Department of Psychology, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel.
Neurological Rehabilitation Unit, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Eat Weight Disord. 2020 Aug;25(4):1039-1047. doi: 10.1007/s40519-019-00728-2. Epub 2019 Jun 17.
The allocentric lock theory (ALT) suggests that people with eating disorders have difficulties in multisensory integration in two reference frames-egocentric and allocentric, whereby the egocentric, but not allocentric, is impaired. This leads to a distorted body image that contributes to the development and maintenance of the disorder. The current study aimed to explore a facet of the ALT, namely, the visuo-spatial aspect, and its relation to cognitive flexibility in patients with anorexia nervosa (AN).
Fifty-five participants took part in the study: 20 AN patients and 35 controls, matched by age and education. The object perspective taking test (OPTT) and the mental rotation test (MRT), tapping egocentric and allocentric representations, respectively, and a set-shifting task were administered. The brief symptom inventory was used to measure overall levels of distress.
AN patients showed higher level of distress. They performed poorer on the OPTT and set-shifting task but not on the MRT. The OPTT and MRT were correlated for controls but not for AN patients, while the set-shifting task and body mass index were associated with the OPTT but not with the MRT for the AN patients.
The findings support the ALT by demonstrating impaired visual egocentric representations and intact allocentric visual functions in AN patients, with cognitive flexibility associated only with the egocentric frame. Therefore, egocentric frame impairment in AN patients may be influenced by visual perception and cognitive flexibility deficiency.
Level III: case-control analytic study.
非自我中心锁理论（ALT）表明，饮食失调患者在两个参考框架（自我中心和非自我中心）的多感官整合方面存在困难，其中自我中心但非非自我中心受到损害。这导致了扭曲的身体形象，从而促成了该障碍的发展和维持。本研究旨在探索 ALT 的一个方面，即视空间方面，及其与神经性厌食症（AN）患者认知灵活性的关系。
55 名参与者参加了这项研究：20 名 AN 患者和 35 名年龄和教育程度相匹配的对照组。分别进行了物体视角测试（OPTT）和心理旋转测试（MRT），分别测试自我中心和非自我中心的表现，以及一套转换任务。Brief Symptom Inventory 用于衡量整体困扰程度。
AN 患者表现出更高的困扰水平。他们在 OPTT 和转换任务上表现较差，但在 MRT 上表现正常。OPTT 和 MRT 之间在对照组中相关，但在 AN 患者中不相关，而转换任务和体重指数与 AN 患者的 OPTT 相关，但与 MRT 不相关。
这些发现通过证明 AN 患者的视觉自我中心表现受损和非自我中心视觉功能正常，支持了 ALT，并且认知灵活性仅与自我中心框架相关。因此，AN 患者的自我中心框架损伤可能受到视觉感知和认知灵活性缺陷的影响。
三级：病例对照分析研究。
