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Forgetting What You Have Checked: A Link Between Working Memory Impairment and Checking Behaviors in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2011

N. Jaafari ,
M. Frasca ,
F. Rigalleau ,
F. Rachid ,
R. Gil ,
J.-P. Olié ,
D. Guehl ,
P. Burbaud ,
B. Aouizerate  and
J.-Y. Rotgé
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N. Jaafari*
Affiliation:
Unité de recherche clinique intersectorielle, centre hospitalier Henri-Laborit, 370, avenue Jacques-Coeur, 86021Poitiers, France CHU Poitiers, 2, rue de la Milétrie, BP 577, 86021Poitiers cedex, France Faculté de médecine et de pharmacie, université de Poitiers, 6, rue de la Milétrie, B9 199, 86034Poitiers cedex, France CIC-P Inserm U 802, 86000Poitiers, France
M. Frasca
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 6234, centre de recherches sur la cognition et l'apprentissage, université de Poitiers, université François-Rabelais de Tours, maison des sciences de l'homme et de la société, Poitiers, France
F. Rigalleau
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 6234, centre de recherches sur la cognition et l'apprentissage, université de Poitiers, université François-Rabelais de Tours, maison des sciences de l'homme et de la société, Poitiers, France
F. Rachid
Affiliation:
Unité de recherche clinique intersectorielle, centre hospitalier Henri-Laborit, 370, avenue Jacques-Coeur, 86021Poitiers, France Private practice, 7, place de la Fusterie, 1204Geneva, Switzerland
R. Gil
Affiliation:
Centre mémoire de ressources et de recherche, université de médecine et de pharmacie de Poitiers, CHU de Poitiers, 86000Poitiers, France
J.-P. Olié
Affiliation:
Laboratoire de physiopathologie des maladies psychiatriques, université Paris Descartes, Inserm U 894, service hospitalo-universitaire de santé mentale et thérapeutique, centre hospitalier Sainte-Anne, Paris, France
D. Guehl
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 5293, institut des maladies neurodégénératives, université Bordeaux 2, Bordeaux, France
P. Burbaud
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 5293, institut des maladies neurodégénératives, université Bordeaux 2, Bordeaux, France
B. Aouizerate
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 5293, institut des maladies neurodégénératives, université Bordeaux 2, Bordeaux, France
J.-Y. Rotgé
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 5293, institut des maladies neurodégénératives, université Bordeaux 2, Bordeaux, France
N. Vibert
Affiliation:
CNRS UMR 6234, centre de recherches sur la cognition et l'apprentissage, université de Poitiers, université François-Rabelais de Tours, maison des sciences de l'homme et de la société, Poitiers, France
*
⁎Corresponding author. Tel.: +33 05 49 44 58 02; fax: +33 05 49 44 58 00. E-mail address: n.jaafari@wanadoo.fr (N. Jaafari).
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Abstract

Background

Compulsive checking behaviors are common in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Several authors have suggested that these checking rituals could be related to memory deficits. Our aim was to test whether patients with OCD show working memory impairment in relation to their checking behavior.

Methods

We evaluated the verbal and visuospatial components of patients’ and controls’ working memory using the reading span and backward location span tests. Checking behaviors were measured by recording participants’ eye movements during an image comparison task using a non-invasive, infra-red TOBII 1750 eyetracker. Participants were seated, head-free, in a natural position in front of the eyetracker screen where the images were displayed.

Results

Patients with OCD made more gaze moves to compare images than controls. Both patients’ working memory spans were reduced, and the patients’ deficit in the comparison task was negatively related to their working memory spans.

Conclusions

This work demonstrates that checking behavior in OCD is linked to a general reduction of the patients’ verbal and visuospatial working memory span.

Keywords

Working memory spanEye movement recordingsImage comparison taskObsessive compulsive disorderChecking behavior
Type
Original article
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , February 2013 , pp. 87 - 93
Copyright
Copyright © Elsevier Masson SAS 2013

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