Has food lost its attraction in anorexia nervosa? A cognitive approach

Although a lot of people try to lose weight, sticking to a diet can be difficult. But not for people with anorexia nervosa, who are expert dieters despite already being seriously underweight. In her PhD research, Renate Neimeijer concluded that there are differences in people’s level of attraction to food. Anorexia patients, for example, are all but immune to the automatic attraction to food that healthy people feel. There are also striking differences between people who manage to diet successfully, those who do not and those who don’t diet at all. Mood seems to be one of the main factors.