Physical appearance perfectionism explains variance in eating disorder symptoms above general perfectionism

•Physical appearance perfectionism (PAP) is associated with disordered eating.•But does PAP explain variance in disordered eating above general perfectionism?•Data from 559 female university students were analyzed.•General perfectionism explained 11–20% variance in eating disorder symptoms.•PAP explained an additional 9–17% variance.

Physical appearance perfectionism is a domain-specific form of perfectionism comprising two components: hope for perfection and worry about imperfection (Yang & Stoeber, 2012). Previous studies found that physical appearance perfectionism is related to eating disorder symptoms, particularly the worry about imperfection component, but did not address the question of whether physical appearance perfectionism explains variance in eating disorder symptoms above general perfectionism. The present study investigated the question examining 559 female university students. Physical appearance perfectionism explained an additional 9–17% of variance in eating disorder symptoms above the 11–20% variance explained by general perfectionism. The findings suggest that physical appearance perfectionism plays an important role in disordered eating beyond general perfectionism.