Discovering genetic variants that confer risk to AN has the potential to illuminate pathways relevant to both etiopathogenesis and drug development efforts. However, to date replicable associations of candidate gene tagging and coding SNPs with diagnostic categories have mostly eluded the eating disorders field. The present study arguably represents the most comprehensive candidate-gene-based approach conducted in eating disorders. We performed association tests with SNPs and haplotypes to detect associations with a priori defined statistical thresholds to three eating disorder case–control datasets, where the cases were nested based on binging and purging. We studied a relatively large sample, selected high probability candidate genes, used tagging and coding SNPs, and applied conservative quality control and multiple test correction procedures. However, these association analyses yielded no statistically significant results.
