"Although we knew the emotion of disgust was good for us, here we've been able to build on that, showing that disgust is structured, recognising and responding to infection threats to protect us," said lead researcher Professor Val Curtis.
Co-author of the paper Micheal de Barra said the results show that people have an intuitive sense of what to avoid in their environment. "Our long coevolution with disease has 'wired in' this intuitive sense of what can cause infection," explained de Barra.
So next time you want to gag when someone coughs in front of you, or you see maggots crawling on rotten meat, ask yourself what your body is trying to tell you. Your feelings of being grossed out might not be so useless after all but rather nature's way of protecting you.
Which of the images on this list gave you the ick? Don't forget to upvote them and feel free to tell us more about what you find most disguting in the comments down below.
