Psychoendocrine interaction in anorexia nervosa, and the retreat from puberty: a study of attitudes to adolescent conflict, and luteinizing hormone response to luteinizing hormone releasing factor, in refed anorexia nervosa subjects.

Seventeen young women suffering from anorexia nervosa underwent LHRF infusion, and repertory grid psychometric measures, soon after they had regained ideal body weight. Those who had regained normal LH responsiveness showed repertory grid evidence of increased adolescent conflict compared to those who failed to respond to LHRF. Certain other clinical variables which might account for this finding were excluded, and the hypothesis that amenorrhoea in anorexia nervosa is partly explicable as a psychobiological defence against adolescent conflict is supported.