ABNORMAL AND NORMAL COMPULSIONS

Previous research by Rachman and de Silva (1978, Behaviour Research an d Therapy, 16, 233-248) and by Salkovskis and Harrison (1984, Behaviou r Research and Therapy, 22, 549-552) has shown that abnormal and norma l obsessions are similar in content. The present study examined whethe r the same is true for abnormal and normal rituals. A sample of normal subjects (N = 150) were asked about their idiosyncratic rituals. A ma jority of them (54.7%) indicated that they had such rituals. While the se rituals were less frequent, less intense, and less often associated with negative affect than the compulsions of a sample of patients wit h obsessive-compulsive disorder, differences in terms of content betwe en normal and abnormal rituals were small. Experts often tended to mis classify abnormal compulsions as normal rituals. By and large, the pre sent findings indicate that there is a continuity between abnormal and normal compulsions. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserve d.