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OCD, AKA Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, is defined by its namesake: it is the exhibition of both obsessions (cognitive component) and compulsions (behavioral component). So for example, I might have an obsession with the door being locked, and thus have a compulsion to lock it. In OCD, this is taken to the extreme--the most minute details are subject to obsessions, and therefore, compulsions. Often, OCD patients don't leave their houses because the compulsions get so out of control that they need to be situated in an environment in which they have the utmost control over these minutiae. As for causes, there are many perspectives on this. I personally subscribe to the behavioral notion in which it's just reinforcement of a stimulus gone awry, along with some shit in the brain that's gone wrong. OCD can be treated with cognitive-behavioral therapy to cause extinction in these behaviors, but it often has to be done one by one, and most OCD patients have multiple obsessions/compulsions. The disease can go to such extreme lengths that sometimes psychosurgery is used, but it only has about a 25% success rate, because we really don't know jack shit about the human brain.
