Purpose To investigate the temporal relationship between depressive symptoms, overeating and binge eating among adolescent and young-adult females in the United States. Methods We investigated incident overeating, binge eating, and depressive symptoms among 4,798 females in the Growing Up Today Study (GUTS), a prospective cohort study of adolescents and young adults throughout the United States. Participants who reported at least monthly episodes during the past year of eating a very large amount of food in a short of amount of time, but not experiencing a loss of control, were classified as overeaters. Those who did report a loss of control while overeating were classified as binge eaters. Depressive symptoms were assessed with the McKnight Risk Factor Survey. Participants were followed from 1999 until 2003. Generalized estimating equations were used for lagged-analysis with time-varying covariates. Analyses were adjusted for age, age at menarche, body mass index (BMI), and follow-up time. Results Females reporting depressive symptoms at baseline were two times more likely than their peers to start overeating (odds ratio (OR)=1.9; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.4, 2.5) and binge eating (OR=2.3; 95% CI: 1.7, 3.0) during the follow-up. Similarly, females engaging in overeating (OR=1.9, 95% CI: 1.1, 3.4) or binge eaters (OR=1.9, 95% CI: 1.2, 2.9) at baseline, were two times more likely than their peers to develop depressive symptoms during the follow-up. Conclusions These results indicates that it is important to consider depressive symptoms in overeating and binge eating prevention and treatment initiatives targeting adolescent and young adult females.