Characteristics of OCD Flashcards
What is OCD?
Obsessive compulsive disorder is an anxiety disorder characterised by persistent, recurrent, unpleasant thoughts (obsessions) and repetitive, ritualistic behaviours (compulsions)
What are obsessions?
Obsessions comprise forbidden or inappropriate ideas and visual images that aren’t based in reality, such as being convinced that germs lurk everywhere, and this leads to feelings of extreme anxiety
What are compulsions?
Compulsions are intense, uncontrollable urges to repetitively perform tasks and behaviours, like repetitively washing your hands to get rid of germs. Compulsions are an attempt to reduce distress or prevent feared events, even though there’s little chance of them doing so
What, other than obsessions, makes anxiety levels higher?
Most sufferers realise their obsessive ideas and compulsions are excessive and inappropriate, but cannot consciously control them
What other conditions do the symptoms of OCD overlap with? What has this led some clinicians to do?
Tourette’s syndrome and autism; This has led to some clinicians to question whether OCD exists as a separate disorder
Why do obsessions and compulsions interfere with the sufferers’ daily lives?
They can become very time-consuming
What percentage of people suffer from OCD?
2% with no real sex differences in the prevalence of the disorder, though there are sex differences in the types of OCD suffered, and onset in males is younger than women
What types of OCD are more common in women?
Preoccupations with contamination and cleaning
What types of OCD are more common in men?
Focus is more on religious and sexual obsessions
What are the behavioural symptoms of obsessions?
Hinder everyday functioning: Anxiety caused by obsessions hinders the ability to perform everyday functions
Social impairment: Anxiety levels are so high they limit the ability to conduct meaningful interpersonal relationships
What are the emotional symptoms of obsessions?
Extreme anxiety: Persistent inappropriate or forbidden ideas create excessively high levels of anxiety
What are the cognitive symptoms of obsessions?
Recurrent and persistent thoughts
Recognise their obsessions are self-generated, not external
Realisation of inappropriateness
Attentional bias: Perception tends to be focused on anxiety-generating stimuli
What are the most common obsessions?
- Contamination
- Fear of losing control
- Perfectionism
- Religion
What are the behavioural symptoms of compulsions?
Repetitive: Sufferers feel compelled to repeat behaviours as a response to their obsessive thoughts, ideas and images
Hinder everyday functioning
Social impairment
What are the emotional symptoms of compulsions?
Distress: The recognition that compulsive behaviours cannot be consciously controlled can lead to strong feelings of distress
