Anxiety, depression, and trauma frequently intersect and may manifest through disordered eating behaviors that present differently across cultural contexts and intergenerational narratives. Effective care requires cultural humility, nuanced assessment, and a decolonized framework that centers the client’s lived experience while recognizing the broader mental health factors influencing emotional regulation and coping.

Clinicians should distinguish disordered behaviors from culturally normative practices and explore how identity, community expectations, and relational pressures shape emotional expression and coping. Providers are encouraged to approach emotional processes with curiosity, to recognize the role of trauma in emotional avoidance, and to actively challenge systemic biases within eating disorder and mental health care.

By the end of the presentation, participants will be able to:

• Describe how trauma, anxiety, and depression contribute to emotional avoidance in eating disorders.
• Recognize culturally influenced expressions of disordered eating and family narratives around food, emotion, and mental health.
• Differentiate disordered eating from cultural practices using culturally humble assessment strategies.
• Apply trauma-informed, identity-affirming interventions that target emotional avoidance and increase emotion tolerance, and support recovery from anxiety and depression.

Register Here