Background
Numerous studies have investigated response inhibition in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), with many reporting that OCD patients demonstrate deficits in response inhibition as compared to controls. However, reported effect sizes tend to be modest and results have been inconsistent, with some studies finding intact response inhibition in OCD. To date, no study has examined the effect of medications on response inhibition in OCD patients.
Methods
We analyzed results from a stop-signal task to probe response inhibition in 65 OCD patients (32 of whom were medicated) and 58 healthy controls.
Results
There was no statistically significant difference in stop-signal reaction time between the OCD group and the healthy control group, nor between the medicated and unmedicated OCD patients. However, variability was significantly greater in the medicated OCD group compared to the unmedicated group.
Conclusions
These results indicate that some samples of OCD patients do not have deficits in response inhibition, making it unlikely that deficient response inhibition underlies repetitive behaviors in all OCD patients. Future research is needed to fully elucidate the impact of medication use on stop-signal performance. Implications for future research on the cognitive processes underlying repetitive thoughts and behaviors are discussed.
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