Abstract:

Alexithymia is a personality trait that includes difficulty in discriminating bodily sensations in patients or healthy individuals, inability to be empathic, inability to express emotions, limited imagination and tangibility, tendency to think hard. According to cognitive theory, the occurrence of alexithymia caused by some deficiencies in cognitive development periods or distortions in cognitive processes and irrational thoughts are effective. In this study, the role of negative automatic thoughts and rumination in predicting alexithymic symptoms was investigated. Toronto Alexithymia Scale, Automatic Thoughts Scale and Rumination Scale were applied to a total of 417 participants, including 301 women and 116 men included in the study. According to the findings obtained from the research, negative automatic thoughts have a significant effect on alexithymia and the level of personal dissonance / desire to change, quit / hopelessness factors increase alexithymia. In addition, rumination also has a significant effect on alexithymia. While thinking deeply from rumination factors does not affect alexithymia; obsessive thinking increases the level of alexithymia. The alexithymia levels of the participants differ statistically significantly according to gender, education level, number of children and where they grew up. The factors related to automatic thoughts of the participants differ statistically significantly according to gender, age, marital status, education level, number of children, economic status, employment status and psychiatric condition. At the level of rumination, statistically significant differences were observed according to gender, education level, number of children, working status, place of growth and status of having psychiatric disorders. Rumination obsessive thinking factor increases the level of alexithymia.

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