Michael Lowe

Publications (2)2.23 Total impact

• Article: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy as a Novel Treatment for Eating Disorders: An Initial Test of Efficacy and Mediation.

  Adrienne Juarascio, Jena Shaw, Evan Forman, C Alix Timko, James Herbert, Meghan Butryn, Douglas Bunnell, Alyssa Matteucci, Michael Lowe
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  ABSTRACT: Eating disorders are among the most challenging disorders to treat, with even state-of-the-art cognitive-behavioral treatments achieving only modest success. One possible reason for the high rate of treatment failure for eating disorders is that existing treatments do not attend sufficiently to critical aspects of the disorder such as high experiential avoidance, poor experiential awareness, and lack of motivation. These variables are explicit targets of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). The current study examined the efficacy of an ACT-based group treatment for eating disorders by examining whether the addition of ACT groups to treatment-as-usual (TAU) at a residential treatment facility for eating disorders would improve treatment outcomes. TAU patients received an intensive residential treatment, while ACT patients received these services but additionally attended, depending on diagnosis, either ACT for anorexia nervosa groups or ACT for bulimia nervosa groups. Although individuals in both treatment conditions demonstrated large decreases in eating pathology, there were trends toward larger decreases among those receiving ACT. ACT patients also showed lower rates of rehospitalization during the 6 months after discharge. Overall, results suggest that ACT is a viable treatment option for individuals with eating pathology and further outcome research is warranted.
  Behavior modification 03/2013; · 2.23 Impact Factor
• Source

  Available from: Evan M Forman

  Article: Implicit internalization of the thin ideal as a predictor of increases in weight, body dissatisfaction, and disordered eating.

  Adrienne S Juarascio, Evan M Forman, C Alix Timko, James D Herbert, Meghan Butryn, Michael Lowe
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  ABSTRACT: The freshman year of college has been identified as a time when some students experience large changes in their eating behaviors, body image, and weight. One factor that is predictive of changes in these variables is internalization of the thin ideal (i.e., the degree to which an individual has accepted societal values of thinness and applies these values to herself). However, given the limitation of self-report and previous research demonstrating the additional predictive validity implicit measurement provides, it may be important to develop an implicit paradigm for assessing internalization of the thin ideal. The Implicit Association Test is the most common implicit measurement technique. However this test is associational in nature, which reflects only one aspect of human cognition. The current study evaluates a newly-created implicit measure of internalization of the thin ideal that utilizes the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP). In particular, the study investigates concurrent and prospective associations between internalization of the thin ideal and disordered eating, body image dissatisfaction, and weight in a group of women at the beginning and end of their freshman year in college. Results of the study indicate that weight, disordered eating and body image dissatisfaction increased during the freshman year, and that these were predicted by implicit internalization of the thin ideal at the beginning of the year. Moreover, the new implicit measure was predictive above and beyond any predictive ability of the explicit measure. Results indicate that the thin ideal IRAP can successfully predict changes in many variables of interest at the freshman year of college, and suggest it may be a beneficial screening tool to assess at-risk freshman. This study also highlights the need for additional implicit measures in the realm of body image and disordered eating.
  Eating behaviors 08/2011; 12(3):207-13.