Social safeness and eating disorder symptoms: a correlational study exploring associations of social safeness, eating disorder symptoms, social support and shame in a non-clinical young adult sample

Background: A greater experience of “social safeness” in social relationships has been associated with reduced general psychopathology. This association appears to be independent of the perceived level of actual social support. The tripartite model of emotion suggests that experiences of social safeness may be associated with increased activation of the ‘soothing system’, inhibiting the experience of threat and shame. Associations of eating disorder (ED) pathology and shame have been well established. This study aims to answer the questions: Is there an association with experience of social safeness and ED symptoms in a non-clinical sample? Are any associations independent of perceived or received social support? Methods: A non-clinical sample of 80 young adults (aged 18–25) completed an online survey. The survey included measures of ED symptoms, social safeness, perceived and received social support and shame. Correlation and hierarchical regression analyses were conducted to explore cross-sectional associations between variables. Results: Increased sense of social safeness was strongly correlated with reduced ED symptoms. Social safeness explained unique variance in ED symptoms independent of received and perceived social support. Shame and ED symptoms were positively correlated, while shame and safeness were negatively correlated. Conclusions: This study presents evidence of an association between the experience of social safeness and ED symptoms. The impact of the emotional experience of social safeness appears independent of current social support, and may be associated with increased activation of the soothing system, and reduced activation of the threat system and experiences of shame, as in the tripartite model of EDs. Further research could explore these associations in clinical populations and explore whether reduced social safeness is a risk factor for the development / maintenance of EDs, or could be a useful target for ED interventions. Plain english summary: This study looked for a possible link between having a greater general experience of ‘safeness’ in social relationships, and reduced eating disorder symptoms, in a healthy young adult sample. Eighty young adult participants completed online questionnaire measures of eating disorder symptoms, social safeness, social support, and shame. Having a greater sense of ‘social safeness’ was strongly correlated with having lower eating disorder symptoms. This effect seemed to exist independently of the level of social support someone reported. Shame was positively correlated with ED symptoms and negatively correlated with social safeness. These findings are consistent with the ‘tripartite model’ of emotion: the emotional experience of social safeness may be linked with increased activation of the soothing system and reduced activation of shame. A link between reduced experience of ‘social safeness’ and eating disorder symptoms may have useful implications for understanding and intervening with eating disorders.