Role of level processing and mood congruence in emotional words recognition in people with alexithymia

This study was designed for survey of role of level processing and mood congruence in emotional words recognition in alexithymic people.

Method was semi-experimental and Statistical population includes 9000 male students of Tehran University that were selected 80 Subjects through them. These people were divided to high alexithymia score group and low alexithymia score group via Persian version of the Toronto Alexithymia Scale. Subjunctive's task was recognition of emotional words in two level of processing (perceptual or semantic) and also in mood congruence or mood incongruence conditions.

Results shows high alexithymia score group recognized less emotional words in comparison to low alexithymia score group. Though their function was weaker than low alexithymia score group in both of levels of processing (perceptual and semantic), they had more difficulties in semantic level in comparison to perceptual level. Mood congruence or mood incongruence conditions had no effect on emotional words recognition in them.

It seems alexithymia is more related to stable constructs such as personality traits or incompetence in emotional information processing, rather than to unstable states such as affect and mood. So it is better that emphasis to emotional for interactive orientation in semantic knowledge