Examining memory performance in body dysmorphic disorder (BDD): A comparison study with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).

The aim of this study is comparing directly the BDD and OCD disorders in terms of similarities and differences in memory function for the first time. 19 BDD patients, 15 OCD patients and 26 individuals in a healthy control group were recruited from three hospitals in Tehran. They were administered the following subtests of the Wechsler Memory Scale: logical memory (immediate and delayed), verbal paired association (immediate and delayed), digit span and spatial span as well as the Rey-Osterrieth complex figure test (RCFT). The results showed that BDD and OCD groups had lower performance in comparison to the control group across all measures, except for the immediate memory of the verbal paired associate task, which was similar across the three groups. Both the BDD and OCD groups showed poor performance on the auditory-verbal memory tasks. However, only the BDD group showed poor performance in the visual domain (i.e. spatial span and RCFT). This suggest that memory deficits are similar between BDD and OCD patients in the verbal domain. Furthermore, BDD patients demonstrated poorer visual working memory. The findings of this study reveal that BDD and OCD patients have more similarities than differences regarding neuropsychological features, in other words, the idea of the incorporation of BDD within the obsessive-compulsive and related disorders (OCRDs) spectrum in DSM-5 is supported, at least through the viewpoint of neuropsychology.

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