Neurocognitive performance in obsessive-compulsive disorder before and after treatment with cognitive behavioral therapy

IF 1.7 4区医学 Q3 PSYCHIATRY

Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry Pub Date : 2025-01-20 DOI:10.1016/j.jbtep.2025.102019

Michael G. Wheaton , Eyal Kalanthroff , Micha Mandel , Rachel Marsh , H. Blair Simpson

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background

Cross-sectional studies have reported neurocognitive performance deficits in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), particularly on tasks assessing response inhibition and proactive control over stimulus-driven behaviors (task control). However, it is not clear whether these deficits represent trait-like markers of OCD or are state-dependent.

Methods

This study examined performance on two neurocognitive tasks in OCD patients (N = 26) before and after cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and matched healthy controls (HCs, N = 19). Tasks included the stop-signal task (assessing response inhibition) and the Object Interference (OI) task (assessing a specific form of task control). OCD patients completed these tasks and clinical ratings before and after 17 sessions of CBT delivered by expert therapists over two months. HCs completed tasks before and after 2-months. This design used CBT as a tool to reduce OCD symptoms to determine whether neurocognitive performance similarly improves.

Results

Results showed that OCD patients and HCs did not significantly differ in their stop-signal performance at either time point. In contrast, OCD patients exhibited impaired performance on the OI task at baseline and their OI performance improved after treatment, resolving the deficit relative to HC.

Limitations

The sample size was small, particularly for the healthy control group. We also tested only two neurocognitive tasks. Future study with larger sample sizes and more tasks is warranted.

Conclusions

These results suggest that task control deficits in OCD may be sensitive to symptom state. The possibility that improving task control represents a neurocognitive mechanism of successful CBT represents an important direction for future research.

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认知行为疗法治疗前后强迫症患者的神经认知表现。

背景：横断面研究已经报道了强迫症（OCD）的神经认知表现缺陷，特别是在评估反应抑制和对刺激驱动行为的主动控制（任务控制）的任务上。然而，尚不清楚这些缺陷是否代表强迫症的特征标记或状态依赖。方法：本研究检测了认知行为治疗（CBT）前后强迫症患者（N = 26）和匹配健康对照（hc, N = 19）在两项神经认知任务上的表现。任务包括停止信号任务（评估反应抑制）和对象干扰（OI）任务（评估特定形式的任务控制）。强迫症患者在专家治疗师在两个月内提供的17次CBT治疗前后完成了这些任务和临床评分。hc在2个月前后完成任务。本设计使用CBT作为减少强迫症症状的工具，以确定神经认知能力是否同样得到改善。结果：结果显示强迫症患者和hc患者在任何时间点的停止信号表现均无显著差异。相比之下，强迫症患者在基线时在成骨不全任务中的表现受损，治疗后他们的成骨不全表现得到改善，解决了与HC相关的缺陷。局限性：样本量很小，特别是健康对照组。我们也只测试了两项神经认知任务。未来的研究需要更大的样本量和更多的任务。结论：强迫症的任务控制缺陷可能对症状状态敏感。改进任务控制可能是CBT成功的一种神经认知机制，这是未来研究的一个重要方向。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry Multiple-

CiteScore

3.60

自引率

5.60%

发文量

期刊介绍： The publication of the book Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition (1958) by the co-founding editor of this Journal, Joseph Wolpe, marked a major change in the understanding and treatment of mental disorders. The book used principles from empirical behavioral science to explain psychopathological phenomena and the resulting explanations were critically tested and used to derive effective treatments. The second half of the 20th century saw this rigorous scientific approach come to fruition. Experimental approaches to psychopathology, in particular those used to test conditioning theories and cognitive theories, have steadily expanded, and experimental analysis of processes characterising and maintaining mental disorders have become an established research area.