Dissecting commonalities and differences of adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and schizophrenia

• Applicants: Dr. Katharina Bey; Professor Dr. Axel Krug; Professorin Dr. Alexandra Philipsen
• Subject Area: Biological Psychiatry ; Cognitive, Systems and Behavioural Neurobiology
• Term: since 2025
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 557344764

Research of the last years have shown overlap in a number of symptoms, cognitive anomalies, brain structural differences as well as in personality dimensions in adult attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and schizophrenia. Additional studies showed that genetic as well as environmental factors show different degrees of overlap. This implies a great necessity to study these disorders not by themselves but rather in a transdiagnostic fashion. Only by doing so, differences and commonalties can be clearly delineated. The applicants have been able to obtain funding to study ADHD and schizophrenia as well as healthy individuals in this transdiagnostic fashion. The current application aims to include OCD as a third group to be studied. The overarching aim of this application is to add OCD to the cohort to be established and to phenotype all subjects regarding symptoms, personality, cognition as well as protective and risk factors. As an additionally important point, all subjects will be studied using traditional and newer MRI protocols, including quantitative T1-mapping and quantitative susceptibility mapping. For traditional markers, several cohorts are readily available as replication samples. The newly established methods, together with the unique combination of patient groups will constitute a unique proposition. All variables will be subject to machine-learning approaches to better understand the differences and commonalties within this cohort. Above and beyond local analyses, national and international collaborations (e.g. ENIGMA) will further enhance the quality of this endeavor.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants