title: Neurocognitive functions and social functioning in young females with recent-onset anorexia nervosa and recovered individuals.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Young individuals with anorexia nervosa (AN) or recovered from AN display impairments of social function. To date, however, it is not clear whether they differ from controls with respect to neurocognitive performance and whether those functions contribute to the compromised social function observed in individuals with AN.
  
  
  METHODS
  We included 43 young females with first-episode AN, 28 individuals recovered from adolescent-onset AN, and 41 control individuals (14-22 yr), all without comorbid autism spectrum disorder. We compared the performance of participants across groups in seven neurocognitive functions relevant to social functioning: set-shifting, local processing, processing speed, working memory, sustained attention, verbal memory, and verbal abstraction. Further, we tested the association between neurocognitive function and social function, measured by Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS), with an ordinal logistic regression model.
  
  
  RESULTS
  First, participants did not differ on any neurocognitive function across groups. Second, only the neurocognitive function "verbal memory" was significantly associated with social function. Higher performance in verbal memory was associated with lower odds of impaired social function. Diagnostic group remained a significant factor, but the absence of an interaction between group and neurocognitive performance indicated that the association between verbal memory and social function was independent of group membership.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Young individuals with AN and those recovered from AN did not differ from controls with respect to neurocognitive performance. Verbal memory was associated with social function in all groups.
authors.affiliation: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Centre, Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark, Bispebjerg Bakke 30, 2400 København NV, Denmark.|Department of Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
authors.forename: Mette
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bentz
authors.affiliation: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Centre, Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark, Bispebjerg Bakke 30, 2400 København NV, Denmark.|Lundbeck Foundation Center for Clinical Intervention and Neuropsychiatric Schizophrenia Research (CINS) and Center for Neuropsychiatric Schizophrenia Research (CNSR), Psychiatric Center Glostrup, Glostrup, Denmark.
authors.forename: Jens Richardt Moellegaard
authors.initials: JRM
authors.lastname: Jepsen
authors.affiliation: Unit for Psychiatric Research, Aalborg University Hospital, Aalborg, Denmark.|Department of Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark.
authors.forename: Gry
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Kjaersdam Telléus
authors.affiliation: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Centre, Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark, Bispebjerg Bakke 30, 2400 København NV, Denmark.
authors.forename: Ulla
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Moslet
authors.affiliation: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Centre, Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark, Bispebjerg Bakke 30, 2400 København NV, Denmark.|Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance, Centre for Functional and Diagnostic Imaging and Research, Copenhagen University Hospital Hvidovre, Hvidovre, Denmark.
authors.forename: Tine
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pedersen
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, USA.|Department of Nutrition, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, USA.|Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
authors.forename: Cynthia M
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Bulik
authors.affiliation: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Centre, Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark, Bispebjerg Bakke 30, 2400 København NV, Denmark.|Department of Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
authors.forename: Kerstin Jessica
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Plessen
keywords: Adolescents; Anorexia nervosa; Neurocognition; Recovered; Social function; Verbal memory