Is anorexia related to genetics?

I have always been interested in genetics my entire life. I find it fascinating that scientists and doctors are beginning to find links to a person's genetic make up and specific disorders.

About a year and a half ago, one of my best friends began to show signs of becoming anorexic. She began to distance herself majorly from the rest of the world; she would barely eat anything or just play with her food, pushing it around her plate to make it seem like she had eaten; she lost a significant amount of weight; and she could barely make it through a full day of school.

Now my friend has never been fat or overweight. She is barely five feet tall and and weighed less than a hundred pounds to begin with, and her whole life everyone has always told her how tiny she was. Most girls who are anorexic are very self conscious about their body image and what they look like. With Hollywood the way that it is today, there are so many models and actresses who are stick thin and many girls would give anything to be as skinny as these celebrities. Here in turn then comes the problem of eating disorders. My friend, however, knows that she has always been tiny and never ever thought that she was fat or needed to lose weight. So for her, her problem did not seem psychological, in the way that she felt the need to follow what society says is beautiful- being skinny.

Many scientists and doctors are beginning to see a link between eating disorders and genetics. They at first were looking for a a gene for anorexia, but then focused more in on the serotonin system and and how it played into eating. Doctors began to see that girls that were anorexic were twice as likely to have variations of the serotonin receptor gene than girls who were not anorexic. People with high levels of serotonin tend to be very anxious. My friend has always been a very anxious and stressful person as long as I've known her. She feels the need to control everything, and if something does not go right, she gets very stressed and anxious. Studies have shown that serotonin in high levels can also suppress appetite, which can then lead to eating disorders.

So, does anorexia and other eating disorders have genetic links?

Pinker would agree that eating disorders are genetic, either in the way that I explained with having a specific gene, or by running in the family. He would not believe that it had to do with the environment. Lewontin would probably say that it is the environment that is the contributing factor to eating disorders, and the big roles that culture and the media plays in people's everyday lives. I find it very interesting that there may be a genetic link to anorexia and it might not be entirely based on the environment and society.