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Obsessional states: anxiety disorders or schizotypes? An information processing and personality assessment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

Simon J. Enright  and
Anthony R. Beech
Simon J. Enright
Affiliation:
Department of Clinical Psychology, Fair Mile Hospital, Wallingford, Oxfordshire
Anthony R. Beech*
Affiliation:
Department of Clinical Psychology, Fair Mile Hospital, Wallingford, Oxfordshire
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr A. R. Beech, Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OXI 3UD.
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Synopsis

This paper presents evidence that on an information processing task, designed to investigate putative inhibitory mechanisms in selective attention, obsessive compulsive disordered individuals can be clearly distinguished from other anxiety disorder clients and show significantly higher scores on questionnaire measures designed to detect schizotypy in the normal population. It is suggested that these results provide some support for the idea that obsessive compulsive disorder may be misclassified as an anxiety disorder and may in fact be categorically more closely aligned to the schizophrenic constellation of disorders.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , August 1990 , pp. 621 - 627
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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