Susceptibility to eating disorders is associated with cognitive inflexibility in female university students

The inability to learn from and adapt to changing feedback in our environmentmay be etiologically linked to eating disorders (EDs). However, previous investigations on thisissue have shown conflicting results. In the current study with a non-clinical sample of femalestudents, we investigated the relation between cognitive inflexibility (CI) and vulnerability toEDs by using a modified version of the probabilistic reversal learning (PRL) task, which requiresparticipants to adapt their response strategy according to changes in stimulus-reward contin-gencies. We found that females vulnerable to EDs in the general population showed an impairedPRL performance, also after controlling for comorbidity. However, our results also show thatthe ED construct comprises separate dimensions, which affect contingency learning in oppositemanners: some individuals vulnerable to EDs showed impaired contingency learning; others usedunimpaired contingency learning skills to pursue self-harming goals. Such results point to thenecessity of an appropriate assessment of CI in order to better apply individualized treatment.