PhD Scholarship – Gaining a Holistic Understanding of Eating Disorders: Phenotyping and Genotyping Illness

Eating disorders are serious mental illnesses characterised by severe disturbances in eating behaviours, which are particularly difficult to treat, with poor treatment outcomes and high relapse rates. However, current treatments are moderately effective at best. Given available therapies are designed to target known core psychopathological features of the illness, the moderate efficacy of existing treatments suggests we do not yet have a full understanding of what is core to these illnesses, nor how best to heal from them. This PhD aims to obtain a comprehensive, integrated, multi-level understanding of mechanisms and features involved in the development and maintenance of eating disorders.\
This PhD scholarship is supported by funding from the Australian Eating Disorders Research and Translation Centre (AEDRTC) and will fund the candidate to work as part of a multidisciplinary team. The candidate will receive training in, and use a range of psychological, cognitive, and behavioural tools and techniques in both clinical trials and longitudinal studies.\
This PhD program would suit applications with interests in the intersection of biological, psychological, and social mechanisms underpinning mental illness.

The principal supervisor will be Professor Antonio Verdejo-Garcia. Professor Verdejo-Garcia is a Professor of Addiction Studies and holds an NHMRC Leadership Fellow in the School of Psychological Sciences, Monash University. His research focuses on the cognitive and neural mechanisms underpinning executive control and decision-making, and their implications for substance and behavioural addictions, compulsive eating, and obesity. The student will be co-supervised by Dr Courtney McLean.

For more information on how to apply, go to: https://careers.pageuppeople.c​om/513/cw/en/job/677907/phd-sc​holarship-gaining-a-holistic-​understanding-of-eating-​disorders-phenotyping-and-​genotyping-illness