ArticleJournal of clinical medicine2021
AN-VR-BE. A Randomized Controlled Trial for Reducing Fear of Gaining Weight and Other Eating Disorder Symptoms in Anorexia Nervosa through Virtual Reality-Based Body Exposure.
Article in Journal of clinical medicine, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 28 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
28 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 67 citations in OpenAlex.
- Digital Tools for the Promotion of Healthy and Sustainable Eating Behaviors in the General Population: A Systematic Review of the Literature.Nutrients · 2026Pooled it
- Treatment effectiveness for comorbid anorexia nervosa and obsessive-compulsive disorder: a systematic review.International journal of psychiatry in clinical practice · 2025Pooled it
- Reshaping restriction: virtual embodiment modulates eating biases in anorexia nervosa.Npj mental health research · 2026Article
- Rethinking the bodily self: evidence from the enfacement illusion in women at risk for eating disorders.Journal of eating disorders · 2025Article
- Therapeutic immersion: a single-subject study on virtual reality multisensory experiences for mitigating body disturbance in anorexia nervosa.Eating and weight disorders : EWD · 2025Article
- Article
- The Role of Body Image Perception on a Continuum from Dysfunctional to Healthy Eating Attitudes and Behaviors Among People Seeking Treatment.Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Article
- Anxiety matters: a pilot lab study into food, weight, and virtual body exposure in anorexia nervosa.Journal of eating disorders · 2024Article
- Harnessing Immersive Virtual Reality: A Comprehensive Scoping Review of its Applications in Assessing, Understanding, and Treating Eating Disorders.Current psychiatry reports · 2024Article
- Established and emerging treatments for eating disorders.Trends in molecular medicine · 2024Review
- Virtual Reality as an Innovative Tool for Eating Disorders Psychological Treatment.Health psychology research · 2024Article
- Reduced body-image disturbance by body-image interventions is associated with neural-response changes in visual and social processing regions: a preliminary study.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Article
- Exploring How Virtual Reality Could Be Used to Treat Eating Disorders: Qualitative Study of People With Eating Disorders and Clinicians Who Treat Them.JMIR XR and spatial computing · 2024Article
- Eating Disorders and Dental Erosion: A Systematic Review.Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Review
- Attentional Bias Modification Training Based on Virtual Reality and Eye Tracking in Anorexia Nervosa Patients.Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Article
- Body Dissatisfaction and Body-Related Attentional Bias: Is There a Causal Relationship?Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Article
- What's New in Research during the Current Epidemic Wave of Eating Disorders?Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Article
- Modification of Body-Related Attentional Bias through Virtual Reality and Eye-Tracking in Healthy Participants: Implications for Anorexia Nervosa Treatments.Brain sciences · 2023Article
- An Attentional Bias Modification Task, through Virtual Reality and Eye-Tracking Technologies, to Enhance the Treatment of Anorexia Nervosa.Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Article
- Virtual Reality Exposure to a Healthy Weight Body Is a Promising Adjunct Treatment for Anorexia Nervosa.Psychotherapy and psychosomatics · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
14 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
In vivo body exposure therapy is considered an effective and suitable intervention to help patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) reduce their body image disturbances (BIDs). However, these interventions have notable limitations and cannot effectively reproduce certain fears usually found in AN, such as the fear of gaining weight (FGW). The latest developments in virtual reality (VR) technology and embodiment-based procedures could overcome these limitations and allow AN patients to confront their FGW and BIDs. This study aimed to provide further evidence of the efficacy of an enhanced (by means of embodiment) VR-based body exposure therapy for the treatment of AN. Thirty-five AN patients (16 in the experimental group, 19 in the control group) participated in the study. FGW, BIDs, and other body-related and ED measures were assessed before and after the intervention and three months later. The experimental group received treatment as usual (TAU) and five additional sessions of VR-based body exposure therapy, while the control group received only TAU. After the intervention, ED symptoms were clearly reduced in both groups, with most of the changes being more noticeable in the experimental group. Specifically, after the intervention and at follow-up, significant group differences were found in the FGW and BIDs, with the experimental group showing significantly lower values than the control group. The current study provides new insights and encouraging findings in the field of exposure-based therapies in AN. VR technology might improve research and clinical practice in AN by providing new tools to help patients confront their core fears (i.e., food- or weight-related cues) and improve their emotional, cognitive, and behavioral responses to their body image.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.