Abstract
Alexithymia, including the inability to identify and express one's own feelings, is a subclinical condition responsible for some of the socioemotional symptoms seen across a range of psychiatric conditions. The language hypothesis of alexithymia posits a language-mediated disruption in the development of discrete emotion concepts from ambiguous affective states, exacerbating the risk of developing alexithymia in language-impaired individuals. To provide a critical evaluation, a systematic review and meta-analysis of 29 empirical studies of language functioning in alexithymia was performed. A modest association was found between alexithymia and multi-domain language deficits (r = −0.14), including structural language, pragmatics, and propensity to use emotional language. A more theoretically-relevant subsample analysis comparing alexithymia levels in language-impaired and typical individuals revealed larger effects, but a limited number of studies adopted this approach. A synthesis of 11 emotional granularity studies also found an association between alexithymia and reduced emotional granularity (r = −0.10). Language impairments seem to increase the risk of alexithymia. Heterogeneous samples and methods suggest the need for studies with improved alexithymia assessments.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 104864 |
Number of pages | 23 |
Journal | Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews |
Volume | 141 |
Early online date | 8 Sept 2022 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Oct 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:GB was supported by the Baily Thomas Trust. The funding source was not involved in the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors
Keywords
- Alexithymia
- Constructionist
- Emotion
- Emotional granularity
- Language
- Meta-analysis
- Systematic review
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Behavioral Neuroscience