No vital function in early life plays such a central role in the emotional household of the organism as does eating. The child experiences the first relief from physical discomfort during nursing; thus the satisfaction of hunger becomes deeply associated with the feeling of well-being and security.… Another emotional attitude of fundamental importance, which becomes linked early in infancy with eating and hunger is possessiveness, with all its implications, such as greed, jealousy, and envy.… Knowledge of these fundamental psychological facts is necessary for the understanding of the emotional background of neurotic eating disorders.

The adult eating disorders as they present in clinical practice can be placed on a spectrum ranging from severe anorexia on the one end to superobesity