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Purpose: Invalidating childhood environments have been characterised as those in which caregivers do not validate a child's personal experiences and the communication of emotions is considered inappropriate, being either ignored or punished. The current study assessed the relationships among invalidating childhood environments, body dissatisfaction, disordered eating and difficulties in close relationships in a sample of college students., Methods: In this study, 362 non-clinical participants with ages ranging from 17 to 25 years (M = 20.02, SD = 1.51) completed self-report measures., Results: Difficulties in close relationships, body dissatisfaction and disordered eating were significantly higher in invalidating families than in validating families. Invalidating childhood environments were associated with higher body dissatisfaction and disordered eating, and both associations were mediated by difficulties in close relationships. Finally, body dissatisfaction mediates the effects of BMI and difficulties in close relationships on eating disorder symptoms., Conclusions: Perceived experiences of invalidation in childhood may be associated with eating disorder symptomatology. In addition, difficulties in close relationships during adulthood possibly contribute to the emergence of eating disorder symptoms., Level of Evidence: Level V, descriptive study.

Purpose: The current study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of the Portuguese version of the invalidating childhood environment scale (ICES) in a non-clinical and clinical sample of eating disorder (ED) patients. This study also investigated the between-sample differences regarding invalidating parental behaviors and family styles and explored the associations between invalidating childhood environments and eating pathology., Methods: A sample of 410 high school and college students and 101 patients with a diagnosis of ED completed self-report measures. Principal component analyses and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to examine the factor structure of the ICES. The internal consistency and the between-sample differences and associations between invalidating childhood environments and eating pathology were also tested., Results: Principal component analyses and confirmatory factor analyses indicated a two-factor solution for each parent. The ICES demonstrated high internal consistency and was able to differentiate between non-clinical and clinical samples. The perception of parental invalidation was higher in ED patients, and the clinical sample presented higher scores in the chaotic and perfect family styles and lower scores in the validating family style, in comparison with the non-clinical sample. Both maternal invalidation and invalidating styles were significantly associated with a higher ED symptomatology., Conclusions: The Portuguese version of the ICES revealed adequate psychometric properties. Considering the relationship between invalidation in family and eating pathology, the ICES may be useful in clinical practice, especially among ED patients., Level of Evidence: Level V, cross-sectional descriptive study.