Maternal care from the perspective of mothers of young people with eating disorders

• Grant number: 25/13356-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: November 01, 2025
• End date: October 31, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Psychology
• Principal Investigator: Manoel Antônio dos Santos
• Grantee: Lívia Costa Coelho
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (FFCLRP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Ribeirão Preto , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The literature indicates that eating disorders (EDs) may be associated with the maintenance of a dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship pattern, characterized by a fusional or undifferentiated bond, in interaction with other predisposing factors. One of the theoretical assumptions is that the fusional/symbiotic bond - which implies the persistence of an initial, rudimentary state of undifferentiation between self and other -stems from failures in the separation-individuation process, which relates to the development of subjectivity in the early stages of the mother-child relationship. The capacity for motherhood may be influenced by the emotional care experiences that a woman, as a mother, received from her own mother at the beginning of life. Based on these assumptions, the emergence of a psychopathological configuration such as EDs can be better understood by investigating early mothering experiences. The aim of this study is to investigate the experiences of mothers of patients diagnosed with EDs regarding the primary maternal care provided to their daughters. Drawing on the theoretical framework of intergenerational psychic transmission, this study seeks to identify how maternal psychic experiences lived by previous generations, when left unprocessed and untransformed, can be transmitted transgenerationally to daughters affected by ED symptoms. This is a clinical-qualitative, cross-sectional, and exploratory study. Mothers of patients diagnosed with anorexia or bulimia who attend an outpatient clinic specializing in ED care at a university hospital will participate. After signing the Informed Consent Form, two instruments will be administered face-to-face: a Sociodemographic Data Form and a Semi-Structured Interview Script, with questions focusing on the participants' experiences of motherhood and the meanings they attribute to it. The data will be supplemented by the researcher's notes in a field notebook, forming part of her psychoanalytic narrative. Data will be collected in a private room at the service location, during the patients' scheduled outpatient appointments. The material will be analyzed qualitatively using the Reflective Thematic Analysis technique proposed by Braun and Clarke and interpreted in light of the adopted theoretical framework.