Predicting alexithymia based on attachment styles and perfectionism dimensions

Alexithymia is difficulty in describing, differentiating and regulating emotions. This construct is rooted in the relatively stable emotional bond of the child with the primary caregiver and it continues under the influence of one's effort to avoid emotions by focusing on perfectness and hiding defects. Based on these, does it possible to predict alexithymia by attachment styles and dimentions of perfection?

The present study was carried to predict alexithymia based on attachment styles and dimensions of perfectionism in students of University of Tehran.

current study is descriptive-correlation research. 268 students (37 women and 231 men) from University of Tehran completed the Adult Attachment Inventory (Besharat, 1392), Tehran's Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (Besharat, 1386) and Farsi Toronto Alexithymia Scale 20 (Besharat, 2007) by accessible sampeling, voluntarily.

The analysis of data involves Pearson’s correlation coefficient and simultaneous regression analytic. The results demonstrated that as the self-oriented (p<0/01, r=0/30), other-oriented (p<0/01, r=-0/26) and social-oriented (p<0/05, r=0/14) perfectionism increased, the scores of alexithymia increased too. Results also showed that increasing in secure attachment subscale (p<0/01, r=-0/35), the alexithymia score reduce and an increasing in avoidance (p<0/01, r=0/38) and ambivalence (p<0/01, r=0/38) attachment sunscales, the alexithymia score increased. Findings showed that secure, avoidance, and ambivalent attachment styles, along with self-oriented perfectionism, explained 26% of alexithymia variances (p<0/01)

This means that child's failure to have a secure relationship with the caregiver leads to alexithymia and perfectionism that operate as a means to self-expression during the development also delay recognition and description of emotions so that alexithymia persists.