical samples and individuals from different cultural backgrounds, would enhance the generalizability of the findings and offer a more comprehensive understanding of the moderation effect.