Mental Contamination in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Associations With Childhood Trauma, Alexithymia, and Clinical Symptomatology.

Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to examine the relationships between mental contamination, childhood trauma, alexithymia, and clinical characteristics in individuals diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and to evaluate factors associated with mental contamination within a cross-sectional design.

Methods: The study included 70 patients with OCD and 70 control groups (CGs). Participants completed a sociodemographic information form, the Vancouver Obsessional Compulsive Inventory-Mental Contamination Scale, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, the Toronto Alexithymia Scale, and the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale. Group comparisons, correlation analyses with correction for multiple comparisons, and hierarchical regression analyses were conducted using IBM SPSS 26.0.

Results: The OCD had significantly higher scores for mental contamination, childhood trauma and alexithymia compared with CGs. In the OCD, mental contamination showed significant associations with childhood trauma and alexithymia; however, associations with obsession and compulsion severity were attenuated after correction for multiple comparisons. In hierarchical regression analyses, alexithymia remained the only variable significantly associated with mental contamination even after controlling for childhood trauma and contamination-related obsessions and cleaning compulsions. In the CG, alexithymia was also the only variable significantly associated with mental contamination.

Conclusion: Our findings suggest that mental contamination in patients with OCD may be associated with childhood trauma and, in particular, alexithymic features rather than with OCD symptom severity or specific symptom subtypes. Future studies employing longitudinal and experimental designs are recommended to examine the causal nature of the relationships between mental contamination, alexithymia, and childhood trauma.