Depression, anxiety, and eating disorders and recalled parental rearing behavior

Objectives: Prevalence rates and sex differences in depression, anxiety, and eating disorders and associations with recalled childrearing practices. Methods: Cross-sectional study based on self-report scales: Questionnaire of Recalled Parental Rearing Behavior (German version of EMBU), Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), Fragebogen zur Depressionsdiagnostik nach DSM-IV (German version of the Inventory to Diagnose Depression), and Eating Attitudes Test (EAT). 707 university entrants with an average age of 20 years were tested. Results: Point prevalence rates of 6.2 % for depression, 5.2 % for anxiety disorders, and 6.9 % for eating disorders. Higher rates in females for all of the three disorders. Significant associations of sociodemographic and biographical factors with the recalled parental rearing behavior and mental disorders was found. After controlling the impact of factors such as sex, parental divorce, or the occurrence of chronic physical disease the recalled parental rearing behavior proved to be a significant variable especially for depression (lack of warmth by the father, rejection/punishment and control/overprotection by the mother), but also for anxiety (control/overprotection by the father and rejection/punishment by the mother) and eating disorders (control/overprotection by the mother).