Central coherence and eating disorders

Recent research has looked into the links between cognition problems and the development of eating disorders. People with eating disorders tend to have poorer performance in set-shifting tasks where they are asked to transfer their attention from one element to another. There has also been research into the links between central coherence and eating disorders; central coherence being the ability to understand context and see 'the big picture.' A review of 16 studies into central coherence and eating disorders has found that the majority of them found that people with eating disorders did have global processing difficulties i.e. a weak central coherence. However, there was little evidence that people with eating disorders had stronger 'local' processing in terms of tackling detailed, specific tasks.

Lopez, C. ... [et al] - Central coherence in eating disorders: a systematic review Psychological Medicine October 2008, 38(10), 1393-1404