Imagery versus verbal interpretive cognitive bias modification for compulsive checking

• Negative interpretive biases maintain compulsive checking.
• Imagery inductions may enhance Cognitive Bias Modification (CBM-I) training.
• Participants receiving positive CBM-I interpreted novel scenarios more adaptively.
• CBM-I led to mixed findings on self-report measures and had no effect on behaviour.
• Future research may enhance imagery induction and measurement of training effects.

Pathological doubting and checking is a common symptom presentation in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Previous research has established that compulsive checkers do not display an actual memory deficit, but lack confidence in their memories and experience intolerance of uncertainty regarding the completion of tasks. We investigated whether interpretive cognitive bias modification (CBM-I) reduced memory distrust and intolerance of uncertainty in a nonclinical sample. We also examined the possible enhancement of CBM-I for OCD through imagery training. The results provide evidence that participants who received positive imagery CBM-I training may have interpreted novel ambiguous checking scenarios more adaptively and endorsed negative checking beliefs less relative to participants in the control imagery CBM-I condition. Findings on behavioural checking tasks did not indicate any specific response to CBM-I training. Future research may translate these suggestive findings into a useful adjunct to traditional strategies targeting maladaptive OCD beliefs.