ABSTRACT
The causes of eating disorders are still not well known. However, the recent increase in the incidence of eating disorders among adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic suggests that social factors play an important role. Nonetheless, the fact that only some individuals develop eating disorders, despite being subjected to the same social conditions, implicates some additional individual processes. Available data suggests that eating disorders seem to arise through a complex interaction of genetic and environmental risk factors. However, the individual causal processes involved and how genetic factors interact with environmental factors to result in an eating disorder are not known. The psychological cognitive behavioural theory holds that the eating disorder onset has two main origins that can operate simultaneously. The first occurs when individuals who generally need to feel in control of various aspects of their lives begin to shift their efforts towards controlling their eating. The second is the presence of overvaluation of shape and weight in individuals who have internalised the thinness ideal.
