Who is impacted by eating disorders with Bryn Austin

Release date: November 18, 2024

This episode is the first in Talking About Kids’ series on eating disorders. Over four episodes, leading experts and I will discuss prevalence, consequences, prevention, and the resources available to help you help the kids in your classroom, program or home. We will address body image, food, language, and when and how to intervene. My guest to start us off with a description of who is impacted, who is at-risk, and who is often overlooked, is the award-winning researcher, educator, and advocate, Bryn Austin. Bryn is responsible for some of the most-cited and most-impactful research on eating disorders. She is the Founding Director of the Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders (STRIPED) at Harvard University, where she also is a Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences in the School of Public Health and a Professor of Pediatrics in the Medical School. More information about Bryn and resources hand-picked by her, including a tool for finding treatment providers in your area, are below.

Biography of Bryn Austin

Dr. S. Bryn Austin is an award-winning researcher, teacher, and mentor. She is Professor at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Boston Children’s Hospital, and she directs the Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders: A Public Health Incubator. Dr. Austin is currently a Mental Health Policy Fellow with Inseparable, and she is Past President of both the Academy for Eating Disorders and Eating Disorders Coalition, the leading advocacy organization dedicated to U.S. federal policy on eating disorders. She is a social epidemiologist and behavioral scientist with a research focus on health inequities affecting socially and structurally marginalized youth. She leads two primary research programs: One focuses on environmental influences on eating disorders and public health approaches to prevention of eating disorders with an emphasis on policy translation research and advocacy. The second focuses on determinants of sexual orientation and gender identity disparities in a range of health domains, including disordered weight-related behaviors, substance use, bullying victimization, and other health risk indicators. A unifying goal of her academic career has been to advance innovations in transdisciplinary science applied to eating disorders prevention and the study of health inequities adversely affecting socially and structurally marginalized youth.