Disgust, mental contamination, and posttraumatic stress: Unique relations following sexual versus non-sexual assault

Abstract

Disgust and mental contamination (or feelings of dirtiness and urges to wash in the absence of a physical contaminant) are increasingly being linked to traumatic event exposure and posttraumatic stress (PTS) symptomatology. Evidence suggests disgust and mental contamination are particularly relevant to sexual assault experiences; however, there has been relatively little direct examination of these relations. The primary aim of the current study was to assess disgust and mental contamination-based reactivity to an individualized interpersonal assault-related script-driven imagery procedure. Participants included 22 women with a history of traumatic sexual assault and 19 women with a history of traumatic non-sexual assault. Sexual assault and PTS symptom severity predicted greater increases in disgust, feelings of dirtiness, and urges to wash in response to the traumatic event script. Finally, assault type affected the association between PTS symptom severity and increases in feelings of dirtiness and urges to wash in response to the traumatic event script such that these associations were only significant among sexually assaulted individuals. These findings highlight the need for future research focused on elucidating the nature of the relation between disgust and mental contamination and PTS reactions following various traumatic events.

Disgust and imaginal exposure to memories of sexual trauma: Implications for the treatment of posttraumatic stress.

“…This replicates prior findings documenting an increased magnitude of disgust versus anxiety responding to script-driven imagery involving sexual trauma cues (Badour, Feldner, Babson et al, 2013). There was also an interaction between change in disgust and change in anxiety in predicting the rate of decline in script-elicited PTSD symptoms across the course of exposure.…”

Disgust as a unique affective predictor of mental contamination following sexual trauma

“…This was examined among a sample of women with a history of sexual trauma, as sexual victimization has been identified in previous research as an experience particularly likely to result in mental contamination (Fairbrother & Rachman, 2004; Badour, Feldner, Babson et al, 2013). Consistent with hypotheses, peritraumatic self-focused disgust and disgust propensity positively correlated with mental contamination above and beyond the influence of peritraumatic fear, posttraumatic cognitions, contact contamination, and symptoms of psychopathology (i.e., symptoms of PTSD, OCD, and depression).…”

“…In the only study we are aware of in this domain, Badour, Feldner, Babson, and colleagues (2013) demonstrated that increases in state feelings of dirtiness correlated with concurrent increases in state disgust, but not increases in state anxiety, in response to idiographic imagery of a past sexual trauma. While these correlational results do not speak directly to the etiological role of disgust in mental contamination, it is possible that feeling disgusted during a traumatic event (i.e., peritraumatic disgust) may increase risk for developing mental contamination concerns following a sexual trauma.…”

“…For example, one study suggests that mental contamination concerns are experienced by nearly half of individuals with clinical diagnoses of OCD (Coughtrey, Shafran, Knibbs, & Rachman, 2012). Moreover, mental contamination concerns have been consistently shown to correlate with severity of PTSD symptoms following sexual trauma (Badour, Feldner, Babson, Blumenthal, & Dutton, 2013; Badour, Feldner, Blumenthal, & Bujarski, 2013; Fairbrother & Rachman, 2004; Ishikawa et al, in press; Olatunji, Elwood, Williams, & Lohr, 2008). As the vast majority of individuals with a history of sexual trauma report experiencing at least transient mental contamination at some point following their assault (Fairbrother & Rachman, 2004), much of the research on mental contamination has been conducted among these samples.…”

Disgusted by Sexual Abuse: Exploring the Association Between Disgust Sensitivity and Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms Among Mothers of Sexually Abused Children

“…Although little is known about the mechanisms through which disgust sensitivity may lead to PTS symptoms, preliminary research has shown that high disgust sensitivity is associated with higher experienced disgust during a traumatic event, defined as peritraumatic disgust (Engelhard et al., ). Research has supported a model involving disgust‐based conditioning in which intense experiences of peritraumatic disgust increases posttraumatic disgust reactivity (i.e., reacting with high levels of disgust) to traumatic event cues (Badour, Feldner, Babson, Blumenthal, & Dutton, ; Badour, Feldner, Blumenthal, & Knapp, ). This in turn was found to increase PTS symptoms (Badour, Feldner, Babson, et al., ; Badour, Feldner, Blumenthal, et al., ; Olatunji, Babson, Smith, Feldner, & Connolly, ; Shin et al., ).…”