The association between alexithymia and binge drinking among young people
The association between alexithymia and binge drinking among young people
Background: Globally, the use of alcohol by young people represents a significant public health concern with serious health and behavioural consequences, particularly in the US and Europe (World Health Organization, 2014). Those who engage in a pattern of binge drinking consume large amount of alcohol in a short period of time during a single occasion (Gmel et al., 2011). Among university students this drinking pattern is highly prevalent (Haardorfer et al., 2021). Therefore, it can cause social, educational, legal, health problems in this age group (Varvil-Weld, 2014). Accordingly, emotion processing has been emphasized in relation to various psychopathological disorders such as substance abuse (Sloan et al., 2017). Particularly, the onset and maintenance of alcohol abuse may be attributed to impairments in emotion processing (Kopera et al., 2015).
Alexithymia involves disrupted affective-emotional process, which results in difficulties recognizing and expressing emotions in words (Craparo et al., 2016). It is estimated to affect 13% of the general population, whereas in individuals with alcohol use disorders, the rate can be as high as 78% (Cruise & Becerra, 2018). There is evidence that alexithymia and binge drinking are closely related, based on the data gathered from university samples (Herman et al., 2020). Alcohol may be used to cope with negative emotions, high levels of stress or to alleviate tension by university students who have high score in alexithymia (Bruce et al., 2012). Alcohol use is also more likely to occur when they experience difficulty managing their emotions as an emotion regulation strategy (Aurora & Klanecky, 2016).
The psychosocial determinants of heavy alcohol use have been examined previously in several samples including adolescents, adults, and students (Lannoy et al., 2019; DiBello et al., 2018; Mange et al., 2021). In terms of psychological factors closely related to self-regulation of emotions (e.g. alexithymia) may explain the development of binge drinking among young people. As heavy drinking can adversely affect young people’s mental, physical, and social well-being (Mekonen et al., 2017), as well their peers, their families, and communities in general (McBride, Barrett, Moore & Schonfeld, 2014), the implementation of effective strategies is vital in reducing heavy alcohol use in this target group (Kuntsche et al., 2013).
Methods: Our participants were recruited from public university in Hungary. In this cross-sectional study, we used Toronto Alexithymia Scale, and Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Scale to assess binge drinking.
Results: The findings of our study indicated that alexithymia, especially for the TAS DIF facet, was positively associated with binge drinking.
Conclusion: The findings of our study point to the importance of emotional processing/regulation when it comes to the alcohol misuse and, particularly, binge drinking.
