Increased cognitive flexibility mediates the improvement of eating disorders symptoms, depressive symptoms and level of daily life functioning in patients with anorexia nervosa treated in specialised centres.

Results suggest that enhancing cognitive flexibility could help reduce rigid cognitive and behavioural patterns involved in AN, thus improving everyday functioning and clinical severity. Further studies combining different types of cognitive flexibility evaluation as well as neuroimaging may be necessary to better establish which of its aspects are involved in patients' improvement.