GENDER AND BDD ACROSS THE LIFE SPAN BDD AND GENDER: WHAT ABOUT GENDER DIFFERENCES?
What about gender differences? In my studies, I’ve found more similarities than differences between men and women with BDD. Men and women appear similar in terms of most demographic features (e.g., age and employment status) and in terms of most clinical features, such as which body areas they dislike, BDD behaviors, severity of BDD symptoms, degree of impairment in functioning, and number of suicide attempts. Men and women are also largely similar in terms of how many have coexisting psychiatric disorders, including anorexia nervosa, panic disorder, and depression. This latter finding is interesting because, in the general population, these disorders affect more women than men. Why men with BDD appear to have as high a rate of depression as women with BDD is puzzling. Although this finding requires confirmation, there are several possible explanations. One is that depression may often be “secondary” to BDD—that is, resulting from the distress and impairment that BDD causes. My clinical impression and recent research findings suggest that this is often the case. If this theory is correct, then it isn’t surprising that men and women are equally likely to be depressed, because they experience similar degrees of distress and impairment as a result of their BDD symptoms. Another possible explanation is that the same underlying biological and psychological mechanisms that cause BDD also contribute to the depression that accompanies BDD; because in our study BDD affected as many men as women, depression would be expected to as well.*148\204\8*
