Asian Journal of Islamic Psychology
Vol. 2 No. 2 (2025): Volume 2 Issue 2 August 2025

A Heart-Centered Metacognitive Framework for Understanding and Treating Obsessions and Compulsions in Islamic Psychology

Fatimah Badawy (The American University in Cairo)
Abdelrahman Badawy (Al-Azhar University)



Article Info

Publish Date
08 Oct 2026

Abstract

Obsessions and compulsions are typically conceptualized in modern psychology as maladaptive thoughts and behaviors that require cognitive or behavioral modification. Within Muslim populations, however, these symptoms are frequently moralized and misunderstood as indicators of weak faith or spiritual corruption, often resulting in reassurance-seeking, ritualization, and increased symptom severity. This study proposes a heart-centered metacognitive framework grounded in Islamic psychology that reconceptualizes obsessions as morally neutral intrusive cognitions misinterpreted at the level of the heart (qalb). Using an integrative theoretical review design, classical Islamic scholarship on the heart, doubt, and waswās was synthesized with contemporary empirical literature on obsessive–compulsive disorder, metacognition, and scrupulosity. The analysis yielded a coherent model explaining how misinterpretation of intrusive thoughts leads to compulsive neutralization behaviors, and how healing occurs primarily through non-engagement and restoration of epistemic certainty (yaqīn). The framework provides Muslim mental health practitioners with a clinically effective and theologically grounded approach for assessment and intervention.

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Journal Info

Abbrev

ajip

Publisher

Subject

Religion Other

Description

Asian Journal of Islamic Psychology is a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to publishing the scholarly study of the Islamic psychology. This journal is managed by the Pusat Studi Psikologi Islam (PSPI) Fakultas Psikologi Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta. The articles are written in English and ...