Eating disorders have a serious impact on an individual’s wellbeing and physical health. Individuals with eating disorders are up to 6 times more likely of dying prematurely, compared to healthy adults with no eating disorders. It is therefore crucial that we better understand the reasons why young people develop eating disorders. However, it is difficult to study the early signs of eating disorders because teenagers only see a doctor when they are already seriously ill. We need research into child development to identify early signs of eating disorders and to understand how eating disorders develop.

We want to understand how the genes influence risk of eating behaviour and eating disorders in the general population. We will use sophisticated genetic analyses to investigate if any subtle genetic changes are linked with weight, eating behaviours, and eating disorder symptoms in the general population. These analyses will also reveal which biological mechanisms are linked to eating disorders. We will also investigate overlap between my findings for eating disorders and those for other mental health conditions.