TY - JOUR
T1 - Psychological flexibility and inflexibility in obsessive-compulsive symptom dimensions, disability, and quality of life
T2 - An online longitudinal study
AU - Thompson, Emma M.
AU - Brierley, Mary Ellen E.
AU - Destrée, Louise
AU - Albertella, Lucy
AU - Fontenelle, Leonardo F.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by Consdelho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq; grant # 302526/2018–8 , Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ; grant # CNE E−26/203.052/2017 , Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), the David Winston Turner Endowment Fund (Melbourne, VIC, Australia), and intramural grants from D’Or Institute for Research and Education (IDOR, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), and Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarships and Monash Graduate Excellence Scholarships. The funding sources had no involvement in the study design, interpretation of data, or the writing and submission of the manuscript.
Funding Information:
Since the unidimensional AAQ-II has been the dominant measure of psychological flexibility or experiential avoidance in previous studies (Angelakis & Pseftogianni, 2021; Jelinek et al., 2021), the significant findings from the AAQ-II may be capturing aspects of self-as-content rather than experiential avoidance. Indeed, the AAQ-II has been shown to have a stronger correlation with the MPFI self-as-content subscale (.74) than the MPFI experiential avoidance subscale (0.47; Rolffs et al., 2018). Within the context of existing literature, these results raise questions on which inflexibility processes may be most represented in the unidimensional AAQ-II. Overall, using the MPFI our findings do not support the association of experiential avoidance and OC symptom severity in a community sample, above and beyond psychological distress.This work was supported by Consdelho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cient?fico e Tecnol?gico (CNPq; grant # 302526/2018?8, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), Funda??o de Amparo ? Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ; grant # CNE E?26/203.052/2017, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), the David Winston Turner Endowment Fund (Melbourne, VIC, Australia), and intramural grants from D'Or Institute for Research and Education (IDOR, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil), and Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarships and Monash Graduate Excellence Scholarships. The funding sources had no involvement in the study design, interpretation of data, or the writing and submission of the manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Association for Contextual Behavioral Science
PY - 2022/1
Y1 - 2022/1
N2 - Early intervention in obsessive-compulsive disorder has recently gained traction. However, to address obsessive-compulsive (OC) symptoms before they progress to clinical levels, it is important to investigate potential processes involved in driving OC symptoms, as well as the processes driving the lower quality of life, impairments in functioning, and increased comorbidities that are already present in the subthreshold phase of the disorder. This study aimed to investigate the role of 12 psychological flexibility and inflexibility processes in predicting quality of life, disability, and OC symptoms over six months while controlling for psychological distress. An online community sample of 766 individuals from Amazon Mechanical Turk was evaluated at baseline and again at 6-month follow-up with a survey battery assessing OC symptom dimensions, psychological in/flexibility processes, psychological distress, and sociodemographic information. Results revealed that greater self-as-content was associated with more severe mental contamination and unacceptable thoughts at baseline. No other psychological inflexibility processes were associated with OC symptom severity or disability cross-sectionally or longitudinally. The study did not provide support for psychological flexibility processes being associated with quality of life at any time point. These findings suggest that self-as-content may be related to OC symptom severity, and potentially more so than other inflexibility processes. With this knowledge, self-as-content requires more research attention in relation to OC symptoms, as well as research on processes that have the potential to improve important non-psychiatric outcomes.
AB - Early intervention in obsessive-compulsive disorder has recently gained traction. However, to address obsessive-compulsive (OC) symptoms before they progress to clinical levels, it is important to investigate potential processes involved in driving OC symptoms, as well as the processes driving the lower quality of life, impairments in functioning, and increased comorbidities that are already present in the subthreshold phase of the disorder. This study aimed to investigate the role of 12 psychological flexibility and inflexibility processes in predicting quality of life, disability, and OC symptoms over six months while controlling for psychological distress. An online community sample of 766 individuals from Amazon Mechanical Turk was evaluated at baseline and again at 6-month follow-up with a survey battery assessing OC symptom dimensions, psychological in/flexibility processes, psychological distress, and sociodemographic information. Results revealed that greater self-as-content was associated with more severe mental contamination and unacceptable thoughts at baseline. No other psychological inflexibility processes were associated with OC symptom severity or disability cross-sectionally or longitudinally. The study did not provide support for psychological flexibility processes being associated with quality of life at any time point. These findings suggest that self-as-content may be related to OC symptom severity, and potentially more so than other inflexibility processes. With this knowledge, self-as-content requires more research attention in relation to OC symptoms, as well as research on processes that have the potential to improve important non-psychiatric outcomes.
KW - Experiential avoidance
KW - Obsessive-compulsive symptom
KW - Psychological flexibility
KW - Psychological inflexibility
KW - Quality of life
KW - Self-as-content
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85119287692
U2 - 10.1016/j.jcbs.2021.11.004
DO - 10.1016/j.jcbs.2021.11.004
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85119287692
SN - 2212-1447
VL - 23
SP - 38
EP - 47
JO - Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science
JF - Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science
ER -
