title: Emotional interference modulates performance monitoring in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Enhanced performance monitoring in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), typically measured by error-related negativity (ERN), provides evidence for the fronto-striatal model of OCD. Here, we examined whether performance monitoring in OCD patients is modulated by emotional interference induced by task-irrelevant emotional stimuli.
  
  
  METHODS
  A modified version of the flanker task with emotional face stimuli (fearful vs. neutral faces) was performed by 22 OCD patients and 22 healthy control subjects while electroencephalogram signals were recorded. Response-locked ERN was defined as the mean amplitude from 20 to 120msec after the response.
  
  
  RESULTS
  During trials with fearful face stimuli, OCD patients showed larger ERN amplitude than control subjects, but there was no difference between groups during trials with neutral face stimuli. Whereas OCD patients exhibited enhanced ERN amplitude in the fearful face condition compared with the neutral face condition, control subjects showed no variation between conditions. OCD patients also exhibited larger correct response negativity amplitude than control subjects in both fearful and neutral face conditions.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results support the theory that OCD involves overactive performance monitoring and indicate that emotional interference modulates performance monitoring in patients with OCD, thus implying that affective function in the fronto-striatal network forms part of the neural basis of OCD.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Chuncheon Sacred Heart Hospital, Hallym University College of Medicine, Chuncheon-si, Gangwon-do, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Daeyoung
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Roh
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Severance Hospital, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jhin-Goo
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Severance Hospital, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea; Institute of Behavioral Science in Medicine, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: spr88@yuhs.ac.
authors.forename: Chan-Hyung
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Kim
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D056344:Executive Function / Q000502:physiology*; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009771:Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Anterior cingulate cortex; Error-related negativity; Event-related potential; Obsessive–compulsive disorder