The relationship between eating disorders and substance use: moving beyond co-prevalence research

The frequent comorbidity of eating disorders and substance use has been demonstrated consistently by research. Less is known about the basis of this relationship. A review of the literature indicates that the hypotheses proposed to clarify the etiological relationship between eating disorders and substance use have not been supported sufficiently or consistently by empirical evidence. General criticisms include: a lack of well developed models, a reliance on co-prevalence data, and a lack of integration of knowledge from eating disorder and substance use research. It is suggested that an understanding of the etiological relationship between eating disorders and substance use will be arrived at only after fundamental inquiries into the functional relationship between eating disorders symptomatology and substance use patterns have been conducted. A behavioral assessment approach is offered as a means of evaluating the functional relationship between eating disorder symptomatology and substance use.