Eating disorders and self-harm are serious health problems in young people, and are associated with poor outcomes. Rates of self-harm and eating disorders increased over adolescence and young adulthood. Further research on mechanisms occurring early in life that underlie the development of both self-harm and eating disorders in adolescence are required to inform potential preventative measures and treatment interventions.
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are robustly associated with both eating disorders and self-harm and may act as a common risk factor for both. However, not everyone who has a stressful experience in childhood goes on to develop psychopathology, and it is unclear what factors may predispose an individual to develop self-harm or eating disorders following an ACE.

Subjective experience has been shown to be more important than objective reports in predicting psychopathology following ACEs. Therefore, two candidate mechanisms via which ACEs may lead to eating disorders and self-harm are 1) how individuals remember events in their past, their autobiographical memory, and 2) how people perceive themselves and their self-worth, their sense of self and self-esteem.

This project will investigate whether different features of autobiographical memory, as well as self-esteem, are on the pathway from ACEs to self-harm and eating disorders.