Alexithymia: Treatment Interventions

Abstract

ÖzetAleksitimi "duygular için söz yokluğu" anlamına gelmekte ve kişideki aleksitimi düzeyi arttıkça, psikoterapi sürecinin de olumsuz etkilendiği bilinmektedir. Dolayısıyla aleksitimi skorlarından da hastaların klinik tedavisinde uzmanlara yol gösterecek önemli bir araç olarak yararlanılabileceği düşünülmektedir. Bu kuramsal derleme çalışmasında, aleksitimi tedavisinin günümüzde ne noktada olduğu sorusuna yanıt aranmıştır. Bu soruyu yanıtlamak için aleksitimik özelliklerin uzun vadede terapi sonucu üzerindeki etkileri ve aleksitimi tedavisinde öne çıkan psikoterapi yaklaşımlarına odaklanılmıştır. Bu bağlamda, ilgili araştırmaların sonuçları ışığında, aleksitimi tedavisinin farmakoterapiden psikoterapiye gelişimi; aleksitimik bireylerin psikoterapide bağlanma ve ilerleme sorunu; tedavilerindeki engelleri aşmak için yararlanılabilecek psikoterapötik yöntemler ve aleksitimi tedavisinde diğer yaklaşımlara kıyasla öne çıkan grup terapisi ve bilişsel davranışçı terapi alt başlık-ları ele alınmıştır.Anahtar sözcükler: Aleksitimi, tedavi, psikoterapi, grup terapisi, bilişsel davranışçı terapi. AbstractAlexithymia means "no words for emotions" and the psychotherapy process is known to be negatively influenced, as the level of alexithymia increases. Therefore, alexithymia score is considered as an essential tool helping clinicians treat the patients. In this literature review, ongoing discussions on the alexithymia treatment will be studied by focusing on the long-term effects of the alexithymic characteristics on the treatment results and the prominent psychotherapy approaches in the alexithymia treatment. In the light of the related studies' results, the treatment of alexithymia will be examined in terms of its progress in time from pharmacotherapy to psychotherapy; problems of attachment and progress in psychotherapy; psychotherapeutic techniques, which help clinicians overcome the obstacles in the treatment process. At this point, the focus will be on group therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy, as they are considered as the prominent therapies in comparison with the other therapy approaches in the treatment of alexithymia.

The relationship between social media addiction levels and alexithymia in young people at home during pandemic process

“…Social media addiction was found to affect alexithymia by 21.3% according to the regression analysis. There are studies showing that there is a close relationship between alexithymia and social media addiction (Taylor, Bagby, & Parker, 1991;Berardis et al, 2009;Şaşıoğlu et al, 2014;Şar, 2018). However, this relationship is a controversial issue whether the individuals with alexithymia display addictive behaviors due to lack of insight and self-knowledge, or whether the social media addiction is caused by preventing the socialization and mutual relations in the individuals (Avcı, 2019).…”

“…Although alexithymia, known as emotional deafness, was first proposed to explain the symptoms seen in psychosomatic patients, today alexithymia is accepted as a personality trait that we encounter in many different psychiatric disorders, even in healthy populations (Şaşıoğlu, Gülol, & Tosun, 2014). Taylor, Parker, and Bagby (1991) claim that individuals with alexithymia tend to engage in compulsive behaviors in order to regulate their emotions (Taylor et al, 1991).…”