Moral RJ, Ramos BS

Language: Spanish
References: 0
Page: 266-287
PDF size: 525.76 Kb.

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a review of the alexithymia construct and its relationship with victimization and perpetration in intimate partner violence. Its aim is to explore whether alexithymia is a potentially useful concept to study and intervene in intimate partner violence. It is found that there is an important cumulus of research about alexithymia since its introduction in the early 1970s.The personality construct of alexithymia refers to a deficit of cognitive processing of emotions and involves difficulty regulating emotions, difficulty adjusting to personal relationships and difficulty solving problems of coexistence. For these characteristics, the concept has begun to be applied to study of intimate partner violence, and may be potentially useful for the clinical intervention in this issue. The relationship between alexithymia and victimization appear to be partially mediated by depression, while the relationship between alexithymia and perpetration appear to be totally mediated by victimization or by anger expression, and therefore the association of alexithymia is more substantive with victimization than with perpetration. Taking into account these findings, some ways are suggested to study and intervene clinically in this trait.