A Structural Model of Relationship Between Disgust Propensity and Fear of Contamination: The Mediating Role of Mental Contamination

Background: Fear of contamination is one of the complex and powerful fears and is often seen in contamination/washing obsessive-compulsive disorder. Earlier researches have shown that this disorder is related to mental contamination and recent research showed that individuals with the fear of contamination are prone to experiencing disgust. Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the mediating role of mental contamination between disgust propensity and fear of contamination. Methods: The sample consisted of 391 students of Shahed University in Tehran city, Iran. The participants were selected by cluster sampling in November and December in 2015. The tools used were Disgust Propensity and Sensitivity Scale-Revised (DPSS-R), Vancouver Obsessional Compulsive Inventory-Mental Contamination Scale (VOCI-MC), and Padua Inventory (PI). The proposed model was examined by Structural Equation Modeling Modeling (SEM), using Amos-22 software. Baron and Kenny as well as bootstrap methods were used for the analysis of the role of mental contamination as a mediator in this relationship. Results: Goodness of fit indexes indicated that the proposed model had a good fit (GFI = 0.92, AGFI = 0.90, TLI = 0.93, CFI = 0.94 (all > 0.90), and RMSEA = 0.04 (CI (90%) = 0.04-.05). The results showed that disgust propensity caused the fear of contamination both directly ( = 0.35; SE = 0.05) and indirectly ( = 0.16; SE = 0.03) through mental contamination. Conclusion: The findings provided support for the proposed model and showed that disgust propensity played a role in increasing mental contamination which, in turn, leads to fear of contamination. As a result, it would seem that the assessment of disgust propensity and mental contamination is essential to treating the fear of contamination and washing behavior.