History of trauma and dissociative symptoms among patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder and social anxiety disorder

Abstract

We aimed to compare the history of trauma and the profile and severity of dissociative symptoms of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) to those of patients with social anxiety disorder (SAD). Patients with OCD (n = 34) and patients with SAD (n = 30) were examined with the following instruments: Trauma History Questionnaire (THQ), Dissociative Experience Scale (DES), Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory (OCI), Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS), Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI). Patients with OCD reported significantly lower rates of exposure to traumatic events. Nevertheless, the severity of dissociative symptoms was not significantly different between the groups. Regression analyses showed that, while the OCI scores better predicted the variance on DES scores in the OCD sample, the LSAS and the BAI better predicted the variance on the DES among patients with SAD. Patients with OCD are probably less vulnerable to some types of traumatic experiences. Dissociative symptoms may cut across different anxiety disorders.