EPA-0841 - Alexithymia: advances in theory and research

Abstract

Alexithymia has been shown to be related to many psychiatric and somatic illnesses. Neurobiological underpinnings of alexithymia are important to be known. To review the literature about advances in theory and research of alexithymia Searches were undertaken in PubMed and other databases, from 2007 until 2012, using keywords ‘alexithymia’,’pshycopathology’ and ‘psychosomatics’. Neurobiological model has explored the relationship between alexithymia and emotional process. Research data indicates modulation of emotional responses from the superior cortical systems, involving an integrative hemispheric function, that is, the left hemispheric verbal capacity in conjunction with the hability to evaluate e regulate emotions of the right hemisphere. Some studies point to a bidirectional inter-hemispheric deficit, wich affects affective regulation and the hability to communicate emotions and to fantasie. Affective and cognitive cllinical features of alexithymia are described. Recent epidemiology enfatizes comorbid somatic pathology, as well as other psicopathology manifestations. Alexithymia is a multidimensional construt, wich undeniabale heuristic value. Therefore, more neurobiological research should be done, such as funcional imaging studies, to keep finding the biological factors of alexithymia's etiology, so that new perspectives can be approached.