Alexithymia and the split brain. II. Sentential-level content analysis

The Hoppe-Bogen finding of alexithymia in 12 commissurotomy patients is examined, using 6 sentential-level items corresponding to 6 of the 8 key alexithymia items in the Beth Israel 'Psychosomatic Questionnaire'. 8 of the same commissurotomy patients and 8 precision-matched normal control subjects were shown a 3-min videotaped film about death. Content analyses of the subjects' spoken and written responses to this film were carried out, with directional support found for all items; however, only 2 of these differences in group means were statistically significant. The items were factor analyzed, and a 1-factor solution obtained. Factor score comparisons replicated the earlier study, as commissurotomy patients were found to be more alexithymic than normal controls.