Substance abusers report being more alexithymic than others but do not show emotional processing deficits on a performance measure of alexithymia
Lindsay, Julie Ciarrochi, Joseph
Lindsay, Julie
Ciarrochi, Joseph
Author
Abstract
Substance abusers report that they have deficits in emotional processing (“alexithymia”; Taylor et al. ), but is their actual emotional processing performance actually deficient? The prevalence of self-reported alexithymia in a group of newly abstinent substance abusers (N = 40) was 50%, which is considerably higher than that found in normal and psychiatric outpatient samples. However, the actual performance of this group on a task that required them to identify and describe feelings was not significantly different from either a group of university students (after controlling for IQ, age, and gender) or a normal group of adults. In addition, there was no relationship between self-reported and actual emotional processing performance, which is contrary to what has been found in a normal sample. Substance abusers believe they are more alexithymic than others, but do not perform as if they are so.
Keywords
alexithymia, level of emotional awareness, emotion regulation
Date
2009
Type
Journal article
Journal
Addiction Research and Theory
Book
Volume
17
Issue
3
Page Range
315-321
Article Number
ACU Department
Institute for Positive Psychology and Education
Faculty of Education and Arts
Faculty of Education and Arts