Developmental coupling between obsessive-compulsive symptoms and psychotic-like experiences in youth: a four-wave longitudinal study

Obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS) and psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) commonly emerge during late childhood and early adolescence and often co-occur. However, it remains unclear whether this overlap reflects stable between-person differences, within-person longitudinal coupling, or symptom-specific developmental pathways. Using four waves of data from 7,451 participants in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study, we examined OCS–PLEs coupling from late childhood to early adolescence. Parallel-process latent growth models characterized co-developmental trajectories; cross-lagged and random-intercept cross-lagged panel models distinguished between-person from within-person associations; and temporal network analyses identified symptom-level bridge patterns. OCS and PLEs followed distinct but partially coupled developmental trajectories, with higher initial OCS associated with higher initial PLEs and a less favorable trajectory of PLEs over time. Conventional cross-lagged models showed bidirectional associations at the observed-score level, whereas random-intercept models suggested that early associations largely reflected stable between-person differences; only PLEs predicted subsequent increases in OCS from ages 12 to 13 at the within-person level. Symptom-level networks showed earlier OCS-to-PLE links and later more reciprocal coupling, with intrusive thoughts and worry emerging as consistent bridge symptoms. These findings suggest that OCS–PLEs overlap may vary across developmental stages and highlight the importance of developmental timing and symptom-specific assessment in youth.