What is the cause of eating disorders like anorexia?

A mix: Psychiatric illnesses occur when a combination of risk factors collide. The most common factors include your genes, your family upbringing and culture, and your thoughts. Eating disorders can also be caused by the simple process of losing too much weight. This had been noted in pow's in vietnam and other wars where healthy soldiers who had lost weight would further restrict while in prison camps!

No one knows: The science is simply not there yet. To date an appears to be a highly heritable brain disorder of unknown cause. We do know, however that parents do not cause it and patients do not choose to have it.