Abstract
Disgust is perceived to be a negative emotion, which restricts or decreases an organism’s behaviour to defend the body, mind, and/or social order when exposed to stimuli from the outside world. However, disgust may also lead to behaviours that are advantageous for an organism’s survival and thus have value. Moral foundations theory proposes that human moral judgments are based on six inherent criteria, one of which is the moral value of sanctity/purity. This study explores the relation between disgust and sanctity/purity. Most research in this field has been conducted primarily in the United States and in Europe and has yielded contradictory findings. While disgust becomes moralized specifically in the domain of sanctity/purity, it is also related to a wide array of other domains. This study revealed that the disgust displayed by Japanese participants was not associated with sanctity/purity alone but was deeply connected to and affected by relations with others and moral values, namely, loyalty and authority, which emphasize the importance of continued survival and maintaining one’s social group.
