The Hygiene Centre, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London WC1E 7HT, UK.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2011 Feb 12;366(1563):389-401. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2010.0117.
Disgust is an evolved psychological system for protecting organisms from infection through disease avoidant behaviour. This 'behavioural immune system', present in a diverse array of species, exhibits universal features that orchestrate hygienic behaviour in response to cues of risk of contact with pathogens. However, disgust is also a dynamic adaptive system. Individuals show variation in pathogen avoidance associated with psychological traits like having a neurotic personality, as well as a consequence of being in certain physiological states such as pregnancy or infancy. Three specialized learning mechanisms modify the disgust response: the Garcia effect, evaluative conditioning and the law of contagion. Hygiene behaviour is influenced at the group level through social learning heuristics such as 'copy the frequent'. Finally, group hygiene is extended symbolically to cultural rules about purity and pollution, which create social separations and are enforced as manners. Cooperative hygiene endeavours such as sanitation also reduce pathogen prevalence. Our model allows us to integrate perspectives from psychology, ecology and cultural evolution with those of epidemiology and anthropology. Understanding the nature of disease avoidance psychology at all levels of human organization can inform the design of programmes to improve public health.
厌恶是一种进化而来的心理系统，通过疾病回避行为来保护生物体免受感染。这种“行为免疫系统”存在于多种物种中，表现出普遍的特征，协调与病原体接触风险相关的卫生行为。然而，厌恶也是一个动态的自适应系统。个体在与神经质人格等心理特征相关的病原体回避方面表现出差异，也会因处于怀孕或婴儿期等特定生理状态而产生差异。三种专门的学习机制可以改变厌恶反应：加西亚效应、评价性条件作用和传染律。通过“模仿常见的行为”等社会学习启发式，在群体层面上影响卫生行为。最后，文化规则将群体卫生扩展到纯洁和污染上，这些规则造成社会隔离，并通过礼仪加以执行。合作卫生努力，如卫生设施，也可以降低病原体的流行率。我们的模型使我们能够将心理学、生态学和文化进化的观点与流行病学和人类学的观点结合起来。在人类组织的各个层面上理解疾病回避心理学的本质，可以为改善公共卫生的项目设计提供信息。
