Neuroanatomical profiles of alexithymia dimensions and subtypes
Open accessAbstract
Alexithymia, a major risk factor for a range of psychiatric and neurological disorders, has been recognized to comprise two dimensions, a cognitive dimension (difficulties identifying, analyzing, and verbalizing feelings) and an affective one (difficulties emotionalizing and fantasizing). Based on these dimensions, the existence of four distinct alexithymia subtypes has been proposed, but never empirically tested. In this study, 125 participants were assigned to four groups corresponding to the proposed alexithymia subtypes: Type I (impairment on both dimensions), Type II (impairment on the cognitive, but not the affective dimension), Type III (impairment on the affective, but not the cognitive dimension), and Lexithymics (no impairment on either dimension). By means of voxel-based morphometry, associations of the alexithymia dimensions and subtypes with gray and white matter volumes were analyzed. Type I and Type II alexithymia were characterized by gray matter volume reductions in the left amygdala and the thalamus. The cognitive dimension was further linked to volume reductions in the right amygdala, left posterior insula, precuneus, caudate, hippocampus, and parahippocampus. Type III alexithymia was marked by volume reduction in the MCC only, and the affective dimension was further characterized by larger sgACC volume. Moreover, individuals with the intermediate alexithymia Types II and III showed gray matter volume reductions in distinct regions, and had larger corpus callosum volumes compared to Lexithymics. These results substantiate the notion of a differential impact of the cognitive and affective alexithymia dimensions on brain morphology and provide evidence for separable neuroanatomical representations of the different alexithymia subtypes.
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Impairment in the affective and cognitive domains of alexithymia has been associated with different underlying neural atypicalities.
“Impairment in the affective and cognitive domains has been associated, unsurprisingly, with different underlying neural atypicalities (Goerlich-Dobre et al., 2015).”
From Atypical interoception as a common risk factor for psychopathology: A review (2021) · cites this paper as Goerlich-Dobre et al., 2015
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References 82 · Cited by 71
- Authors
- Goerlich‐Dobre, K. S., Votinov, M., Habel, U., Pripfl, J., & Lamm, C.
- Affiliations
- Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy Medical Faculty RWTH Aachen University 52074 Aachen Germany
- University of Vienna (AT)
- Jülich Aachen Research Alliance (DE)
- Venue
- Human Brain Mapping
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2015-06-19
- Volume
- 36
- Issue
- 10
- Pages
- 3805-3818
- ISSN
- 1065-9471 (ISSN-L)
- 1097-0193
- PMC
- PMC6869665
- OpenAlex
- W2109813510
- Cited by
- 71
- References
- 82
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 8 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 2
- FWCI
- 5.15
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Human Brain Mapping (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Austrian Science Fund (P22813-B09)
- Österreichische Nationalbank (14350)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
- Keywords
- alexithymia, gray matter volume, white matter volume, amygdala, thalamus, posterior insula, corpus callosum, brain structure, emotional awareness
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adult, Affect, Affective Symptoms, Brain, Cognition, Corpus Callosum, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Surveys and Questionnaires, Young Adult, White Matter, Gray Matter
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