An externally oriented style of thinking as a moderator of responses to affective films in women

This study was conducted to test the hypothesis that differences in alexithymia would moderate coupling in physiological and subjective-experiential responses to two affective films, which were shown to induce a common negative (sad) feeling, but to provoke different hyper- or hypo-arousal physiological responses (e.g., heart rate acceleration or deceleration) associated with antipathic or empathic context, respectively (Davydov et al., 2011). Only women were studied as persons showing more reactivity to sad films than men. Reactivity was evaluated for facial behavior, physiological arousal, and subjective experience. Some other affective and cognitive disposition factors (e.g., depression and defensiveness) were considered for evaluating their probable mediation of the alexithymia's effects. While subjective experience was not affected by alexithymia, high scorers on the externally-oriented thinking factor showed reduced physiological reactivity in both film conditions. These effects were mediated through different disposition factors: either low affectivity (low depressed mood), which mediated alexithymia's effect on hyper-arousal responses (e.g., decrease of heart rate acceleration), or impression management (other-deception), which mediated alexithymia's effect on hypo-arousal responses (e.g., decrease of heart rate deceleration).

► EOT facet of alexithymia decoupled the physiological reactivity from experiential. ► EOT facet inhibited both hypo-arousal, and hyper-arousal responses to the films. ► Inhibition of hypo-arousal was mediated by variation in impression management. ► Inhibition of hyper-arousal was mediated by variation in low affectivity. ► The findings specify the ‘decoupling’ hypothesis of alexithymia.