Psychological factors in the etiology of binge eating

Numerous psychological factors have been hypothesized to play a role in the etiology of binge eating. This chapter proposes that female gender-role socialization puts girls at risk for the development of binge eating. Moreover, it is proposed that an understanding of risk requires an exploration of the developmental tasks of female adolescence. As research of the etiology of binge eating in particular and eating disorders in general begins to move away from testing single-factor causal models and toward testing complex, multifactorial models of causation, research needs to examine the psychological factors discussed in this chapter.