Inducing thought-action fusion experience and examining the relationships between obsessive compulsive disorder symptoms and obsessive beliefs, thought suppression, thought-action fusion: An experimental study

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder(OCD) is a mental disorder characterized by obsessions, compulsions, or both. This study firstly aimed to explore the relationships between obsessive-compulsive symptoms, obsessive beliefs, thought suppression tendency, and thought-action fusion(TAF) in a non-clinical sample. Another aim of the study was to create TAF through the use of imagination of short stories, examining the effect of suppression and acceptance of thought by experimental manipulation. The first stage involved 363 university students in Ankara, and the second stage involved 69 students. While first stage data collection included Demographic Information Form, Thought-Action Fusion Scale(TAFS), Depression Anxiety Stress Scale-21(DASS-21), Padua Inventory-Washington State University Revision(PI-WSUR), Obsessive Beliefs Questionnaire-20(OBQ-20), and White Bear Suppression Inventory(WBSI), second stage included short stories created by the researcher, a Visual Analog Scale, and thought frequency counters. The data obtained were evaluated by Hierarchical Regression Analysis and a series of variance analyses. The results show that gender, depression and anxiety are important predictors of obsessive-compulsive symptoms, and perfectionism and threat estimation are prominent obsessive beliefs in predicting obsessive-compulsive symptoms. Following TAF induction, participants experienced increased anxiety, distress, and guilt. There was a decrease in intrusive thoughts in the acceptance and control groups after manipulation. When the probability of the event in the short stories is examined, it is found that the participants had low scores in all groups. However, assessments of thought unacceptability remained consistent over time. In the post-manipulation, participants in the thought acceptance group exhibited greater willingness than the suppression and control groups. Additionally, a strong urge to do something to eliminate the effects of the thought was observed in each group. An important finding was that spontaneous suppression behaviour was observed in all groups. Considering the limitations of the study, further studies are needed to develop new methods for the investigation of TAF experience of OCD patients.