title: Neuropsychological investigations in obsessive-compulsive disorder: A systematic review of methodological challenges.
abstract: The inconsistent nature of the neuropsychology literature pertaining to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) has long been recognized. However, individual studies, systematic reviews, and recent meta-analytic reviews were unsuccessful in establishing a consensus regarding a disorder-specific neuropsychological profile. In an attempt to identify methodological factors that may contribute to the inconsistency that is characteristic of this body of research, a systematic review of methodological factors in studies comparing OCD patients and non-psychiatric controls on neuropsychological tests was conducted. This review covered 115 studies that included nearly 3500 patients. Results revealed a range of methodological weaknesses. Some of these weaknesses have been previously noted in the broader neuropsychological literature, while some are more specific to psychiatric disorders, and to OCD. These methodological shortcomings have the potential to hinder the identification of a specific neuropsychological profile associated with OCD as well as to obscure the association between neurocognitive dysfunctions and contemporary neurobiological models. Rectifying these weaknesses may facilitate replicability, and promote our ability to extract cogent, meaningful, and more unified inferences regarding the neuropsychology of OCD. To that end, we present a set of methodological recommendations to facilitate future neuropsychology research in psychiatric disorders in general, and in OCD in particular.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA; Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA; Department of Psychology, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX, USA. Electronic address: abramovitch@txstate.edu.
authors.forename: Amitai
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Abramovitch
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mittelman
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Amelia P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Tankersley
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Jonathan S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Abramowitz
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The Academic College of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv, Israel.
authors.forename: Avraham
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schweiger
mesh_terms: D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D009771:Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*
keywords: Cognitive function; Methodology; Neuropsychology; OCD; Psychiatric disorders; Research methods; Statistics