The development of two multidimensional perfectionism measures at the start of the 1990’s facilitated exponential growth in research on perfectionism. Until then, perfectionism had been assessed with unidimensional measures. The Burns Perfectionism Scale came from the depression literature and assessed dysfunctional perfectionistic attitudes (Burns, 1980) and perfectionism was assessed in the e...

Perfectionism has been identified as an antecedent of athlete burnout. However, to date, researchers examining the relationship between perfectionism and athlete burnout have measured perfectionism at a trait level. The work of Flett and colleagues (Flett, Hewitt, Blankstein, & Gray, 1998) suggests that perfectionism can also be assessed in terms of individual differences in the frequency with ...

Perfectionism is associated with symptoms of anxiety disorders, eating disorders and mood disorders. Treatments targeting perfectionism may reduce the symptoms of these disorders (Egan, Wade, & Shafran, 2011). This study is the first randomised controlled trial to investigate the efficacy of group cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) for perfectionism. Forty-two participants with elevated perfec...

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to examine the role of perfectionism as a phenotypic trait in anorexia nervosa and its relevance across clinical subtypes of this illness. METHOD The Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale and the perfectionism subscale of the Eating Disorder Inventory were administered to 322 women with a history of anorexia nervosa who were participating in an internati...

The construct of clinical perfectionism, conceptualized as a one-dimensional construct (Shafran, Cooper, & Fairburn, 2003), has drawn considerable debate because of the associated critique of multidimensional perfectionism’s relevance for clinical theory and research. Hence Dickie, Surgenor, Wilson, and McDowall’s (2012) finding that the Clinical Perfectionism Questionnaire (CPQ), designed to m...

Findings from cross-sectional studies on the relationship between perfectionism and the Big Five personality traits demonstrate that conscientiousness shows significant positive correlations with self-oriented perfectionism, and neuroticism with socially prescribed perfectionism. The question is whether conscientiousness and neuroticism also predict longitudinal changes in self-oriented and soc...

Objectives: Motivational and self-presentational processes pervade all aspects of our lives including exercise behaviors. Furthermore, trait perfectionism has been shown to heighten self-presentational tendencies and energize achievement striving (Flett & Hewitt, 2002; Hewitt et al., 2003). How maladaptive and adaptive perfectionism traits relate to these cognitive and behavioral processes spec...

Striving for excellence is an admirable goal. Adaptive or healthy perfectionism can drive ambition and lead to extraordinary accomplishments. High-achieving people often show signs of perfectionism. However, maladaptive, unhealthy, or neurotic perfectionism, where anything less than perfect is unacceptable, can leave individuals vulnerable to depression. In both personal and professional relati...

Recent developmental theorizing conceptualizes perfectionism as a mediator of the relation between intrusive parenting and psychopathology. Research addressing this hypothesis in relation to eating disorders (EDs), however, is lacking. This case-control study (a) examined mean-level differences between ED patients and normal controls in psychologically controlling parenting and perfectionism an...

OBJECTIVE This study examined perfectionism in relation to recovery from eating disorders by comparing different conceptualizations of perfectionism across healthy controls and fully recovered, partially recovered, and active eating disorder cases, where full recovery was defined using physical, behavioral, and psychological indices. METHOD Participants were primarily young adult females; 53 ...