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She loved ballet but was devastated when her ballet instructor and mentor died of complications from anorexia nervosa. “Not only did it affect me on a personal level,” says Anne Claire, “but it also sparked questions. How is it that all of these ballerinas were exposed to the same environment and yet only one of us had the predisposition to suffer from a clinical disorder?”

Several years later, Anne Claire is still pondering that question and, thanks to Bryn Mawr’s Leadership, Innovation, and Liberal Arts Center (LILAC), had the opportunity to research answers during her summer internship at the Eating Disorder Assessment and Treatment Program at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

As a research assistant, Anne Claire worked on various projects that sought to tease out answers to some vexing questions about eating disorders: What is the relationship between culture and eating disorders among college women? Can forgiveness interventions help trauma survivors? Can difficult to treat adolescents with anorexia nervosa benefit from a particular class of atypical antipsychotic medications?

Most days, Anne Claire was settled in the lab where, she quickly learned, research can be tedious and even small victories few and far between. “It’s hurry-up-and-wait. You put in something for an IRB [Institutional Review Board] protocol, or submit an abstract, and wait to hear back. While you wait, you’re constantly juggling other projects; it’s definitely a lesson in multitasking.”

And while the internship didn’t include a clinical component, her colleagues’ accounts of case reports intrigued her. “What drives me is hearing other people’s stories, engaging with a patient,” she says, “That’s my passion.”

But even as she found herself increasingly drawn to clinical work, Anne Claire still found herself thinking like a researcher. “I would be asking myself, ‘Is the therapy that is being used the most empirically supported therapy? What methods can be used to target high risk groups in order to promote better treatment outcome?'"

For Anne Claire, the most important takeaway from her summer experience may well be that her interests don’t fit into one single box: she’s not only a researcher nor only a clinician.  Rather, as she explains, “I see the two as informing one another.  Working with individuals sparks novel research questions and research assures that the treatment used in clinical work is evidence- based.”

Back at Bryn Mawr this fall, Anne Claire is hard at work on her senior thesis which examines the effectiveness of three interventions for reducing body dissatisfaction in college-aged women. She is also furthering her understanding of the complexity of weight by engaging in a Praxis III at the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Weight and Eating Disorders, where she assists with an obesity treatment trial. Looking forward, she is turning her sights toward a career in clinical psychology as she continues to be involved in research and pulls together applications for Ph.D. programs.

Related Links

• Leadership, Innovation, and the Liberal Arts Center