A Guide to Common Subtypes of OCD
Published December 19th, 2024
4 min read
The specific obsessions and compulsions that people with obsessive-compulsive disorder experience center around particular themes or subtypes. Here are the most common ones.
Written by Simon Spichak
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is one of the most common and misunderstood mental health conditions. People with OCD develop intrusive thoughts called obsessions that cause anxiety and distress. They perform compulsive behaviours to relieve the distress.
Obsessions and compulsions often center on a particular topic. Understanding these topics or themes allows therapists to characterize and treat people based on their subtypes of OCD. Here are some of the most common ones.
Checking OCD
Checking OCD is a potentially debilitating subtype of OCD. People with this subtype have a compulsive urge to check that they’ve done something — making sure over and over again that they’ve turned off the stove, locked the door, or left food for their pet.
If they don’t perform these checking rituals, the person with OCD will worry that something bad will happen, and they will be responsible. Compulsive checking can make people late for work and social activities. It may also prevent them from leaving the house altogether.
Contamination OCD
This subtype causes intense fear, distress, or anxiety about contracting or spreading disease. Obsessions over contamination may manifest as compulsive cleaning, avoidance of public spaces, frequent showering, avoiding public restrooms, and hours of researching potential illnesses to convince yourself that you won’t get them.
Although people with this subtype know that some of their compulsions are irrational, performing these behaviours is the only way they feel will reduce their distress.
Harm OCD
Harm OCD is characterized by intrusive thoughts of harming oneself or others. The idea of harming yourself or others causes anxiety and distress.
People with this form of OCD might avoid being close to sharp objects, seek excessive reassurance from their loved ones that they aren’t causing any harm, or may ruminate and overthink the day’s interactions to make sure they haven’t harmed anyone physically or emotionally.
Magical thinking OCD
In this subtype of OCD, people begin to believe that something terrible may happen or something good won’t happen if they don’t complete a ritual.
For example, some people might believe that taking a specific route to work will cause a car crash, so they take a longer drive instead. Others may fear that saying certain words or phrases a certain number of times could harm themselves or others. They may need to ruminate on good thoughts to cancel out the intrusive ones.
Pedophilia OCD
This subtype is a common but seldom diagnosed form of OCD characterized by unwanted sexual thoughts about children. Even if you may never act on these thoughts, people with this form of OCD start to avoid any situations with children just in case. Many people with this form of OCD feel ashamed and do not disclose their symptoms to therapists.
Purely obsessional OCD (Pure O)
In purely obsessional OCD, the obsessions aren’t physical rituals. Instead, it causes people to ruminate on their intrusive thoughts, causing anxiety, distress, and panic. For example, some people who have checking OCD might spend an hour trying to convince themselves that they really did turn off the oven or try to convince themselves that their magical thinking OCD is irrational.
Though these mental rituals often go unseen, they can negatively impact your life like other physical compulsions.
Religious (Scrupulosity) OCD
This subtype of OCD involves unwanted, intrusive thoughts about violating religious, moral, or ethical beliefs. For example, someone might develop anxiety over committing a sin and perform compulsive rituals that manifest as excessive prayer or seeking excessive reassurance to assuage their concerns.
Treating OCD
The frontline treatment for OCD is exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy. It works by progressively exposing you to distressing situations that trigger your obsessions while preventing you from acting out the compulsions. The treatment is personalized based on your OCD symptoms.
It helps rewire the brain, helping it become desensitized to obsessive thoughts – making it easier for you to feel relief and lower your anxiety without having to perform the compulsions.
You can read more about OCD and ERP here:
Resolvve’s therapists are trained to treat OCD and can help you reduce your symptoms. If you’re ready to take the next step toward treatment, you can book a free consultation with one of our therapists.
Please note that this post is written for educational purposes; it is not therapy. If you need to talk to a professional, please book a consultation with a psychotherapist through Resolvve.