Experience of joy and sadness in alexithymic emotional discourse

Abstract

Alexithymia is a personality trait characterized by difficulties in identifying and describing emotional feelings. Impairment in the cognitive processing of emotions experienced by individuals with alexithymia translates into a limited capacity to symbolize their emotions. However, despite being one of the core aspects of the construct of alexithymia, emotional elaboration has not been thoroughly investigated. While a few studies have reported quantitative features of alexithymic individuals' discourse, the qualitative properties of alexithymics' emotional discourse and the difference in symbolization between positive and negative emotions remain to be examined. This study aims to explore how individuals with high levels of alexithymia symbolize their subjective emotional experiences, through an investigation of specific features in their discourse pertaining to positive and negative emotions. The sample consisted of 9 individuals with high levels of alexithymia, screened with the TAS-20. The participants were interviewed about a typical experience of joy and sadness. Data were analyzed using an interpretative phenomenological analysis approach. Themes associated with sadness revealed that high-alexithymia individuals tend to avoid contact with sadness and to perceive sadness as a state imposed by external events. Themes associated with joy revealed that this emotion seems easier to share with peers. Moreover, joy appeared to be easier to express and symbolize for high-alexithymia individuals than sadness. This comprehensive description of alexithymic individuals' emotional discourse provides us with a better understanding of the symbolization of emotions according to their valence and allows us to better recognize the ways in which individuals with high levels of alexithymia express their emotions.