Richard A. Gordon is Professor of Psychology at Bard College and is a practising clinical psychologist. He has published and lectured extensively on the subject of eating disorders and has treated anorexic and bulimic patients in clinical practice for the past 20 years.

"He (Gordon) has successfully produced a very useful volume, which can be recommended as a primer which is readable, informative and well referenced...interesting and persuasive...coverage of the field is broad and most approaches are represented. A good read." Paul Robinson, European Eating Disorders Review, 2000, Vol 9, No 1.

• Acknowledgements. Preface.1. Culture and Psychopathology: The Notion of an Ethnic Disorder.2. Eating Disorders: Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa.3. Dimensions of an Epidemic: The Epidemiology of Eating Disorders.4. A Conflicted Female Identity.5. The Thin Body Ideal.6. The War Against Fat: Obesity, Dieting, and Exercise.7. The Templates of a Disease.8. The Cultural Politics of Eating Disorders.Index.