Childhood Trauma, Alexithymia and Emotional Dysregulation in Adults with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

Abstract

Objectives: The aim of the current study was to find out the relationship among childhood trauma, emotional dysregulation and alexithymia in adults with obsessive compulsive disorder.
Design: Correlational research design was implemented
Subject and method: The participants with the age ranged 20-44 years (51.1% males and 48.9% females) were selected through purposive sampling strategy diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder from different hospitals in Lahore. Toronto Alexithymia Scale (Bagby, 1994), Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-short form (Bernstein & Fink, 1998) and Emotional Regulation Inventory (Roth et al., 2009) were utilized.
Result and conclusion: Results revealed that childhood trauma was significantly associated with emotional dysregulation (r=.86, p<.000) and alexithymia (r=.78, p<.000). In addition, mediation analysis showed the significant indirect pathway of the alexithymia (z= 8.91, p<.00) which further revealed that there is variation from alexithymia among childhood trauma and emotional dysregulation. Thus, findings revealed that there was a significant correlation between childhood trauma and emotional dysregulation among adults with obsessive compulsive disorder. Alexithymia significantly mediates the association between childhood trauma and emotional dysregulation. Moreover, this research would be beneficial to fill out the research gap in Pakistani literature as there is scarcity in studying the mediating pathway of alexithymia among obsessive compulsive disorder adults in Pakistan