Post-error slowing in anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders

Abstract

Altered brain response to errors in anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD) suggests cognitive control abnormalities across both types of illness, but behavioral metrics of cognitive control function have yet to be compared in patients selected from these different diagnostic categories. Thus, we examined post-error slowing (PES), a behavioral adjustment that typically occurs after a mistake, in children and adolescents with and without a primary anxiety disorder (N = 103 anxiety and N = 28 healthy controls) and adolescents and adults with and without OCD (N = 118 OCD and N = 60 healthy controls) using a go/no-go task. Primary analyses tested for differences in PES between diagnostic groups (anxiety, OCD, healthy), controlling for age, overall reaction time, and overall accuracy. Results indicated that patients with anxiety disorders exhibited more post-error slowing than both patients with OCD and healthy volunteers. In contrast, participants with OCD did not differ from healthy volunteers in post-error slowing. In subgroup analyses restricted to adolescent participants (ages 13-17 years), more post-error slowing was observed in the anxiety disorders group compared with either the OCD or healthy groups. These data suggest that excessive post-error slowing, an index of behavioral adjustment following errors, may uniquely characterize patients with anxiety disorders relative to healthy individuals and those with OCD.

Abstract task sequence initiation deficit dissociates anxiety disorders from obsessive-compulsive disorder and healthy controls

“…Post error slowing is an increase in RT on the response following an incorrect response and can be used as a marker of cognitive control, as this process is thought to reflect the capacity to flexibly adjust behavior after an outcome (Dutilh, van Ravenzwaaij, et al, 2012;Dutilh, Vandekerckhove, et al, 2012). In non-sequential tasks, increased post error slowing (greater RTs following error trials) has been observed in ANX compared to both OCD and HCs (Rueppel et al, 2022). In the current experiment, increased post error slowing in response to errors at position 4 could give rise to increased RTs at position 1 and the appearance of an increased initiation cost in participants with ANX compared to HCs.…”

“…Post-error slowing has not often been studied in the context of OCD and the results are mixed, possibly because the phenomenon can be studied in the context of nearly any task and the specific task itself may play a role. One study used a flanker task with congruent and incongruent stimuli and showed deficits in posterror slowing in participants with OCD compared to HCs (Modirrousta, Meek, Sareen, & Enns, 2015), while another that used a stop-signal task did not observe a difference in participants with OCD, but did in patients with ANX (Rueppel, Mannella, Fitzgerald, & Schroder, 2022).…”

Developmental trajectory of flanker performance and its link to problem behavior in 7-to 12-year-old children

“…Post-error slowing (PES) is a behavioral index of error monitoring, defined as the slowing of response time on a post-error trial. While different accounts explain the PES phenomenon (Danielmeier & Ullsperger, 2011;Dutilh et al, 2012;Rueppel, Mannella, Fitzgerald, & Schroder, 2022), PES generally reflects the behavior adjustment mechanism following error-making and serves as a measure of cognitive control. Both SAT and PES capture individuals' 'strategy' during task performance.…”

“…Also, children are slower and commit more errors compared to adults (e.g., Santesso, Segalowitz, & Schmidt, 2006; for a review, see Hämmerer, Müller, & Li, 2014). There are mixed findings considering PES in childhood (Rueppel et al, 2022). Some studies find no age-related changes in PES (Denervaud et al, 2021;Ladouceur et al, 2007;Taylor, Visser, Fueggle, Bellgrove, & Fox, 2018), some studies report a developmental decrease in PES (Meyer, Weinberg, Klein, & Hajcak, 2012;Smulders, Soetens, & van der Molen, 2016) and others find a developmental increase in PES (Hogan, Vargha-Khadem, Kirkham, & Baldeweg, 2005;Overbye et al, 2019).…”

“…For example, according to the defense reactivity trait hypotheses (Weinberg, Riesel, & Hajcak, 2012), an error can be considered as a threat to an individual's safety, and therefore errors are considered 'bad' and should be avoided (Hajcak & Foti, 2008). Yet, results finding an association between anxiety and behavioral indices of performance monitoring are mixed (Rueppel et al, 2022;. For instance, Meyer, Weinberg, Klein, and Hajcak (2012) found that larger PES and post-error mistakes were more prevalent in children with higher anxiety scores.…”