Among a group of patients referred to the psychiatric out-patient departments of the Maudsley and King's College Hospitals primarily for emotional disorders, 40 patients who were at least 15 per cent above their ideal weight (Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 1959, Statistical Bulletin, 40, 1) were selected for weight reduction. There were thirty-one women and nine men in the sample, and they were aged 25 to 54. The psychiatric diagnoses given were: anxiety (20), depression (17), and personality disorder (3).