Eat an extremely large amount of food within a 2-hour period (a binge) at least 2 times a week on average for at least 6 months. Common personality traits found in those with binge eating disorder and other eating disorders include excessive concern about body size and shape, low self-esteem, and depression.3 Binge eating disorder is different than bulimia because people with binge eating disorder do not regularly vomit or use other ways to get rid of calories.

When asked to name an eating disorder, most people will probably say anorexia or bulimia. However, there is another eating disorder that has come into the spotlight more recently, referred to as binge-eating disorder. There is some debate about whether it should be considered a mental illness, but the fact remains it can be devastating to live with and have serious health consequences. There are several different types of eating disorders.

ANRED, a national organization for Eating Disorders, supplies lots of information on anorexia, bulimia, and binge-eating.

People with this disorder eat whether they are hungry or not and continue eating well past being uncomfortably full. If not treated, the consequences of binge-eating can be deadly. This disorder often leads to obesity, which is responsible for as many as 300,000 deaths year, or other serious and often life-threatening eating disorders such as bulimia nervosa and anorexia nervosa.

What are the symptoms for binge eating?Is it just eating a lot, or is there more to it than that. I have a friend, and I think she's a binge eater, but she's not fat or anything. My friend lost a lot of weight very fast on the Atkins diet. I am not sure if she was just exercising a lot and hardly eating or if the diet actually works. Has anyone tried it? My problem is that I do not like to feel deprived because then I find myself craving things too often.

This article provides insight into personality, environmental, and biochemical risk factors for eating disorders.

This article discusses causes of eating disorders and defines them. Personality, genetic and biochemistry issues are discussed.

Depression and an Eating Disorder can occur at the same time. This article discusses the biochemistry behind this.

Binge eating is very common. About one in five young women report that they have had binge-eating problems. Unlike anorexia and bulimia, binge eating is relatively common in men, who make up about 40% of binge-eating cases.

First you must decide if you want to make helping people a career or a volunteer activity. If you want a career, prepare yourself by getting at least a masters degree in psychology, counseling, psychiatric nursing, or clinical social work. If you want more training, you could become a psychiatrist or a clinical psychologist. The people in your campus academic counseling center can help you arrange the classes you need for these options.

This information is provided by Cynthia M. Bulik, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry at the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric & Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University.) Although there does appear to be a genetic component, just because an individual may be genetically predisposed does not mean that she or he will necessarily express the genes. Both anorexia and bulimia nervosa do run in families, and twin studies suggest that genetics do contribute to the familial tendencies.

There is no simple explanation and there has been a lot of research into the “causes” of eating disorders. We know that we cannot simply blame “the culture”, fashion magazines, family relationships, early traumatic experiences, or abuse or buried psychological problems like depression or anxiety.

Great site with information on why Prevention is so important and information on ways to prevent EDs.