Alexithymia and Decision Making Styles: A study of the relation between both constructs in a Nonclinical Group

Overview: Due to the important role of the brain and frontal area, especially the prefrontal cortex, in decision-making and also proposing defects in the functioning of frontal area in alexithymia, the aim of the present study was to examine the relationship between decision making styles and alexithymia.
In the present descriptive-correlational study, 257 university students were selected among Payam Noor Universities of Bonab and Tabriz by multistage random sampling and both Making Styles Questionnaire of Scott and Bruce (1995) and Twenty-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale were administered among the subjects. The obtained data were analyzed by Pearson correlation test and multiple linear regression analysis.
The results approved the predictive role of alexithymia in explaining the decision making styles of rational, avoidance, and intuitive. As predicted, increasing alexithymia leads to increasing rational decision making style, and decreasing avoidance and intuitive decision making styles. However, among three factors of alexithymia, concrete thinking was recognized as the only effective factor in rational decision making style, and difficulty in identifying emotions as the only effective factor on avoidance and intuitive decision making styles.
It seems that there should be common points in the biological basis of decision making and alexithymia. This defect is most likely to occur in the prefrontal cortex function which is activated in ethical decision making, and defects in exchanging information from its right side to the left side