DOI work
Fetched
Post
crossref
Bethany F. M. Oakley, Emily J. H. Jones, Daisy Crawley, Tony Charman, Jan Buitelaar, Julian Tillmann, Declan G. Murphy, Eva Loth, et al.
(2022).
Alexithymia in autism: cross-sectional and longitudinal associations with social-communication difficulties, anxiety and depression symptoms.
Psychological Medicine, 52(8), 1458-1470.
Cambridge University Press (CUP).
- Publication date
-
8 Oct 2020
- Identifier
-
10.1017/s0033291720003244
- Authors
-
Bethany F. M. Oakley,
Emily J. H. Jones,
Daisy Crawley,
Tony Charman,
Jan Buitelaar,
Julian Tillmann,
Declan G. Murphy,
Eva Loth,
The EU-AIMS LEAP Group
- Source
- Psychological Medicine
- Details
- 52(8), 1458-1470
- Reference type
- article
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Metadata source
- crossref
Abstract
Abstract Background Alexithymia (difficulties in identifying and describing emotion) is a transdiagnostic trait implicated in social–emotional and mental health problems in the general population. Many autistic individuals experience significant social-communication difficulties and elevated anxiety/depression and alexithymia. Nevertheless, the role of alexithymia in explaining individual variability in the quality/severity of social-communication difficulties and/or anxiety and depression symptoms in autism remains poorly understood. Methods In total, 337 adolescents and adults (autism N = 179) were assessed for alexithymia on the Toronto Alexithymia Scale and for social-communication difficulties, anxiety and depression symptoms. A total of 135 individuals (autism N = 76) were followed up 12–24 months later. We used regression models to establish cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between alexithymia, social-communication difficulties, anxiety and depression symptoms. Results Autistic individuals reported significantly higher alexithymia than comparison individuals (p < 0.001, r effect size = 0.48), with 47.3% of autistic females and 21.0% of autistic males meeting cut-off for clinically relevant alexithymia (score ⩾61). Difficulties in describing feelings were particularly associated with current self-reported social-communication difficulties [p < 0.001, β = 0.57, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.44–0.67] and predicted later social-communication difficulties (p = 0.02, β = 0.43, 95% CI 0.07–0.82). Difficulties in identifying feelings were particularly associated with current anxiety symptom severity (p < 0.001, β = 0.54, 95% CI 0.41–0.77) and predicted later anxiety (p = 0.01; β = 0.31, 95% CI 0.08–0.62). Conclusions Our findings suggest that difficulties in identifying v. describing emotion are associated with differential clinical outcomes in autism. Psychological therapies targeting emotional awareness may improve social-communication and anxiety symptoms in autism, potentially conferring long-term benefits.
Study authors in this cited reference