Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany; and Department of Education and Psychology, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany
Katharina Bey
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Bonn, Germany; and German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE), Germany
Rosa Grützmann
Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany
Julia Klawohn
Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany
Christian Kaufmann
Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany
Leonhard Lennertz
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Bonn, Germany
Michael Wagner
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Bonn, Germany; and German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE), Germany; and Department for Neurodegenerative Diseases and Geriatric Psychiatry, University Hospital Bonn, Germany
Norbert Kathmann
Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany
Anja Riesel
Department of Psychology, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany; and Department of Psychology, University of Hamburg, Germany
Studies have shown that people with obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) have impairments in spatial working memory (SWM) performance. However, it remains unclear whether this deficit represents a cognitive endophenotype preceding symptoms or a correlate of OCD. We investigated SWM in 69 people with OCD, 77 unaffected first-degree relatives of people with OCD and 106 healthy control participants. Taking age effects into account, SWM performance was best in healthy controls, intermediate in relatives and worst in OCD participants. However, since performance did not differ significantly between healthy controls and relatives, our study does not fully support SWM performance as a core cognitive endophenotype of OCD.
