ORIGINAL ARTICLE. Sex Influences on Shared Risk Factors for Bulimia Nervosa and Other Psychiatric Disorders

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ORIGINAL ARTICLE Sex Influences on Shared Risk Factors for Bulimia Nervosa and Other Psychiatric Disorders Tracey D. Wade, PhD; Cynthia M. Bulik, PhD; Carol A. Prescott, PhD; Kenneth S. Kendler, MD Background: The examination of opposite-sex and same-sex dizygotic twins allows us to explore the sexspecific comorbidity of psychiatric disorders. To date, this question has not been explored in eating disorders. Objective: To determine whether sex influences shared risk factors between bulimia nervosa (BN) and other forms of psychopathology. Design: The study examines associations between BN and other forms of psychopathology in twin pairs using interview and survey reports. Setting: Twins from the Virginia population-based twin registry. Participants: Male-female dizygotic twins (N=1192 pairs), mean (SD) age 36.6 (8.9) years, and femalefemale dizygotic twins (N=467 pairs), mean (SD) age 36.0 (7.6) years. Main Outcome Measures: Lifetime psychiatric disorders as diagnosed by a structured psychiatric interview, including major depression, anxiety disorders, and substance abuse and dependence. Also, continuous measures of body mass index and personality, including neuroticism and novelty seeking. Results: Significant within-person associations existed for women between BN and higher body mass index, neuroticism, novelty seeking, and all lifetime psychopathology. Results from this study suggest the presence of either familial or nonfamilial shared risk factors between BN and generalized anxiety disorder, neuroticism, psychoactive substance use, novelty seeking, major depression, and panic disorder. The shared risk factors between BN and generalized anxiety disorder and BN and novelty seeking were only present in men. Conclusion: Evidence supports the existence of a sexspecific manifestation of familial liability with respect to BN and generalized anxiety disorder and BN and novelty seeking. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2004;61:251-256 From the School of Psychology, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia (Dr Wade); the Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill (Dr Bulik); and the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Department of Psychiatry, Medical College of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond (Drs Prescott and Kendler). MANY STUDIES SHOW that bulimia nervosa (BN) co-occurs with a range of psychiatric disorders, including major depressive disorder, anxiety disorders, and psychoactive substance dependence. 1 Additionally, the presence of BN is associated with a wide range of personality styles including increased neuroticism, 2 higher levels of novelty seeking, 3,4 and lower premorbid self-esteem than psychiatric control subjects. 5 A variety of community-based studies suggest that at least some of this observed comorbidity is not spurious. In a case-control study of women with BN, women with psychiatric disorders, and healthy control subjects, rates of exposure to most of the putative risk factors differed in the women with BN and the control subjects. 5 However, far fewer differences were evident between women with BN and women with other psychiatric disorders, consistent with the hypothesis that BN is the result of exposure to nonspecific risk factors for psychiatric disorder. Women with BN in the general population are significantly more likely to be experiencing an affective disorder than women in the general population. 6 A community study found significantly more women with BN or partial-syndrome BN to have an anxiety disorder, 7 with social phobia and simple phobia more likely to be elevated than other types of anxiety disorders. Findings from 4 large communitybased studies examining substance abuse problems 8-11 suggest that BN and alcoholrelated disorders do co-occur at a rate greater than chance, with the presence of BN being associated with an approxi- 251

mately 3-fold increase in the risk of alcoholism. 8 Furthermore, individuals with BN have been found to be more likely to have used illicit drugs than either non eating disordered or psychiatric control subjects. 11 The correlational nature of these studies does not permit inference of causality. The question of whether BN shares a common causal factor with other psychiatric disorders and personality styles has therefore been a focus of research in recent years. Family studies provide a design that can address this research question. Some family studies have methodological deficiencies, such as the use of unstructured or semistructured diagnostic procedures of unknown reliability and validity, lack of interviewer blinding, limited statistical power, and reliance on proband rather than relative report in family studies, 12 all of which compromise the interpretability of the studies. However, when the findings of well-designed studies are considered together, some conclusions about shared risk factors between BN and other psychopathology can be made. There is consistent evidence across a range of family studies to suggest that there are no shared risk factors between alcohol dependence and BN. 13-17 One twin study 13 investigated the interplay of genetic and environmental causal factors simultaneously for 6 psychiatric disorders in women, including broadly defined bulimia, phobia, panic disorder, major depression, generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), and alcoholism and found the genetic and environmental risk factors for the psychiatric disorders and alcoholism were quite distinct. This study, however, did find evidence for shared genetic vulnerability between phobia, panic disorder, and bulimia. A further study has supported the presence of shared vulnerability between BN and panic disorder. 18 This same study supported the hypothesis that both GAD and major depressive disorder share a common cause with BN, 18 but another study found that the mode of familial transmission for GAD was unclear and failed to support a shared vulnerability with panic disorder. 14 Interestingly, cluster B personality disorders have been found to be elevated among probands with BN, suggesting that affective instability and impulsivity are important in the development of BN and substance dependence. 14 Cluster B personality disorders are associated with high novelty seeking and low self-directedness in patients receiving treatment for major depression and BN. 19 Previous family studies suffer from low base rates of eating disorders and while 2 studies investigated the sex of the relative of the proband as a covariate, 14,18 they lacked power to investigate any sex influences on shared risk factors. Given the low rates of eating disorders in men, it seems reasonable to hypothesize that there may exist a male equivalent of BN or that sex influences the presence of shared risk factors between BN and other psychopathology. For example, psychopathology that is of higher prevalence in men and that is related to impulsivity, such as substance abuse, might share risk factors with BN in men but not women. Given the absence of any data on whether sex influences the presence of shared risk factors between BN and other forms of psychopathology, the purpose of the current study was to address this question. In order to achieve this purpose, we investigated the presence of such risk factors in 1192 opposite-sex dizygotic (DZ) pairs (male-female) and 467 same-sex DZ twins (femalefemale), where each twin was interviewed regarding their own psychopathology status, and used reliable diagnostic procedures and interviewer blinding. This represented a novel and powerful design where we had access to a large sample of opposite-sex DZ pairs, the twins were correlated for age and shared environment, and the prevalence of eating disorders in men in the general population was low, so we could explore risk for other psychopathology independent of the presence of an eating disorder. As with other family studies, shared risk factors identified in the study of siblings can include either shared familial factors or within-individual factors. METHODS PARTICIPANTS The data were from a population-based longitudinal study of white twins drawn from the Virginia Adult Twin Study of Psychiatric and Substance Use Disorders, formed from a systematic review of all birth records in Virginia after 1918. There were 2 samples examined in the current study. The first was a subset of a group where at least 1 twin in the pair was male and born between 1940 and 1975, as described previously. 20 This population was involved in 2 waves of interviews, the first consisting of a telephone interview (1993-1996) where 6814 (72%) of those approached were successfully interviewed. The second interview was face to face (1994-1998), with 5629 interviews being completed, 83% of the sample interviewed in the first wave. Of this group of male-female twins, 1183 opposite-sex DZ twin pairs participated in both waves of interviews. At the second interview, where lifetime BN was assessed in women, psychiatric diagnoses were available for 1192 twin pairs. The mean (SD) age of this group at the second interview was 36.6 (8.9) years. The second sample, using female twin pairs born between 1934 and 1971, completed 4 waves of interviews and selfreport questionnaires, previously described and reported extensively in the literature. 21 Data for this group were taken from all 4 waves. At the third wave, when lifetime BN was assessed in the same manner as the opposite-sex twins, 88% of the 2163 women approached at wave 1 were interviewed, and this included 467 female-female DZ pairs. The mean (SD) age at wave 3 was 36.0 (7.6) years. Zygosity was determined by standard questions and photographs that have more than 95% accuracy 22 and validated against highly polymorphic polymerase chain reaction markers. 23 Written informed consent was obtained prior to face-to-face interviews and verbal consent, prior to telephone interviews. ASSESSMENT Interviews were conducted blind to information about cotwins. Information about interviewer characteristics was presented earlier. 8,13 Only women were interviewed for lifetime BN, using questions from the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV, 24 with additional questions assessing the severity of bulimic symptoms. The same interview questions were used with the male-female (wave 2) and female-female (wave 3) twin pairs. To maximize statistical power in the study of a low-prevalence disorder, a broad definition of lifetime BN was adopted. This included 2 modifications to the narrow definition of BN. First, the DSM-III-R D criterion was omitted because there appeared to be few meaningful differences be- 252

Table 1. Independent Measures Used to Predict the Presence of Bulimia Nervosa in the Female Twin for the Opposite-Sex Dizygotic Pairs (DZO) and Female Dizygotic Pairs (DZF) Variable Description DZO Interview Wave DZF Interview Wave Continuous measures Body mass index Weight (kg)/height (m 2 ) 2 1 Extraversion and neuroticism 8 and 12 items, respectively, from Eysenck Personality 1 1 Questionnaire 27 Novelty seeking 18 Items from Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire 28 1 4 Self-esteem 10 Items from Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale 29 1 1 Interpersonal dependency 9 Items from Hirschfeld 30 1 1 Lifetime psychopathology DSM-IV SCID for DZO pairs Major depression DSM-III-R or DSM-IV for DZF 2 1, 4 Panic disorder DSM-III-R for DZF 2 1, 2 Generalized anxiety disorder DSM-III-R for DZF 13 2 1 Phobia (any) Diagnosed when an irrational fear was accompanied by 2 1,2,4 significant objective change or impairment Alcohol dependence/abuse DSM-III-R or DSM-IV for DZF; abuse not assessed at 2 1,3,4 waves 1 and 3 Psychoactive substance use/abuse DSM-IV abuse for DZF; including cannabis, sedatives, stimulants, cocaine, opiates, hallucinogens 2 4 Abbreviation: SCID, Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV. tween women who binge and use associated weight-loss methods twice a week and those who use such behaviors less than twice a week. 7,25 On average, women with broadly defined BN had experienced 9 binges each month during a 3-month period. Second, women had to express at least a little bit more concern than most women about their body shape and weight rather than a lot more concern. The reliability of this broad definition has been examined previously. 26 In addition to the diagnosis of BN, we examined lifetime psychopathology and continuous measures of body mass index (current and highest) and personality. These measures and the interview waves at which they were collected are outlined in Table 1. 27-30 Lifetime psychopathology was assessed as being present if participants met the criteria at any of the waves of interviewing. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS Given that men were not assessed for BN, more traditional modelfitting techniques could not be used. Therefore, we used logistic or linear regressions. First, we examined the within-twin association between BN status and our measures of psychopathology in all DZ women. Continuous measures were standardized so that the resulting odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) indicated the change in risk for the dependent measures for every standard deviation change in the independent variable. To examine whether risk for BN in a sister influences risk of psychopathology in her brother, the data of the male and female co-twins were paired with the brother always appearing as twin 1 and the sister as twin 2. In each case, the psychopathology under investigation was included as the dependent variable with the corresponding variable for the sister used as a covariate to ensure that associations between BN and psychopathology were not due to comorbid psychopathology in the sister. The BN status of the sister was then entered as the independent variable. Linear regression was used for the continuous variables (reporting s, standard errors, and t statistics), and logistic regression was used for lifetime psychopathology (reporting ORs and 95% CIs, along with the 2 statistic). For comparison purposes, the same analyses were carried out for the female-female pairs, with all women with BN positioned to appear as twin 2. For greater conceptual clarity, the 1 female-female DZ pair concordant for BN was removed from the analyses. Finally, female-female DZ twins were added to the malefemale sample. To provide a comparison, the regressions were run first as described earlier and the statistics were reported. The regressions were then run with the additional independent variables of the sex of twin 1 and an interaction between sex and twin 2 BN status. Despite clear directional hypotheses, we used an level of.05 for all the analyses to reduce our chances of a type I error. RESULTS PREVALENCE OF BN Strict criteria for BN were met in 26 (2.18%) women from the male-female pairs. A further 49 women met the broad definition of lifetime BN. Therefore, a total of 75 (6.3%) women met criteria for broadly defined lifetime BN. This compares with a 5.1% lifetime prevalence of broadly defined BN in women from the female-female pairs. There was no significant difference between the prevalence of broadly defined BN between the malefemale pairs and the female-female pairs ( 2 =1.24; P=.27). Age was not significantly associated with BN status for the male-female or female-female twins, with an OR of 1.03 (95% CI, 0.99-1.06) and 1.00 (95% CI, 0.96-1.04), respectively. WITHIN-PERSON ASSOCIATIONS WITH BN All associations with BN for women are reported in the second column of Table 2 (continuous measures) and Table 3 (dichotomous lifetime psychopathology). Significant within-person associations with BN in the female twins existed for only 3 continuous measures: a higher body mass index, neuroticism, and novelty seeking. All forms of lifetime psychopathology were significantly associated with BN, with major depression and panic disorder having the strongest associations. 253

Table 2. Association of the Continuous Variables With Bulimia Nervosa (BN) Status Using Linear Regression With Opposite-Sex Dizygotic Pairs (DZO) and Female Dizygotic Pairs (DZF)* Standardized Women (DZO and DZF) Men (DZO) Women (DZF) Women and Men (DZF and DZO) Within-Person Association Between BN Status and DV BN and DV When Controlling for Sister s Corresponding Variable BN and DV When Controlling for Sister s Corresponding Variable Interaction Between Sex and BN Status Body mass index 0.45 (0.11) 0.05 (0.11) 0.08 (0.09) 0.04 (0.08) 1.26 (.21) Neuroticism 0.22 (0.10) 0.27 (0.13) 0.05 (0.21) 0.19 (0.11) 0.99 (.32) Extraversion 0.02 (0.10) 0.08 (0.13) 0.15 (0.22) 0.01 (0.11) 0.87 (.38) Novelty seeking 0.37 (0.10) 0.28 (0.13) 0.40 (0.22) 0.10 (0.12) 2.59 (.01) Self-esteem 0.01 (0.10) 0.08 (0.12) 0.24 (0.21) 0.13 (0.10) 0.62 (.53) Interpersonal dependency 0.18 (0.10) 0.03 (0.12) 0.06 (0.21) 0.01 (0.11) 0.16 (.87) Abbreviation: DV, dependent variable. *Values expressed as (SE) unless otherwise indicated. Values expressed as t (P value). P.001. P.05. ASSOCIATION BETWEEN BROTHER S PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND SISTER S BN STATUS When the relevant covariate trait for the sister was included in the model, the neuroticism and novelty seeking in the brother were associated with BN in the sister (Table 2, column 3), with a 0.27-fold and 0.28-fold increase in risk for BN in the sister associated with every SD=1.00 increase in neuroticism and novelty seeking, respectively, in the brother. The presence of GAD and use of psychoactive substances in the brother predicted BN in the sister (Table 3, column 3). The brother was 8 times more likely to have GAD if his sister had BN and twice as likely to have used psychoactive substances. When the brother s levels of neuroticism and novelty seeking, presence of GAD and major depression, and use of psychoactive substances were entered into a stepwise logistic regression, only GAD (OR, 7.07; 95% CI, 2.57-19.46) and use of psychoactive substances (OR, 2.77; 95% CI, 1.42-5.43) continued to predict the presence of BN in the sister. ASSOCIATION BETWEEN SISTER S PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND SISTER S BN STATUS The predictors of BN status in the female-female pairs are shown in the fourth column of Tables 2 and 3. Unlike the male-female pairs, where there are larger numbers of twins, none of the relationships reached significance. With respect to body mass index, extraversion, and novelty seeking, the direction of the association was in the opposite direction than for the male-female pairs. The associations are all in the same direction for lifetime psychopathology. ASSOCIATION BETWEEN SIBLING S PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND SISTER S BN STATUS IN A COMBINED SAMPLE OF OPPOSITE-SEX DZ AND FEMALE DZ PAIRS The addition of female DZ pairs to the data set showed that there were no cross-twin associations between BN status (twin 2) and any continuous measures (Table 2, column 5) but that significant associations existed with the lifetime psychopathology of major depression, panic disorder, GAD, and psychoactive substance abuse (twin 1) when controlling for the corresponding psychopathology in twin 2 (Table 3, column 5). In the final column of Table 2 and Table 3, interactions between sex and twin 2 BN status are examined. Two interactions were significant, where vulnerability to BN in the sister is expressed as an increased risk of GAD and novelty seeking in male siblings only. COMMENT The results of the present study provide important replication of previous findings pertaining to shared risk factors between BN and other forms of psychopathology. With respect to the within-twin associations, we replicated findings of previous studies showing that BN is associated with novelty seeking, 3,4 neuroticism, 2 and an array of lifetime psychopathology. 1 When we examined the cross-twin associations that could inform us of the presence of shared risk factors, we found a slightly different pattern of results depending on whether we used a malefemale group or a combined male-female and femalefemale group. With the male-female group, novelty seeking, neuroticism, GAD, and psychoactive substance use in the brother were associated with increased risk for BN in the sister. In the female-female group, major depression, panic disorder, GAD, and psychoactive substance use in one sister were associated with increased risk of BN in the other sister. With respect to psychopathology, the reasons for the different pattern of results is due to higher levels of depression and panic disorder in the women compared with the men, giving more power to the combined analyses. With respect to the continuous measures, it seems that neuroticism and novelty seeking in women have somewhat different relationships with BN in women than men. Neuroticism has a negligible relationship with BN in women but a significant one in men, whereas the directions of association with novelty seeking are different across men and women. 254

Table 3. Association of the Lifetime Psychopathology With Bulimia Nervosa (BN) Status Using Logistic Regression With Opposite-Sex Dizygotic Pairs (DZO) and Female Dizygotic Pairs (DZF)* Dependent Variable Women (DZO and DZF) Men (DZO) Women (DZF) Women and Men (DZF and DZO) Within-Person Association Between BN Status and DV BN and DV When Controlling for Sister s Psychopathology BN and DV When Controlling for Sister s Psychopathology Interaction Between Sex and BN Status Major depression 2.71 (1.79-4.11) 1.64 (0.98-2.75) 2.08 (0.97-4.46) 1.83 (1.21-2.77) 0.20 (.66) Panic disorder 2.72 (1.51-4.91) 1.52 (0.33-7.14) 2.22 (0.92-5.35) 2.19 (1.05-4.57) 0.07 (.80) General anxiety disorder 2.18 (1.29-3.69) 8.54 (3.31-22.01) 1.59 (0.77-3.29) 2.84 (1.64-4.92) 7.58 (.006) Any phobia 2.18 (1.47-3.23) 1.33 (0.75-2.37) 1.80 (0.81-4.01) 1.52 (0.96-2.42) 0.33 (.56) Alcohol dependence 2.30 (1.46-3.64) 1.18 (0.67-2.06) 1.97 (0.79-4.83) 1.24 (0.78-1.98) 1.07 (.30) Alcohol abuse 2.04 (1.30-3.22) 1.33 (0.79-2.22) 1.44 (0.51-4.05) 1.14 (0.74-1.77) 0.01 (.91) Illicit psychoactive substance use 1.87 (1.25-2.80) 2.31 (1.22-4.34) 1.75 (0.73-4.21) 2.00 (1.21-3.31) 0.23 (.63) Illicit psychoactive substance abuse 2.40 (1.50-3.84) 1.23 (0.70-2.16) 1.37 (0.47-3.98) 1.16 (0.71-1.89) 0.02 (.88) Abbreviation: DV, dependent variable. *Values expressed as odds ratio (95% confidence interval) unless otherwise indicated. Values expressed as 2 (P value). P.001. P.01. P.05. Unlike many family studies, we found that there was strong evidence to suggest that BN does share familial risk factors with GAD. Consistent with this evidence was our finding that neuroticism and BN share familial risk factors. In the present study, there exists a significant association between GAD and neuroticism (OR,1.29; 95% CI, 1.20-1.34). The results of one previous study have been consistent with this result, 18 while another study found the association to be unclear. 14 Yet another study 13 found that BN only shared a small degree of genetic risk factors with GAD in women. One notable limitation of this latter study was the absence of data from men, leading the authors to warn that sex differences in prevalence rates and risk factors for common psychiatric disorders may not permit extrapolation of the results to men. Our finding that risk for BN in one sibling is translated to risk for GAD in the other sibling only if the other sibling is male supports the existence of sex-specific manifestation of familial liability. We also found that risk for BN in one sibling is translated to risk for higher levels of novelty seeking in the other sibling only if the other sibling is male. This temperament style may have a behavioral marker in the use of psychoactive substances. In support of this argument, use of psychoactive substances was significantly associated with novelty seeking in the male-female sample, with an OR of 1.03 (95% CI, 1.00-1.06). Novelty seeking, a tendency toward frequent exploratory activity and excitement in response to novel stimuli, 4 is associated with cluster B personality disorders 19 and therefore represents an agreement with the results of Lilenfeld et al. 14 Psychoactive substance abuse and GAD were the only variables retained in our multivariable analysis and may represent the most salient markers of the temperament traits that put people at risk of developing BN. With a positive but nonsignificant association between GAD and psychoactive substance use, one wonders whether in some people there is an aversive juxtaposition of a general anxiety and novelty seeking, where binge eating may serve to temporarily alleviate the tension between the 2 opposing tendencies. However, in some individuals, this may represent 2 different subtypes of risk factors. While we did find that psychoactive substance use shared risk factors with BN in this group, we found no evidence to suggest that substance abuse or dependence did. These results are consistent with many risk factor studies 13-18 and suggest that despite rigorous evidence pointing to a co-occurrence of BN with alcohol and drugrelated disorders beyond chance, 10-11 this co-occurrence is not due to shared familial risk factors. Given that male and female adolescents who binge eat are more likely to use all types of substances than nonbingers and both behaviors are associated with lower self-esteem in girls and higher levels of depression in boys, 31 plausible alternative explanations for the co-occurrence are that the experience of BN leads to drug or alcohol problems (or vice versa) or that a mediating third variable (eg, low selfesteem) accounts for the co-occurrence. In summary, results from this study suggest the presence of either familial or nonfamilial shared risk factors between BN and GAD, neuroticism, psychoactive substance use, novelty seeking, major depression, and panic disorder. These shared risk factors between BN and GAD and BN and novelty seeking are only present in men, thereby supporting the existence of a sex-specific manifestation of familial liability for BN. This suggests that sex of family members must be incorporated into future analyses so that an effect of sex on shared risk factors can be detected. Our findings must be interpreted in the context of 7 limitations. First, we were unable to comment on the nature of these shared risk factors. They may be due to genetic factors, shared environmental factors, or some complex combination of both. Although there is some evidence to suggest a small influence of the shared environment on the development of BN 13 and disordered eating, 32,33 the shared environment only contributes between 1% and 4% of the variance of the etiology of GAD, panic disorder, or major depression. 13 Therefore, the com- 255

mon risk factors are unlikely to be from the shared environment. Second, we did not assess BN in the male twin and therefore may have obtained larger effect sizes than would be the case if we had controlled for the BN status of the brother. As the prevalence of BN in men in the general population is low around 10% of that expected in women the effect of this covariate is unlikely to be substantial. A third limitation relates to our clinical definition of BN. For the purposes of power considerations, we used a broadly defined BN. Given the consistency of our overall results with many other studies and the findings that the so-called subthreshold eating disorders are associated with the same degree of psychopathology as the full-syndrome eating disorders, 7 the validity of our diagnosis is likely to be sound. Fourth, although our results apply to the white paired-twin sample from Virginia, they may not extrapolate to different populations. Fifth, results may be somewhat different if all family members were incorporated or other forms of psychopathology examined. Sixth, we only used one occasion of BN measurement for the male-female pairs, thereby introducing some unreliability of measurement or measurement error. Finally, the interactions should be interpreted qualitatively as well as quantitatively (ie, absence of an interaction does not mean that a trend toward interaction is not present). Conversely, multiple testing could lead to a higher likelihood of type I errors. Submitted for publication May 5, 2003; final revision received September 23, 2003; accepted September 23, 2003. This study was supported by grants MH-40828, MH/AA/DA-49492, DA-11287, and AA-09095 from the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md. An earlier version of this study was presented at the Eating Disorders Research Society annual meeting; November 20,1999; San Diego, Calif. 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