• optimization
• social capital
• fiscal measure
• eating disorders
• binge eating disorder

This dissertation is intended to draw the attention of the reader on the issue of eating disorders, with a special focus on binge eating disorder. Beyond a simplified description of the diagnostic criterions adopted to identify and distinguish among the most diffused eating disorders, namely anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder, this thesis investigates throughout the “triggering” and “substantiating” causes of such disorders. Unfortunately, the understanding of the determinant causes of eating disorders is still limited; this is due to the fact the etiopathogenesis of these disorders is multifactorial, it involves not only psychological and social aspects but also genetic ones. This essay actually supports the hypothesis that people’s poverty of relational goods is a major source of contemporary uneasiness and, in the context of the unbridled diffusion of eating disorders, it aims at proposing a fiscal policy ultimately devoted to improve “collective” social capital as a potential - at least partially - remedy against this class of psychiatric pathologies.