Mind, Brain, and Development
Coursework Assessment 1: Research Review and Proposal
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Selective Attention Differ In People with OCD
What are the differentiation in selective attention for people with OCD? OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) is define as a mental disorder which people have undesirable and repetitive thoughts, emotions, ideas, perception, and behaviors that lead them to do something repeatedly (compulsion) CITATION USN18 l 1033 (U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2018). People who diagnosed with OCD tend to encounter specific attentional bias in selective attention, therefore it is hard for them to take part in multiple concurrent stimuli CITATION Yoa03 l 1033 (Cohen, 2003). They perform more poorly in selective attention tasks because they could not ignore irrelevant sensory stimuli around them and internally create random thoughts CITATION Cla991 l 1033 (Clayton, C, Richards, Jeffrey C, & J, 1999). The period of time for them to complete the tasks are longer compare to people without OCD. The objective in this research is to find out why people with OCD are incompatible in terms of selective attention. It is crucial to understand how selective attention have such big impact on OCD.
In this research, it is essential to study different groups of people using different task in order to differentiate the selective attention for people with OCD. There are two groups of people, the control group are people who are not diagnose with OCD and the experimental group which are people with OCD. Participants have to complete all the tasks which are the Stroop Tasks that measures using cognitive flexibility and the capability to restrain dominant response (blue word with red ink color and green word with yellow ink color) CITATION Cyn03 l 1033 (Riccio, 2004), Visual Search Tasks is visual display that contain a great amount of distraction CITATION psy18 l 1033 (psytoolkit.org, 2018) and Eye Movement Tasks that studies how people move their eyes when they search for a visual target. These tasks are perform to measure the reaction time of people with OCD and to look at the disparity of people with OCD in selective attention. People with OCD are incompetent in doing something such as the selective attention tasks and thus this decrease their level of performance presented. Therefore, by using this methodology, it is easier for us to determine the relationship between selective attention and people with OCD.
I predict that the level of performance in selective attention tasks for people who diagnosed with OCD are lower compared to people without OCD. In addition, the time taken for people with OCD to complete the tasks are longer in contrast with people without OCD. The reason for the prediction is that people with OCD often unclear of something they do. They could not pay full amount of attention to one specific thing or situation hence people with OCD is different in selective attention than people without mental illness condition.
The aim for this experiment is to shows that people with OCD are different in their performance level. In this experiment, The TEA which is an experiment to dispense norm-reference scores to examine four type of attention which is the selective attention, divided attention, sustained attention and also attentional switching. The group are form with eight subtest and give 10 scaled attention scores, in different age. In the TEA experiment, there are eight tasks which included in the searching of map, telephone search (both are related to visual search because participants could not ignore unrelated information and selecting visual target in a composite visual arrays), elevator counting, lottery (these two used to maintain attention on a consistent task) elevator counting with interruption (ability to control the information), precision of visual elevator and rapidness of visual elevator (both tasks measures the ability to shift attention), reversal in elevator counting (which test selective attention and the auditory), searching telephone while counting (design for divided attention) CITATION Ian01 l 1033 (Robertson, Ward, Ridgeway, & Nimmo-Smith, 2001). There are three groups of participants which includes participants with OCD, panic groups and a control group. The result reveal that the pooled mean for panic groups and control groups are higher than the group of participants with OCD using one way analysis. Hence, it shows that participants with OCD perform more poorly compared to panic groups and control in most of the TEA tasks. The result propose that participants with OCD have a minimize ability to selectively ignore unnecessary internal and external stimuli. Even though sample size present in this experiment were small, estimated power values for the test were large, reflecting the effect sizes to be large too CITATION Cla991 l 1033 (Clayton, C, Richards, Jeffrey C, & J, 1999).
Experiment two will provide a different perception in various aspect using visual search task. This method use to simplify the second hypothesis which stated that OCD people use longer reaction time to complete attention tasks. OCD people are not precise in drawing a conclusion therefore they make errors. There were 18 participants who diagnosed with OCD from the range ages of 21-39 years (M=29.05), (SD=4.46) along with their education years from 12-18 (M=13.72), (SD=13.75). Another 18 participants are healthy patients which are known as the control group with the age’s range from 21-39 years (M=29.29), (SD=4.28) and their education years from 12-17 (M=13.88), (SD=1.68). The computer shows one figure which is ordinary (target) and nineteen figures were in the same size and shape (distractor). Participants were asked to click on the left arrow key when they see an ordinary figure and right arrow key when same figure appears. Summing up the conclusion, OCD participants take longer mean median reaction time to detect their target (2.68s, SD= .82) than control participants (2.16s, SD= .64), t(34)=2.11, p; .05. Furthermore, OCD participants have significantly higher mean percentage of error (8.4%, SD=7.1%) than control groups (4.4%, SD=2.6%) CITATION Ore051 l 1033 (Kaplan, Dar, Rosenthal, Hermesh, ; Mendel Fux, 2006). This experiment indicate that if many figures appear at the same time, participants with OCD will become inattentive and will examine the figures appear hence longer time is needed for them to complete the tasks. They made more errors than control group because they have random thoughts in their mind than normal people do.
Wisconsin Card Sorting Test is one of the visual search task. This experiment provide evidence to prove that there is a significant difference between OCD people in selective attention task. 35 people with OCD and 35 healthy subject were participated in this task to show the differences in the performance level. The meantime between the feedback and the participant’s response was 100ms. The outcome shows that OCD people and healthy subjects were significantly different in the test. Thus, OCD people be seen to have more perseverative error F(70.02), P=0.001, ES(1.99) total errors F(64.28), P=0.001, ES(1.92). As a result, people with OCD have lower performance level and they present more perseverative error than healthy subjects CITATION Ali17 l 1033 (Saremi, Shariat, Nazari, & Dolatshahi, 2017).
In this experiment, visually guided saccade task is a test to identify how fast people with OCD move their eyes when they are targeting for subjects. 12 participants with OCD and 12 without OCD participate in this experiment. Participants are asked to move their eyes as quickly as possible when they see the target surrounding them which were presented at 10, 20 and 30 degree from the central fixation. Based on the result, participants with OCD have slower peak saccade speed than participants without OCD (F1,11 = 6.03, P = 0.03). As the distance between the target and the point of central fixation goes higher, the effect goes higher too (F2,22 = 9.18, P = 0.001). The task is not easy as very few participants without OCD can perform the task without mistakes on infrequent trial CITATION Dav96 l 1033 (Rosenberg, Dick, O’Heam, ; Sweeney, 1997). This experiment do not show a perfectly significant result because people will make certain errors when they are emotionally unstable. They are more likely to make the same mistakes as people with OCD if they are in an emotional state.
In the final experiment which is the Stroop Colour-Word Test, 35 people with OCD and 35 people without mental illness engage in this studies. Researchers reported that the internal evenness of reaction time were 0.6, 0.83, and 0.97 in every stage whereas internal evenness for numbers of errors in every stage were 0.55, 0.78, and 0.79. The stimuli are words with the form of the words and the colour of the ink. There are two possible answers which are congruent and incongruent. The experiment found out that the difference in SCWT in terms of the reaction time between the control group and people with OCD are F(69.62), P=0.001, ES(1.99) and the Stroop errors are F(59.71), and P=0.001, ES(1.84). The current study conclude that OCD people are weaker in performance and slower reaction time in the test CITATION Ali17 l 1033 (Saremi, Shariat, Nazari, ; Dolatshahi, 2017). However SCWT may not be 100% reliable because results differ within age, gender and other possible reasons.
All of the results provide sufficient amount of evidence to emphasize the differences in selective attention for OCD people. Although not all the results are detailed and concise, but from all the experiments stated, it does show that selective attention is differ in people with OCD.
References
BIBLIOGRAPHY Clayton, C, I., Richards, Jeffrey C, E., ; J, C. (1999). Selective Attention in Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 108(1), 171-175. Retrieved from American Psychological Association: http://psycnet.apa.org/record/1999-00603-016
Cohen, Y. (2003). Behaviour Research and Therapy. Retrieved from semanticscholar.org: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/fa3a/6d178bdf1db637d59499e0d503ec804899c6.pdf
Greisberg, S., ; Mckay, D. (2003). Neuropsychology of obsessive-compulsive disorder: a review and treatment implications. Clinical Psychology Review, 23, 95-117. Retrieved from sciencedirect.com: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272735802002325
Kaplan, O., Dar, R., Rosenthal, L., Hermesh, H., ; Mendel Fux, R. L. (2006). Obsessive–compulsive disorder patients display enhanced latent inhibition on a visual search task. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 1137-1145. Retrieved from sciencedirect.com website: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0005796705001877?via%3Dihub
Kohli, A., ; Kaur, M. (2006). Wisconsin Card Sorting Test: Normative data and experience. Indian J Psychiatric, 48(3), 181-184. Retrieved from NCBI.gov website: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2932989/
psytoolkit.org. (2018, May 11). Visual Search Task. Retrieved from https://www.psytoolkit.org/experiment-library/search.html
Riccio, C. A. (2004). A meta-analysis of the sensitivity and specificity of the Stroop Color and Word Test with children. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology, 19, 725-743. Retrieved from science direct.com: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S088761770300146X#bBIB77
Robertson, I. H., Ward, T., Ridgeway, V., ; Nimmo-Smith, I. (2001). TEA Test. The Test Of Everyday Attention(TEA), 4, 52-55. Retrieved from research gate website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tony_Ward10/publication/267552527_The_Test_of_Everyday_Attention_Manual/links/5469b4a80cf2f5eb180500f3/The-Test-of-Everyday-Attention-Manual.pdf
Rosenberg, D. R., Dick, E. L., O’Heam, K. M., & Sweeney, J. A. (1997). Response-Inhibition Deficits in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: An Indicator of Dysfunction in Frontostriatal Circuits. Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience, 22, 30-36. Retrieved from NCBI.gov website: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1188814/pdf/jpn00069-0031.pdf
Saremi, A. A., Shariat, S. V., Nazari, M. A., & Dolatshahi, B. (2017). Neuropsychological Functioning in Obsessive-Compulsive Washers: Drug-Naive Without Depressive Symptoms. Basic Clinical Neuroscience, 8(3), 233-248. Retrieved from NCBI Website: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5535329/
U.S. National Library of Medicine. (2018, October 31). MedlinePlus. Retrieved from National Institute of Health Web site: https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/000929.htm
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