Why are some obsessions more upsetting than others?
Section snippets
Why are some obsessions more upsetting than others?
In recent years, there has been increasing interest in understanding the development and persistence of obsessional thoughts. Much of this interest has been generated from cognitive theories of obsessions, which propose a number of factors to explain the persistent nature of obsessions. A fundamental assumption of these theories is that obsessional thoughts arise from commonly occurring intrusive thoughts that are appraised as significant or meaningful (e.g., Rachman (1997), Rachman (1998);
Participants
Twenty-eight individuals with a principal diagnosis of OCD were recruited for this study (mean age of 32, SD=10.6, 71% female). Participants were recruited from among patients presenting to a specialty anxiety disorders clinic in Hamilton, Ontario. All diagnoses were made using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID-IV; First, Spitzer, Gibbon, & Williams, 1996). The principal diagnosis (i.e., the problem causing the most distress and functional impairment) was determined by the
Data screening
Data were examined for the presence of outliers. No outliers were found on the variables of interest.
Thought content
A wide range of thought content was reported for both the most upsetting and least upsetting obsessions. For most upsetting obsessions, 43% were aggressive, religious, or sexual obsessions, 32% were contamination concerns, and the rest (25%) were “other” obsessions, including needs for symmetry and exactness, need to know or remember, thoughts about saving things, and doubts about actions. For
Discussion
The results of the current study suggest several reasons why certain obsessions are so upsetting and persistent for people with OCD. The first factor is appraisal. Upsetting obsessions were appraised as more significant than less upsetting obsessions. This difference in strength of appraisals occurred for appraisals about the importance or meaning of simply having the thought, about the need to exercise control over one's thoughts, and about appraisals of responsibility for one's thoughts and
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2021, Journal of Obsessive-Compulsive and Related DisordersCitation Excerpt :In one study, Rowa and Purdon (2003) showed that the intrusive thoughts identified by nonclinical individuals as the most disturbing were more in conflict with their values than their least disturbing thoughts. They subsequently replicated this finding using participants with OCD (Rowa, Purdon, Summerfeldt, & Antony, 2005). In a naturalistic study of language used in online comments by individuals self-identified as suffering from sexual-orientation OCD (SO-OCD), Coimbra-Gomes and Motschenbacher (2019) found that expressions involving “don't want” featured prominently, particularly in connection to the possibility of a gay identity.