Symptom Structure in Japanese Patients With Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

• Published in: The American journal of psychiatry Vol. 165; no. 2; pp. 251 - 253
• Main Authors: Matsunaga, Hisato, Maebayashi, Kensei, Hayashida, Kazuhisa, Okino, Kenya, Matsui, Tokuzo, Iketani, Tosiya, Kiriike, Nobuo, Stein, Daniel J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Psychiatric Association 01-02-2008
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Adult and adolescent clinical studies; Age of Onset; Aged; Analysis of Variance; Anxiety disorders. Neuroses; Asian Continental Ancestry Group - psychology; Asian Continental Ancestry Group - statistics & numerical data; Behavior; Biological and medical sciences; Clinical outcomes; Cluster analysis; Cognition & reasoning; Combined Modality Therapy; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Culture; Factor Analysis, Statistical; Female; Humans; Japan - epidemiology; Male; Medical sciences; Middle Aged; Neuroses; Obsessive compulsive disorder; Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder - diagnosis; Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder - epidemiology; Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder - therapy; Obsessive-compulsive disorders; Principal Component Analysis; Principal components analysis; Psychiatric Status Rating Scales - statistics & numerical data; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Severity of Illness Index; Studies; Treatment Outcome; Japan; Human; Obsessive compulsive disorder; Symptomatology; Japanese; Anxiety disorder
• ISSN: 0002-953X; 1535-7228
• DOI: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2007.07020340

Objective:
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) comprises a number of specific symptom dimensions. The authors factor analyzed data on the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale symptom checklist in a large group of Japanese OCD patients to examine whether symptom dimensions were stable across cultures.
Method:
A principal components analysis of Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale major symptom categories was performed on Japanese OCD patients (N=343). The association between symptom dimensions and clinical variables, including 1-year outcome after combination treatment, was also examined using Pearson correlations.
Results:
Four factors explaining 57.7% of the variance were identified: 1) contamination washing, 2) hoarding, 3) symmetry repeating and ordering, and 4) aggressive checking symptoms. The symmetry dimension was associated with early age at onset, and both the symmetry and hoarding dimensions were associated with decreased functioning and treatment resistance.
Conclusions:
The findings in this study support transcultural stability in the symptom structure of OCD, which is consistent with the hypothesis that OCD is mediated by universal psychobiological mechanisms.