Decision-making and planning in full recovery of anorexia nervosa

Cognitive flexibility in women who recovered from anorexia nervosa - a model-based approach

Research findings on cognitive flexibility (CF) functioning in women who recovered from anorexia nervosa (RAN) were found to be inconsistent. This was attributed to the multiple definitions of CF and the diverse measuring tools used to assess it. Applying a deductive approach to explore CF function may address these inconsistencies; thus, we used a model that divides CF into three subtypes, namely, stimulus-response mapping, switching sets and task switching. Additionally, we explored the association between CF subtypes and the disorder's clinical measures to assess the relation of CF to recovery. Forty-three RAN and 54 healthy controls performed tasks designed to assess CF subtypes based on the model's division, and the RAN group completed the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire. The results showed that the RAN group performed significantly worse than controls only in the stimulus-response mapping subtype. Additionally, there were no correlations between CF subtypes and clinical symptoms or the disorder measures - current and nadir body mass index, age of onset, time since recovery, and disorder duration. In conclusion, the study revealed CF impairment after recovery from AN, specifically in stimulus-response mapping. The variability in performance of the CF subtypes supports the application of a theory-driven perspective viewing CF as a modular ability in RAN. Additionally, CF is unrelated to clinical measures post-recovery and thus may not be used as a criterion for evaluating recovery.

Clinical factors predicting impaired executive functions in eating disorders: The role of illness duration

Poor performance in executive functions is observed in individuals with eating disorders (EDs). These impairments have usually been associated with the presence of comorbid psychopathology or with higher severity of EDs. However, few studies have explored the interaction between illness duration and deficits in executive functions. The present study investigates the association between ED duration and performance in decision-making, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility in the anorexia nervosa restrictive subtype (AN-R), bulimic/purging subtype (AN-BP), and binge spectrum disorders (BSDs) (namely, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder) among 116 women with EDs compared with 123 women healthy controls (HCs). Using cumulative survival analysis, we estimated the risk of deficits related to illness duration. Predictors of executive dysfunctions were assessed by regression analysis, including as potential predictors illness duration, severity of general psychopathology, and ED symptomatology. Results showed poor decision-making and cognitive flexibility in participants with EDs compared with HCs. ED duration was associated with poor inhibitory control in the AN-BP group and poor cognitive flexibility in the BSD group. The illness duration increased the risk of presenting early deficits in executive function. In decision-making and inhibitory control, the AN-R group showed the earliest deficits, whereas in cognitive flexibility it was the BSD group. ED duration predicted impaired cognitive flexibility in the BSD group and impaired inhibitory control in the AN-BP group, whereas the severity of general psychopathological symptoms was a predictor of impaired cognitive flexibility in individuals with AN-R. These results highlight the relevance of illness duration in executive dysfunctions in EDs.

A review of effort-based decision-making in eating and weight disorders

Effort-based decision-making provides a framework to understand the mental computations estimating the amount of work ("effort") required to obtain a reward. The aim of the current review is to systematically synthesize the available literature on effort-based decision-making across the spectrum of eating and weight disorders. More specifically, the current review summarises the literature examining whether 1) individuals with eating disorders and overweight/obesity are willing to expend more effort for rewards compared to healthy controls, 2) if particular components of effort-based decision-making (i.e. risk, discounting) relate to specific binge eating conditions, and 3) how individual differences in effort and reward -processing measures relate to eating pathology and treatment measures. A total of 96 studies were included in our review, following PRISMA guidelines. The review suggests that individuals with binge eating behaviours 1) are more likely to expend greater effort for food rewards, but not monetary rewards, 2) demonstrate greater decision-making impairments under risk and uncertainty, 3) prefer sooner rather than delayed rewards for both food and money, and 4) demonstrate increased implicit 'wanting' for high fat sweet foods. Finally, individual differences in effort and reward -processing measures relating to eating pathology and treatment measures are also discussed.

Decision-Making, Impulsiveness and Temperamental Traits in Eating Disorders

OBJECTIVE

To explore decision-making, impulsiveness and temperamental traits in patients suffering from eating disorders (EDs), as compared with healthy controls (HC).

METHOD

Fifty-one patients affected by ED (fourteen with anorexia restricting subtype, AN-R; fourteen with bulimia, BN; thirteen with anorexia bingeing/purging subtype, AN-BP; ten with binge-eating disorder, BED) and twenty-eight HC. The patients, recruited at the Section of Psychiatry of the University of Pisa (Italy, were evaluated with a battery of neuropsychological questionnaires, including the IOWA Gambling Task (IGT), the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11), the Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI), the Frontal Assessment Battery (FAB) and the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D).

RESULTS

The results indicated that AN-R, AN-BP and BN patients showed poorer IGT performances than HC (p < .05), while BED performances were similar to those of HC. IGT scores suggested the existence of similarities in decision-making performances of AN-BP and BN patients, as they performed differently from HC starting from block 3 (F(16.2)=1.7). In addition, differences between AN-BP/BN and AN-R patients were detected, given that they performed differently starting from block 4. As far as BIS-11 is concerned, AN-BP and BN patients reached the highest BIS total scores, when compared with the other groups. Further, they shared similar temperamental and impulsiveness profiles, as demonstrated by their BIS-11 'motor impulsiveness' scores, and by their TCI 'novelty seeking', 'reward dependence' and 'persistence' dimensions. The post-hoc analyses revealed that both AN groups (namely, AN-R and AN-BP) scored significantly lower than HC on the FAB. No patients fulfilled the criteria for the diagnosis of a current major depression.

CONCLUSIONS

Decision-making deficits are common in EDs. In AN-R these seem related to cognitive styles, while in AN-BP and BN patients with temperament features and impulsiveness traits.

A further assessment of decision-making in anorexia nervosa

Objective:

Anorexia nervosa (AN) may be associated with impaired decision-making. Cognitive processes underlying this impairment remain unclear, mainly because previous assessments of this complex cognitive function were completed with a single test. Furthermore, clinical features such as mood status may impact this association. We aim to further explore the hypothesis of altered decision-making in AN.

Method:

Sixty-three adult women with AN and 49 female controls completed a clinical assessment and were assessed by three tasks related to decision-making [Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART), Probabilistic Reversal Learning Task (PRLT)].

Results:

People with AN had poorer performance on the IGT and made less risky choices on the BART, whereas performances were not different on PRLT. Notably, AN patients with a current major depressive disorder showed similar performance to those with no current major depressive disorder.

Conclusion:

These results tend to confirm an impaired decision making-process in people with AN and suggest that various cognitive processes such as inhibition to risk-taking or intolerance of uncertainty may underlie this condition Furthermore, these impairments seem unrelated to the potential co-occurent major depressive disorders.

Intact value-based decision-making during intertemporal choice in women with remitted anorexia nervosa? An fMRI study

BACKGROUND

Extreme restrictive food choice in anorexia nervosa is thought to reflect excessive self-control and/or abnormal reward sensitivity. Studies using intertemporal choice paradigms have suggested an increased capacity to delay reward in anorexia nervosa, and this may explain an unusual ability to resist immediate temptation and override hunger in the long-term pursuit of thinness. It remains unclear, however, whether altered delay discounting in anorexia nervosa constitutes a state effect of acute illness or a trait marker observable after recovery.

METHODS

We repeated the analysis from our previous fMRI investigation of intertemporal choice in acutely underweight patients with anorexia nervosa in a sample of weight-recovered women with anorexia nervosa (n = 36) and age-matched healthy controls (n = 36) who participated in the same study protocol. Follow-up analyses explored functional connectivity separately in both the weight-recovered/healthy controls sample and the acute/healthy controls sample.

RESULTS

In contrast to our previous findings in acutely underweight patients with anorexia nervosa, we found no differences between weight-recovered patients with anorexia nervosa and healthy controls at either behavioural or neural levels. New analysis of data from the acute/healthy controls sample sample revealed increased coupling between dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and posterior brain regions as a function of decision difficulty, supporting the hypothesis of altered neural efficiency in the underweight state.

LIMITATIONS

This was a cross-sectional study, and the results may be task-specific.

CONCLUSION

Although our results underlined previous demonstrations of divergent temporal reward discounting in acutely underweight patients with anorexia nervosa, we found no evidence of alteration in patients with weight-recovered anorexia nervosa. Together, these findings suggest that impaired valuebased decision-making may not constitute a defining trait variable or “scar” of the disorder.

Insensitivity to Losses: A Core Feature in Patients With Anorexia Nervosa?

BACKGROUND

Patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) demonstrate aberrations in choice behavior, including impairments in laboratory measures of decision making. Although a wealth of studies suggest that these aberrations arise from alterations in value processing, it remains unclear by which core component of value processing this is mediated.

METHODS

We fit trial-by-trial data of patients with AN (n = 60 first cohort, n = 216 second cohort) and healthy control participants (n = 55) performing the Iowa Gambling Task to a computational model based on prospect utility theory. We determined, per participant, the best-fit model parameters and compared these between the groups.

RESULTS

Analyses revealed a decreased estimate of model parameter λ in patients with AN, indicative of an attenuation of loss-aversive behavior in the Iowa Gambling Task. In comparison, measures of reward sensitivity, value-based learning, and exploration versus exploitation were unaltered in patients with AN. A measurement in a second independent cohort replicated the finding that loss aversion, typically observed in healthy individuals, is reduced in patients with AN.

CONCLUSIONS

We show that patients with AN, in contrast to healthy control participants, demonstrate reduced loss-aversive behavior. This finding provides important fundamental insights into the decision-making capacity of patients with AN, suggesting alterations in the mechanisms involved in value processing related to negative feedback.

Set-shifting, central coherence and decision-making in individuals recovered from anorexia nervosa: a systematic review

BACKGROUND

The aim of this study was to review the existing literature and evaluate whether deficits in set-shifting, central coherence and decision-making persist in individuals recovered from anorexia nervosa (AN-REC).

METHOD

A systematic review approach was used. Literature was identified via searches in PubMed, PsychInfo and Embase database. The main search resulted in 158 articles. After exclusion of 135 articles, 23 articles were included in the review.

RESULTS

The majority of studies on set-shifting showed that set-shifting difficulties persist after recovery. Central coherence might also be trait related, however findings are inconsistent. Few studies have investigated decision-making in AN-REC, however those studies that do exist suggest that decision-making is not impaired in AN-REC.

CONCLUSIONS

Novel treatment strategies based on neuroscience research are emerging, focusing on targeting the underlying mechanisms of the illness, including neuropsychological functioning. Whether these functions are trait or state related could have implications for how they are targeted in treatment.

Decision-making impairment in anorexia nervosa: New insights into the role of age and decision-making style

OBJECTIVE

Patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) often report difficulties in decision making, which may interfere with treatment. The aim of this study was to investigate decision making in a large sample of adolescent and adult patients with AN, by using the Iowa gambling task.

METHOD

Participants were 611 female individuals (310 patients and 301 controls) who underwent neuropsychological and clinical assessment.

RESULTS

Significantly poorer decision-making performance was observed in adult patients, whereas no difference emerged between affected and nonaffected adolescents. Both adolescent and adult patients were characterized by trends for higher levels of attention to losses in comparison with healthy controls. Although healthy adult women exhibited better decision-making performance than healthy adolescents, in AN, there was no improvement of decision making with age. A cluster analysis identified 2 different styles of decision making in both patients and controls: a conservative style and an impulsive style.

DISCUSSION

Our study provides evidence of dysfunctional decision making in adult patients with AN and reveals an association between poor decision making and excessive punishment sensitivity in AN. The clinical and scientific implications of these findings merit further exploration.

An ecological approach to the behavioral assessment of executive functions in anorexia nervosa

The use of ecological tests to assess executive functions (EFs) in patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) has not examined extensively. The objective of this study was to analyze and compare the performance of patients with AN and healthy controls (HCs) on standard versus ecologically valid tests on EFs. Sixty-two females aged between 16 and 42 who were diagnosed with AN and 70 matched HCs completed 2 neuropsychological test batteries: standard tests (WCST, TMT, Stroop, ToL, fluency test) and the Behavioral Assessment of Dysexecutive Syndrome (BADS). On the standard tests, patients with AN produced more perseverative response and were slower than HCs in the TMT; in contrast, they scored as well as HCs on tasks that assessed categorization, interference in color naming, planning and semantic fluency. Conversely, there were differences in the ecological tests with patients with AN systematically slower in the resolution of complex tasks. Results demonstrated the power of ecological tests in capturing selective impairments in multifaceted and unstructured tests. Patients with AN experienced systematic deceleration in the resolution of ecological tasks. Also, the increased time needed to solve the tasks, was not reflected in overall improvement in performance. This evidence is further discussed with respect to central coherence.

Central Coherence in Eating Disorders: A Synthesis of Studies Using the Rey Osterrieth Complex Figure Test

Background

Large variability in tests and differences in scoring systems used to study central coherence in eating disorders may lead to different interpretations, inconsistent findings and between study discrepancies. This study aimed to address inconsistencies by collating data from several studies from the same research group that used the Rey Osterrieth Complex Figure Test (Rey Figure) in order to produce norms to provide benchmark data for future studies.

Method

Data was collated from 984 participants in total. Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, recovered Anorexia Nervosa, unaffected family members and healthy controls were compared using the Rey Figure.

Results

Poor global processing was observed across all current eating disorder sub-groups and in unaffected relatives. There was no difference in performance between recovered AN and HC groups.

Conclusions

This is the largest dataset reported in the literature and supports previous studies implicating poor global processing across eating disorders using the Rey Figure. It provides robust normative data useful for future studies.

Influence of negative affect on decision making in women with restrictive and binge-purge type anorexia nervosa

The present study aims to examine the influence of negative affect on decision making in women with anorexia nervosa (AN) compared to healthy control women and, secondly, to assess differences between the restrictive (ANR) and binge-purge (ANBP) subtypes. One hundred four women (32 with ANR, 32 with ANBP, and 40 healthy controls) participated. All women were asked to watch either a negative or a control film fragment, both followed by the Bechara Gambling Task (BGT). Before and after the fragments negative affect was measured. Additionally, relevant characteristics (e.g., overall depressive symptoms) were assessed. Differences in negative affect did not influence decision making performance. Independent of affective state, decision making was found to be impaired in women with ANBP (no learning effect on the BGT), but not in women with ANR. These findings highlight the importance of considering different AN subtypes when examining decision making processes. However, the role of negative affect on decision making remains uncertain. Since other affect related factors such as affect dysregulation may also play a role, future studies on decision making in AN should take the role of affect into account.

Impaired decision-making in symptomatic anorexia and bulimia nervosa patients: a meta-analysis

BACKGROUND

Impaired decision-making is a potential neurocognitive phenotype of eating disorders. It is therefore important to disentangle the decision-making deficits associated with the eating disorder subtypes and determine whether this putative impairment is a state or trait marker of the disease or more related to starvation. We systematically reviewed the literature on decision-making in eating disorders and conducted a meta-analysis to explore its role in anorexia nervosa (AN), bulimia nervosa (BN) and binge-eating disorder (BED).

METHOD

A search of the Medline and EMBASE databases and article references was performed. A total of 23 studies (2044 participants) met the selection criteria. When the Iowa gambling task (IGT) was used in at least three of the studies, a meta-analysis was run.

RESULTS

IGT performance was significantly worse in patients with an eating disorder diagnosis (AN, BN or BED) compared with healthy controls, indicating that eating disorders have a negative effect on decision-making. Hedges' g effect sizes were moderate to large (-0.72 in AN, -0.62 in BN, and -1.26 in BED). Recovered AN patients had IGT scores similar to those of healthy controls. Restrictive AN patients had significantly lower IGT net scores than purging AN patients, and both AN subtypes had worse performances than healthy controls. Age and body mass index did not explain results.

CONCLUSIONS

Decision-making was significantly altered in patients with eating disorders. Poor decision-making was more pronounced during the acute phase than in the recovered state of AN. Nutritional status during the acute phase of the disease did not seem to influence decision-making skills.

Does depression matter in neuropsychological performances in anorexia nervosa? A descriptive review

OBJECTIVE

This review aims to examine the impact of depressive symptoms on the assessment of cognitive flexibility, central coherence, and decision-making in individuals with anorexia nervosa (AN).

METHOD

An online search was carried out using PubMed and PsycInfo. Articles were selected for review if they were published in English between 1990 and 2014 and used the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, the Trail Making Task parts A and B, the Brixton Test, the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure Test, and/or the Iowa Gambling Task.

RESULTS

Sixty-two studies were included. Thirty (48%) of the studies statistically assessed the association between depression and neurocognition in AN versus healthy controls. Where significant correlations were found, it became clear that the more serious the depression, the greater the neuropsychological impairment. Only six (10%) studies examined whether increased depressive symptoms were able to eliminate the differences between individuals with AN and healthy controls, and one study found that depressive symptoms did eliminate group differences in cognitive flexibility and decision-making.

DISCUSSION

Only a subgroup of articles on neuropsychology in AN adjusted for depression. However, given the role of depression that some articles suggest, future studies should pay closer attention to the evaluation of this potential confounder.

Verbal Versus Figural Fluency Tests in Currently Ill and Weight Restored Anorexia Nervosa Patients

Fluency tests allow domain-specific assessment of verbal and non-verbal executive functions (EF) comparison and also enable utilizing of both quantitative and qualitative scoring methods. Thirty-five currently ill anorexia nervosa patients (PANs), 33 weight-restored patients (WRAN) and 47 healthy controls (HCs) were administered the word fluency test and the five-point test. Results show that WRANs tended to perseverate more than HCs in the verbal-fluency test. In addition, PANs produced significantly less correct figures and perseverated more than HCs and WRANs; HCs used more strategy methods than PANs and WRANs. Additionally, a positive correlation was found in the HC group between the total number of words in the verbal phonemic test and the number of designs produced and the number of correct designs. No such correlations were found in both anorexia groups. In conclusion, there is a differentiation between verbal and non-verbal EF in PANs and WRANs, showing a deficiency in the non-verbal domain. These findings may contribute to our understanding of the cognitive nature of the disorder.

Employing executive functions of perceptual and memory abilities in underweight and weight-restored anorexia nervosa patients

PURPOSE

Executive functions (EF) have been widely investigated in anorexia nervosa (AN) revealing difficulties in various aspects. We aimed at testing the effects of EF on stimuli perception and its representations in memory.

METHODS

Thirty AN underweight patients, 30 weight-restored AN patients, and 44 control participants, were recruited. Various EF were assessed using the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure Test, analyzed with the Boston Qualitative Scoring System.

RESULTS

No differences were found in visuo-constructional measures in either AN groups compared to controls on the copy and memory stages. However, both groups performed significantly worse than controls on most EF variables in the copy stage, while in the immediate and delayed memory stages the difference was less substantial.

CONCLUSIONS

Difficulties in EF among AN patients, current and weight restored, are more pronounced in the perceptual module and less so when employed through memory retrieval. The pattern, which is apparent after weight gain, suggests that there is no ameliorative effect on these difficulties.

Longitudinal examination of decision-making performance in anorexia nervosa: before and after weight restoration

BACKGROUND

This study aimed to extend previous work on decision-making deficits in anorexia nervosa (AN) by using a longitudinal design to examine decision-making before and after weight restoration.

METHODS

Participants were 22 women with AN and 20 healthy comparison participants who completed the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT). Decision-making was assessed both before and after weight restoration in a subset of 14 AN patients. Self-report and interview assessments were used to measure psychological correlates of decision-making performance including depression, anxiety, and eating disorder symptoms, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans were conducted to explore associations between brain volume in the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and decision-making in individuals with AN.

RESULTS

Currently ill AN patients performed worse on the IGT compared to the control group. Although decision-making performance did not improve significantly with weight restoration in the full AN sample, AN patients who were poor performers at baseline did improve task performance with weight-restoration. When actively ill, lower body mass index (BMI) and decreased left medial OFC volume were significantly associated with worse IGT performance, and these associations were no longer significant after weight restoration.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that decision-making deficits in AN in the acute phase of illness are associated with low weight and decreased left medial OFC volume, but increases in brain volume and BMI may not have been sufficient to improve decision-making in all patients. Findings contribute to a model for understanding how some patients may sustain self-starvation, and future work should examine whether decision-making deficits predict relapse.

Defining recovery in chronic fatigue syndrome: a critical review

PURPOSE

In chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), the lack of consensus on how recovery should be defined or interpreted has generated controversy and confusion. The purpose of this paper was to systematically review, compare, and evaluate the definitions of recovery reported in the CFS literature and to make recommendations about the scope of recovery assessments.

METHODS

A search was done using the MEDLINE, PubMed, PsycINFO, CINAHL, and Cochrane databases for peer review papers that contained the search terms "chronic fatigue syndrome" and "recovery," "reversal," "remission," and/or "treatment response."

RESULTS

From the 22 extracted studies, recovery was operationally defined by reference with one or more of these domains: (1) pre-morbid functioning; (2) both fatigue and function; (3) fatigue (or related symptoms) alone; (4) function alone; and/or (5) brief global assessment. Almost all of the studies measuring recovery in CFS did so differently. The brief global assessment was the most common outcome measure used to define recovery. Estimates of recovery ranged from 0 to 66 % in intervention studies and 2.6 to 62 % in naturalistic studies.

CONCLUSIONS

Given that the term "recovery" was often based on limited assessments and less than full restoration of health, other more precise and accurate labels (e.g., clinically significant improvement) may be more appropriate and informative. In keeping with common understandings of the term recovery, we recommend a consistent definition that captures a broad-based return to health with assessments of both fatigue and function as well as the patient's perceptions of his/her recovery status.

Psychopathological and personality traits underlie decision making in recent onset medication naïve anorexia nervosa: a pilot study

The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) analyzes the ability of participants to sacrifice immediate rewards in view of a long term gain. Anorexia Nervosa (AN) in addition to weight loss and body image disturbances is also characterized by the tendency to make decisions that may result in long-term negative outcomes. Studies that analyzed IGT performance in patients with AN were not consistent with each other. Fifteen adolescents with AN and 15 matched controls carried out IGT after being clinically and neuropsychologically evaluated. An interesting generalized estimating equation approach showed that four independent clinical variables, and not the group, explained IGT performances, such as blocks repetition, anxiety, psychogenic eating disorders and self transcendence. The impairment of decision making is not related to the diagnosis of AN, but it is driven by high levels of anxiety and self transcendence. Instead, some psychogenic eating disorders traits, related to illness severity, positively affected IGT performance in the whole sample. IGT impairment in AN found by prior studies could be related to these clinical features which are not always taken into account.

Implicit affective associations predict snack choice for those with low, but not high levels of eating disorder symptomatology

The central purpose of the current study was to examine whether eating disorder symptomatology moderates the extent to which implicitly and explicitly measured affective associations with fruits, or the feelings individuals associate with them, predict food choice. Participants (N = 107) completed both implicit and explicit measures of affective associations with fruits, a self-report of eating disorder symptomatology. In a subsequent snack selection task, they selected either a granola bar or fruit as a measure of their food choice behavior. Logistic regression analyses revealed that eating disorder symptomatology moderated the relation of implicit affective associations on behavior, OR = 0.27, p = .024, 95% CI (0.085, 0.84). A test of the simple effects indicated that implicit affective associations predicted snack choice at or below mean symptomatology levels [OR = 2.073, p = .02, 95% CI (1.12, 3.84)], but not at high levels [OR = 0.56, p = .28, 95% CI (0.18, 1.74)]. The effects of explicit measures on eating behavior were not moderated by eating disorder symptomatology (ps > .05). These findings advance our understanding of both the relation of implicit affective associations on behavior, as well as the ways in which eating disorder symptomatology may impact the decision-making process, thereby perpetuating disorder-related eating behavior. As such, they have implications for both health decision-making theory, as well as for the study and treatment of eating disorders.

The sorting test of the D-KEFS in current and weight restored anorexia nervosa patients

OBJECTIVE

Efforts have been made to characterize executive functions (EF) in anorexia nervosa (AN) both in the acute stage of the illness and after weight gain, yet many questions remain. The question of verbal versus visuo-perceptual stimuli in this regard has not been adequately addressed. The aim of this study is to further examine EF in women with past and present AN and to compare their performances in verbal and visual modalities with women who have never suffered from an eating disorder.

METHOD

Thirty-five underweight AN patients, 33 weight-restored patients symptom-free for at least 2 years, and 48 healthy female controls completed the Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System Sorting Test, so as to evaluate their EF.

RESULTS

No differences were observed between the scores of women with current and past AN. Both groups scored lower than controls on most test variables. However, while in the visuo-perceptual domain the performance of the AN groups was worse than that of controls, in the verbal domain they performed similarly to them.

DISCUSSION

Women with a past or present diagnosis of AN show difficulties in visuo-perceptual EF, whereas verbal EF seem to be preserved. There may be a dissociation between verbal and visuo-perceptual EF that persists after weight restoration.

[Anorexia nervosa - from a neuroscience perspective]

Anorexia nervosa is a frequent disorder especially among adolescent girls and young women, with high morbidity, mortality, and relapse rates. To date, no single therapeutic approach has proved to be superior to others (Herpertz et al., 2011). It remains unclear how its etiology and pathology are encoded within cognitive, neural, and endocrinological processes that modulate important mechanisms in appetitive processing and weight regulation. Yet, several trait characteristics have been identified in AN which might reflect predisposing factors. Further, altered levels of neuropeptides and hormones that regulate appetite and feeding behavior have been found during both the acute and the recovered state, pointing to dysfunctional mechanisms in AN that persist even after malnutrition has ceased. Researchers are also hoping that brain imaging techniques will allow for a more detailed investigation of the neural basis of reward and punishment sensitivity that appears to be altered in AN. The integration and extension of recent findings in these areas will hopefully provide a more comprehensive understanding of the disorder and hence enable the development of more effective treatments.

Executive functioning in anorexia nervosa patients and their unaffected relatives

Formal genetic studies suggested a substantial genetic influence for anorexia nervosa (AN), but currently results are inconsistent. The use of the neurocognitive endophenotype approach may facilitate our understanding of the AN pathophysiology. We investigated decision-making, set-shifting and planning in AN patients (n=29) and their unaffected relatives (n=29) compared to healthy probands (n=29) and their relatives (n=29). The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), the Tower of Hanoi (ToH) and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) were administered. Concordance rates and heritability indices were also calculated in probands/relatives. Impaired performance on the IGT and the WCST were found in both AN probands and their relatives, although planning appeared to be preserved. The IGT heritability index suggested the presence of genetic effects that influence this measure. No evidence for genetic effects was found for the WCST. The results suggest the presence of a shared dysfunctional executive profile in women with AN and their unaffected relatives, characterized by deficient decision-making and set-shifting. Concordance analysis strongly suggests that these impairments aggregate in AN families, supporting the hypothesis that they may constitute biological markers for AN. Decision-making impairment presents a moderate heritability, suggesting that decision-making may be a candidate endophenotype for AN.

Decision-making and impulsivity in eating disorder patients

Impairment in decision-making can be related to some pathological behaviors in eating disorders. This ability was assessed in 71 eating disorder patients (27 restricting type patients and 44 binge/purging type patients) and compared with 38 healthy controls using the Iowa Gambling Task. This task simulates real-life decision-making by assessing the ability to sacrifice immediate rewards in favor of long term gains. Furthermore, some studies have demonstrated a relationship between impulsivity and decision-making, so in our study the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale was also used. Eating disorder patients, both the restricting and the binge/purging groups, performed poorly in the Iowa Gambling Task compared to controls, confirming a deficit in decision-making in these patients. The restricting group showed poorer IGT performance than the binge/purging group. Interestingly, impulsivity was negatively correlated with decision-making, but only in the binge/purging group. In conclusion, our results confirm a specific deficit in eating disorder patients which may be related to their pathological eating behavior, and suggest that this impairment might be explained by different mechanisms in restricting and binge/purging disorders.

Central coherence in full recovery of anorexia nervosa

OBJECTIVE

This study examined central coherence as a possible endophenotype in a large sample of women recovered from anorexia nervosa (rec AN). Recovery was defined by considering physiological, behavioural and psychological variables.

METHOD

A total of 100 rec AN women and 100 healthy women completed the Rey Complex Figure Test, a measure for visual-spatial central coherence. The participants were matched 1:1 for age and educational level.

RESULTS

Compared with the healthy control group, the rec AN group showed better accuracy in the copy condition. There was a trend for a local strategy in the rec AN group compared with a global strategy in the healthy control group.

CONCLUSIONS

This sample of rec AN women showed no inefficiencies in global processing but a superior local processing after full recovery from AN.