Beginning with the notion that eating disorders have become the typical ailment of
our generation, the author discusses key developments within the contemporary
multi-theoretical literature leading to an emerging focus on the role of
inter-personal relationships within the psychopathology. Within this, attention is
narrowed to a restricted obsessional and concretized repertoire of food which
severely limits inter-personal functioning and the capacity for reflection on the
same, producing a quasi-symbiotic picture. Following Foulkes’s ideas on
open communication, the author details her work with this client group in a
short-term group-analytic group and how this relates to multi-disciplinary work that
itself derived principally from cognitive behavioural methodologies. The value of
such short-term interventions is stressed with this client group, as is its place
within the wider organizational context.
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