The roles of thought-action fusion, guilt and anxiety in connections between scrupulosity and religiousity

Scrupulosity is one of many types of psychological disorders that, is an area that is not fully understood and does not have an accurate and effective solution. While the extent of research into the literature in regard to its relationship with religiosity does exist, it does not fully analyze and cover the expansive spectrum for potential causes and ways to manage this disease. The primary purpose of this study is to determine the relationship between scrupulosity and religiosity and the role of thought-action fusion, guilt and anxiety within this relationship. To further support this claim, data was obtained via the qualitative method, whereby a carefully constructed survey was conducted with 202 (Male=66, Female=136) participants on a convenience sample between the ages of 18-60 and these findings were determined with the correlational patterned research method. The survey was formed from the following: Personal information form (gender and age), General Anxiety Level, Thought-Action Fusion Scale, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Scale, Penn Inventory of Scrupulosity, Neuroticism/Anxious Personality Characteristics Scale, Guilt and Shame Scale and Religious Profiler Scale. From the research, findings concluded that as the level of Questioning religiosity increased, the level of religious obsession decreased; It was observed that as Sufi and Commitment religiosity increased, scrupulosity symptoms also increased – providing support that a correlation between the factors do exist. It has also been observed that this disorder is more common in men than in women.