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Alexithymia, craving and attachment in a heavy drinking population
Fred Arne Thorberg1, Ross McD Young, Karen A Sullivan
1Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, Queensland 4059 Australia. f.thorberg@qut.edu.au
Addictive Behaviors
|January 11, 2011
Summary
Individuals with alcohol use disorders and alexithymia experience greater alcohol craving and compulsive behaviors. Anxious attachment partially explains this link, suggesting it as a treatment target for reducing alcohol consumption.
Area of Science:
- Psychiatry
- Psychology
- Neuroscience
Background:
- Alexithymia, a personality trait characterized by difficulty identifying and describing emotions, is prevalent in individuals with Alcohol Use Disorders (AUD).
- This trait is theorized to be linked with underlying attachment difficulties, potentially influencing AUD severity and treatment outcomes.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the relationship between alexithymia, alcohol craving, anxious attachment, and alcohol dependence severity.
- To explore the mediating role of anxious attachment in the association between alexithymia and craving within an AUD population undergoing Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
Main Methods:
- A cohort of 254 patients undergoing CBT for alcohol dependence completed self-report measures including the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20), Obsessive Compulsive Drinking Scale (OCDS), Revised Adult Attachment Anxiety Subscale (RAAS-Anxiety), and Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test (AUDIT).
- Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) and regression analyses were employed to examine the interrelationships between the measured variables.
Main Results:
- Individuals with alexithymia exhibited significantly higher scores on the OCDS, indicating increased obsessive thoughts about alcohol and compulsive drinking urges and behaviors compared to non-alexithymic individuals.
- Regression analyses revealed that anxious attachment partially mediated the relationship between alexithymia and alcohol craving.
Conclusions:
- Alexithymia is associated with heightened craving and compulsive drinking in individuals with AUD.
- Anxious attachment may serve as a crucial mediating factor, suggesting it as a potential therapeutic target for interventions aimed at reducing alcohol consumption in individuals with both AUD and alexithymia.
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