Individuation/Attachment Relationships Mediating Between Overall Family Boundaries and Drive for Thinness and Bulimia Behaviors Reported by College Females

One hundred twenty–four college females completed measures of overall family enmeshed/disengaged boundaries, attachment to parents, autonomy from parents, differentiation from peers, and thinness and bulimia behaviors. Bootstrapping results for multiple mediators highlighted the specific indirect paths that the attachment/individuation process has in the relationship between an overall enmeshed/disengaged structural family boundary and excessive worries about thinness and bulimia. Attachment with parents had strong unique indirect effects for concerns about thinness. The unique influence of connection with parents was balanced with the unique influence of feelings of autonomy from parents in the indirect path for bulimia.