Examining a Purported Association Between Attachment to God and Scrupulosity

Scrupulosity is a moral/religious subtype of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) that remains understudied within the extant literature. Drawing from separate lines of research suggesting that attachment insecurities underlie OCD and that God functions psychologically much like other attachment figures, we examined a purported association between attachment to God and scrupulosity. A large sample of community adults (N 450) completed self-report measures assessing for scrupulosity, obsessive– compulsive symptoms, attachment to God, and related covariates. Results were that attachment to God significantly correlated with scrupulosity. Moreover, attachment to God evidenced incremental specificity in the concurrent prediction of scrupulosity beyond variance shared with religiosity, negative affect, OCD-relevant dysfunctional beliefs, and attachment insecurities in close interpersonal relationships. Attachment to God did not evidence this level of specificity in the concurrent prediction of obsessive– compulsive symptoms. Among the attachment to God dimensions, attachment anxiety shared a particularly robust association with scrupulosity. Conceptual and therapeutic implications of these results are discussed.