Dirt, Disgust, and Disease: Is Hygiene in Our Genes?

Anthropologists have long puzzled over why certain objects and activities are avoided, reviled, or proscribed in many cultures. Numerous theories have been proposed, but as Reinhart (1990) suggests above, a full explanation remains elusive. Psychologists recently have begun to explore the nature of the revulsion that is occasioned by the sight of excreta, rotten food, slime, and bugs. They have described and categorized the emotion of disgust and have even proposed a location in the brain where disgust may be seated. However, the total body of research into disgust is so scant that it has been described as the “forgotten emotion of psychiatry” (Phillips et al. 1998). Our interest in disgust has its roots in a decade of work exploring hygiene behavior in Africa, India and Europe. The failures of the health education