Cognitive performance and specific deficits in OCD symptom dimensions : III. Decision-making and impairments in risky choices

Authors retain copyright. The German Journal of Psychiatry is an online journal that covers all fields of psychiatry. Downloading of articles is free.Objective : To investigate ambiguous and risky decision-making in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) patients grouped according to established primary symptom dimensions. The difficulties of OCD patients in real-life quite often seem related to situations of decision-making, for example, whether to check the door or clean the house. Decisionmaking appears on the face of it impaired in the clinical OCD setting in the context of doubting and uncertainty. Methods : The participants were administered the Iowa Gambling Task and the Cambridge Gambling Task, reputed to be established measures of ambiguous and risky decision-making respectively. Background measures included assessments with standard clinical and psychological questionnaires. The OCD patients (n=72) were grouped according to their primary symptom dimensions using the Dimensional Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale and compared with a healthy control group (n=66). Results : Risky decision-making related to rationality was impaired for patients in the dimensions symmetry/order and sexual/religious, and the deliberation time to make a decision was particularly slow for patients in the dimensions safety and contamination. A deficit in ambiguous decision-making was found in patients showing aggressive and symmetry/ order symptoms. Conclusion : This study is believed to be the first to present selective deficits in different OCD symptom dimensions related to decision-making. The data confirm the necessary role of intact interactions between cognitive and emotional processing.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Cognitive performance and specific deficits in OCD symptom dimensions : II. Spatial memory and impaired recognition of visuospatial object locations

Authors retain copyright. 'The German Journal of Psychiatry is an online journal that covers all fields of psychiatry. Downloading of articles is free.'Objective : To investigate spatial recognition abilities and working memory in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) patients grouped according to their primary symptom dimensions. Memory has always occupied a central position in OCD research, mainly because of the notion that faulty memory processes could mediate many of the repetitive compulsive rituals. However, the role of different memory systems is not yet fully understood. Methods : There were 68 OCD patients and 65 healthy controls who completed two tasks from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB); a) spatial recognition memory, b) spatial working memory. Standard clinical and psychological background measures were also employed. Results : The OCD patients were impaired in spatial recognition memory whereas spatial working memory was spared regarding performance accuracy. Selective deficits in visuospatial recognition memory were associated with patients in all symptom dimensions while patients in the dimension contamination were the only ones impaired in both recognition accuracy and recognition time. Conclusion : It is suggested that spatial memory impairments may be secondary to an inability to apply efficiently elaborated attentional and goal-oriented strategies as part of the executive system to support visuospatial recognition memory in addition to experiences of incompleteness. The clinical relevance of the findings is discussed.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Cognitive performance and specific deficits in OCD symptom dimensions: I.Olfactory perception and impaired recognition of disgust

Die elektronische Ausgabe wird in der Regel unter einer Publikationslizenz wie z.B. Creative Commons License (http://creativecommons.org/worldwide/de/) bereitgestellt. In der Regel wird im Universitätsverlag Göttingen die Creative Commons License 3.0 mit Pflicht zur Namensnennung, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/de/) verwendet.Objective: To investigate the ability of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in identifying pleasant and disgusting smells. Methods: Participants were 55 OCD patients and 80 healthy controls, also matched for history of cigarette smoking. They were administered a smell identification test consisting of a subsample of 13 smells from the Pennsylvania Smell Identification Test (UPSIT) in addition to two new smells. Participants were exposed to smells from liquids in glass bottles. Results: The OCD patients were significantly impaired compared to the healthy controls in identifying the smells. When controlling for anxiety, this group difference remained stable only for disgusting but not pleasant smells. An effect of patients in different symptom dimensions on smell identification was also found. Conclusion: These findings suggest that in OCD, a specific dysfunction related to emotional appraisal of sensory stimuli, in the absence of a sensory deficit, may be apparent. This emotional deficiency could stem from disruption in processing related to the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC).Peer reviewe

Common brain disorders are associated with heritable patterns of apparent aging of the brain

Contains fulltext : 208604.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)Common risk factors for psychiatric and other brain disorders are likely to converge on biological pathways influencing the development and maintenance of brain structure and function across life. Using structural MRI data from 45,615 individuals aged 3-96 years, we demonstrate distinct patterns of apparent brain aging in several brain disorders and reveal genetic pleiotropy between apparent brain aging in healthy individuals and common brain disorders