Symposia
Adult Anxiety
Isabelle E. Siegel, B.A.
Doctoral Student
Rutgers University Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology
Piscataway, New Jersey
Gabriella T. Ponzini, M.S.
PhD Candidate
West Virginia University
Morgantown, West Virginia
Casey A. Schofield, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Skidmore College
Saratoga Springs, NY
Previous work has established that symptoms of OCD and characteristics of its evidence-based treatment are largely misunderstood by the general public and many mental health professionals. Such gaps in mental health literacy (MHL) may help to explain why the average delay to treatment experienced for individuals with OCD is more than a decade, as low MHL is a predictor of psychotherapy use. The current study utilizes a mixed-methods designed to better understand what laypeople believe (and potentially misunderstand) about OCD and its treatment in order to inform work focused on the role of MHL as a treatment barrier.
Participants (N = 37) responded to numerous open-ended questions designed to assess knowledge about the symptoms and prevalence of OCD (e.g., “Can you tell me, to the best of your knowledge, what OCD is?”) and about evidence-based treatment for OCD (e.g., “Have you ever heard of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)? If yes, what is it?”), as well as about their awareness of stereotypes that exist about people with OCD (e.g., “When you think of a person with OCD, what do you picture?”). Open-ended responses were thematically coded and analyzed using Grounded Coding Theory. In addition, participants completed several quantitative measures, including the Symptoms As Benefit Trivialization Scale (α = .93, Pavelko, 2019), a modified version of the Skidmore Anxiety Stigma Scale (α = .85, SASS; Schofield & Ponzini, 2020), and a measure assessing knowledge about CBT using items unanimously agreed upon by N = 10 clinical psychologists with CBT expertise (K-CAT; Schofield et al., in development).
Results suggest that laypeople hold an exceptionally narrow understanding of OCD, such that OCD is conceptualized exclusively as being compulsion-centered and homogenous in presentation (i.e., contamination- and order-focused). In general, participants showed low accuracy in identifying key features of OCD (i.e., prevalence, symptoms, etc.) and little awareness of or knowledge about evidence-based treatment options for OCD.
The limited awareness about the range of expressions that OCD can take, as well as the limited understanding about what best practices look like in the treatment of OCD, represent potentially notable barriers to timely and effective treatment. Having a better sense of the current MHL about OCD and its treatment, as well as the specific content of pervasive misconceptions, represents a first step in confronting MHL as a treatment barrier for OCD.