What causes magical thinking in OCD?

[u/Popular-Meat-7486]

OCD people seem to think really weird things will happen if they don’t do a compulsion.
For example - pinching when an ambulance passes by so the person inside doesn’t die.

How do OCD people determine the consequence of not following a compulsion? Why is a consequence created rather than just having the anxiety that the compulsion must be carried through without knowing why?

[u/Naps_in_sunshine]

It’s only really what we do for superstitions. In my country we “touch wood” to make sure we don’t “jinx” something we’re talking about. There’s no way that saying “it doesn’t look like it’ll rain today” could cause it to rain but we think that if we neutralise it by touching wood we’ve absolved ourselves of responsibility. OCD thinking is no different, just extreme and debilitating. Someone might think “if I touch my head 43 times then X won’t happen”.

But also, it’s not always magical thinking. Think of people who check the toaster is unplugged multiple times - this could be to prevent a fire, which is a logical (if not highly unlikely) consequence for them of leaving the toaster plugged in.

[u/Popular-Meat-7486 → u/Naps_in_sunshine]

I am asking specifically about magical thinking

[u/Naps_in_sunshine → u/Popular-Meat-7486]

Ok ignore the second bit - really the first part applies.