The Many Faces of Guilt: A Review Mapping Unique and Overlapping Expressions in OCD and Depression.

Background: Guilt, a complex emotional experience pervading many lives, takes on an intricate form when intertwined with psychiatric conditions. As a multifaceted concept, guilt represents a key diagnostic feature in depression and is an integral part of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).

Methods: This systematic review aimed to synthesize empirical research on the varied dimensions of guilt across these two mental illnesses, where guilt is emphasized as a pathognomonic factor.

Instinctual impulses in obsessive compulsive disorder: A neuropsychological and psychoanalytic interface.

Psychopathology of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) that has been characterized by a conflict between the ego and superego on one hand, and aggressive and sexual impulses emerging from the id on the other, and employment of characteristic defenses to combat intense conflicts being connected with ones' biological disposition from the psychoanalytic school of thought now gets empirical foundation from neuroimaging research. The findings disregard the psychological construct, exclusively establishing the neurobiology of the disorder. With the objective to study the impact of sexual and aggressive impulses on the executive functions and processing speed in the patient group, 20 OCD patients (11 males, 9 females) and 20 normal control subjects, matched for all relevant variables including age, sex, educational level and handedness were studied.

Neuropsychological disposition and its impact on the executive functions and cognitive style in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Background: Recent brain imaging and electrophysiological studies have consistently shown dysfunction of the fronto-striatal thalamic pathways in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

Aim: To study the relationship of neuropsychological disposition with the executive functions and cognitive style in patients with OCD.

Methods: Twenty OCD patients (14 males, 6 females) and 20 normal control subjects, matched for all relevant variables including age, sex and education, were studied.