Eating disorders and exercise dependence in triathletes.

Triathletes (N = 203) completed both the Exercise Dependence Questionnaire (EDQ) and the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT). Cluster and discriminant analysis showed that there were four distinct groups. Two out of the four groups showed high EDQ scores with one of these groups displaying an additional eating disorder. The members of the third group only had a high EAT score and the last group showed low scores on both inventories. These four dependence groups differed significantly in a number of descriptive variables, but there were few differences between the primary and secondary exercise dependent groups. It was concluded that the existence of primary exercise dependence was demonstrated, but that there was little distinction between it and secondary dependence for the variables examined.