Unique affective and cognitive processes in contamination appraisals: Implications for contamination fear

Josh M. Cisler, Thomas G. Adams, Robert E. Brady, Ana J. Bridges, Jeffrey M. Lohr, Bunmi O. Olatunji

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

21 Scopus citations

Abstract

A large body of evidence suggests an important role of disgust in contamination fear (CF). A separate line of research implicates various cognitive mechanisms in contamination fear, including obsessive beliefs, memory biases, and delayed attentional disengagement from threat. This study is an initial attempt to integrate these two lines of research and examines whether disgust and delayed attention disengagement from threat explain unique or overlapping processes within CF. Non-clinical undergraduate students (N= 108) completed a spatial cueing task, which provided measures of delayed disengagement from frightening and disgusting cues, and a self-report measure of disgust propensity (DP). Participants also completed a chain of contagion task, in which they provided contamination appraisals of an object as a function of degrees of removal from an initial contaminant. Results demonstrated that DP predicted greater initial contamination appraisals, but a sharper decline in estimations across further degrees of removal from the contaminant. Delayed disengagement from disgust cues uniquely predicted sustained elevations in contamination estimations across further degrees of removal from the contaminant. These results suggest that DP and delayed disengagement from disgust cues explain unique and complimentary processes in contamination appraisals, which suggests the utility of incorporating the disparate affective and cognitive lines of research on CF.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)28-35
Number of pages8
JournalJournal of Anxiety Disorders
Volume25
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 2011

Keywords

  • Attention
  • Contamination fear
  • Disgust
  • Obsessive-compulsive disorder

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Clinical Psychology
  • Psychiatry and Mental health

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