Predictores psicosociales de alexitimia estudiados durante un período de 12 meses en una población femenina de "no casos"

Abstract

Conclusions in previous studies on the stability of alexithymia and its relation to anxiety and depression have been drawn without differentiating the concept of relative stability regarding individual differences from the concept of stability in absolute scores. Furthermore previous studies have not explicitly modeled absolute change in alexithymia scores as a function of absolute change in scores on psychosocial symptom severity. Against this background, we wanted to examine the absolute stability of alexithymia over a 1-year period in a non-patient population. We also wanted to investigate whether psychosocial variables explain changes in alexithymia over time. In a 12-month follow-up study, changes in the level of alexithymia, feelings of well-being, somatic anxiety, depressive symptoms, and social disability were examined in a sample of nursery workers. Two hundred and fifty-three subjects were reported for the investigation. Our findings show that although absolute changes in alexithymia may be observed, a high degree of relative stability can also be observed. Changes in alexithymia were found to be independent of changes in symptom severity and demographic characteristics. The results may indicate that alexithymia is not merely a direct concomitant of psychosocial symptom severity or the result of a common cause, that is also responsible for the onset of psychosocial symptoms.