An interactive training programme to treat body image disturbance.

This training has the potential to be a valuable treatment used together with more traditional talking therapies. Statement of contribution What is already known on this subject? A core feature of anorexia nervosa (AN) is an overestimation of body size; sufferers believe themselves to be larger than they are in reality. This study shows that an individual's perceptual boundary between what they classify as a fat versus a thin body is not immutable; it can be changed through a cognitive bias training programme. What does this study add? This means that body size overestimation may now be treatable. Critically, as well as improving the accuracy of body size judgements, we also found a clinically significant improvement in participants' eating-disordered concerns. This demonstrates that a targeted behavioural training regime can change body perception, and the central role that body overestimation has in eating-disordered beliefs.