Just let me check: the role of individual differences in self-reported anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features on subjective, behavioural, and physiological indices during a checking task

Wake, S., Dalla Verde, A., Biagi, N. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7119-0767, Van Reekum, C. M. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1516-1101 and Morriss, J. (2022) Just let me check: the role of individual differences in self-reported anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features on subjective, behavioural, and physiological indices during a checking task. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 179. pp. 43-55. ISSN 0167-8760 doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2022.06.011

Abstract/Summary

Checking behaviour has been described as a form of preventative behaviour used by an individual to establish control over the environment and avoid future misfortune. However, when compulsive, checking behaviours can become disabling and distressing and have been linked to the maintenance of anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders. Despite this, there is limited literature across the field that has assessed the impact of dimensional measures of anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features (i.e., negative affect, uncertainty, and perfectionism) in driving checking behaviour. As such, the present study examined the impact of individual differences in self-reported anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features on subjective, behavioural, and physiological indices during a visual discrimination and checking task (n = 87). Higher self-reported anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features were associated with higher subjective ratings of unpleasantness and the urge to check during the task. Moreover, higher self-reported anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features related to general negative affect, uncertainty, and perfectionism were associated with greater checking frequency during the task. Lastly, stronger obsessional beliefs about perfectionism and the need for certainty were found to predict poorer accuracy, slower reaction times, and higher engagement of the corrugator supercilii during the task. In sum, these findings demonstrate how different anxiety and obsessive-compulsive features, in particular perfectionism and the need for certainty, may relate to and maintain checking behaviour in low threat contexts, which likely has implications for models of excessive and persistent checking in anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/106169
Identification Number/DOI	10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2022.06.011
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Department of Psychology Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Psychopathology and Affective Neuroscience Henley Business School > Digitalisation, Marketing and Entrepreneurship
Publisher	Elsevier
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