Decision-making impairment in obsessive-compulsive disorder as measured by the Iowa Gambling Task

This study aims to evaluate the process of decision-making in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) using the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT). In addition, we intend to expand the understanding of clinical and demographic characteristics that influence decision-making.

Our sample consisted of 214 subjects (107 diagnosed with OCD and 107 healthy controls) who were evaluated on their clinical, demographic and neuropsychological features. Moreover, the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), a task that detects and measures decision-making impairments, was used.

We found that OCD patients performed significantly worse on the IGT. Furthermore, features such as symptoms of anxiety did not influence IGT performance.

Impaired decision-making seems to be a key feature of OCD. Given that OCD is a complex heterogeneous disorder, homogeneous groups are necessary for an accurate characterization of our findings.