Understanding Alexithymia—Emotional Poverty
Nearly one in ten people have alexithymia—a personality trait characterized by difficulty in experiencing, identifying & expressing feelings. Alexithymic people lack self-awareness, a fundamental skill of emotional intelligence, compromising the quality of their relationships and overall well-being.
According to some estimates, 10 to 13 percent of all people have alexithymia—difficulty experiencing, recognizing, and expressing feelings. The term alexithymia, coined by the psychotherapist Peter Emanuel Sifneos, is of Greek origin and comes from a-, meaning “lack,” lexis, meaning “word” and thymus meaning “emotion.” Thus most literally, alexithymic people lack words for their emotions. A broader consideration for alexithymia identifies two components of the condition—a cognitive component (difficulty in recognizing and verbalizing the emotional experience) and an affective component (difficulty in reacting, expressing, feeling, and imagining). Alexithymia can have mild, moderate, and severe forms.
Alexithymia can manifest in various ways, from an inability to identify one’s emotions to having difficulties expressing socially appropriate emotions. Yet they can be hypersensitive to physical sensations and, when interacting with others, they may experience discomfort, confusion, anger, or even panic. People with alexithymia are socially inapt and struggle in their relationships because, in addition to being unable to recognize and express their own emotions, they also find it difficult to identify and adequately respond to the emotions of others.
People with alexithymia are usually poor at non-verbal communication—they find it difficult to read the body language of others, interpret subtleties in the tone of voice, or “read between the lines.” Since they behave less altruistically, they also appear aloof, detached, humorless, and rigid. They come across as having a very constricted way of thinking, decoupled from an emotional component: “a thinking style focused on external events, together with a striking avoidance of a focus on inner experiences.”
People with alexithymia can be very intelligent, well-educated, and quite eloquent—yet their “emotional flatness” is in stark contrast with their accomplishments and other facets of their personality. They are capable of speaking completely dispassionately about disturbing life episodes (and even tragedies)—be it personal or those of others. They often make decisions about key things in life (such as marriage or career) based on logic alone, since they lack any “gut feeling” or intuition. This makes others around them (partners, friends, family members, colleagues) frustrated and often deteriorates personal and professional relationships.
Alexithymia is often misperceived as apathy. On the other hand, it has been established that alexithymia can cause a lack of empathy. Psychologists and neuroscientists consider alexithymia a complex and multifaceted condition, recognizing that the symptoms can vary significantly for different people. Some people with alexithymia lack one or more emotions from the full emotional spectrum. Others mismatch the physical sensations associated with different emotional states or are unable to recognize what kind of emotion they are experiencing at the moment.
While some scientists speculate that the condition might be genetic, neuroscientists have linked Alexithymia to a disconnection between the limbic system and the neocortex, and to damage to the insula—a part of the brain that plays an important role in emotions and social skills. Experiencing childhood neglect or early life trauma is considered a major risk factor for developing alexithymia. Alexithymia is four times more common in males than in females.
This condition is still not well understood by the scientific community and has not been officially recognized as a mental health disorder, even though it has been researched since the early 1970s. This lack of consensus in the scientific community is reflected in the different ways alexithymia has been categorized—as a condition, as a personality dimension or a trait, or as a state reaction to different mental and physical conditions. Consequently, it often takes a long time to run various questionnaires-based metrics and identify the problem. There are also no definitive medical treatments for this condition, and the approach can often be individual-specific (including cognitive behavioral therapy, group therapy, psychotherapy, art therapy, relaxation, hypnosis, journaling, etc.).
As Daniel Goleman explains, “It is not that alexithymic never feel, but that they are unable to know—and especially unable to put into words—precisely what their feelings are. They are utterly lacking in the fundamental skill of emotional intelligence, self-awareness — knowing what we are feeling as emotions roll within us.”
Sources
Kristeen Cherney. All About Alexithymia, or Difficulty Recognizing Feelings. https://www.healthline.com/health/autism/alexithymia#causes
Jayne Leonard. What to know about alexithymia. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/326451
V. Panaite, L.M. Bylsma. Alexithymia. Encyclopedia of Human Behavior (Second Edition), 2012. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/alexithymia
Deborah Serani. The Emotional Blindness of Alexithymia. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/mind-guest-blog/the-emotional-blindness-of-alexithymia/
Katharina S. Goerlich. The Multifaceted Nature of Alexithymia – A Neuroscientific Perspective. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01614/full
Daniel Goleman. Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ. Bantam Books. 1995.