title: Thought-action fusion as a mediator of religiosity and obsessive-compulsive symptoms.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Thought-action fusion (TAF), or maladaptive cognitions regarding the relationship between mental events and behaviours, has been implicated in the development and maintenance of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). As some religions promote TAF-like appraisals, it has been proposed that religiosity may play a role in the transformation of normally occurring intrusive thoughts into clinically distressing obsessions. No research, however, has experimentally investigated the mediating role of TAF on the relationship between religiosity and OC symptoms.
  
  
  METHODS
  85 Christian, Jewish, and Atheist/Agnostic participants were exposed to an experimental thought-induction protocol and reported on their associated levels of distress, guilt, feelings of responsibility, and urge to suppress target intrusions experienced during a 5-min monitoring period. Participants also completed measures of obsessive-compulsive symptomatology, TAF beliefs, and general psychopathology.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Using PROCESS and bootstrapping analyses, a test of the conditional indirect effects of religiosity on obsessive-compulsive symptoms revealed that Christianity moderated the effects of religiosity on moral TAF beliefs, which in turn mediated the relationship between religiosity and obsessive-compulsive symptoms. Furthermore, in the Christian group, moral TAF beliefs mediated the relationship between religiosity and ratings of guilt and responsibility following the experimental protocol.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The use of university students with moderate levels of religiosity.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Collectively the results suggest that obsessional thinking is not attributable to religion per se, but that teachings underlying certain religious doctrines may fuel TAF beliefs that are implicated in the maintenance of OCD.
authors.affiliation: The Clinical Research Unit for Anxiety and Depression, School of Psychiatry, UNSW Medicine, University of New South Wales, Australia. alishia.williams@unsw.edu.au
authors.forename: Alishia D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.forename: Gloria
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Lau
authors.forename: Jessica R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Grisham
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003071:Cognition; D005260:Female; D006167:Guilt; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male; D008960:Models, Psychological; D009771:Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology / Q000523:psychology*; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012941:Social Responsibility; D029181:Spirituality; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000523:psychology; D013850:Thinking