Alexithymia and Self Differentiation: The Role of Fear of Intimacy and Insecure Adult Attachment

It is suggested in literature that there is a link between Alexithymia and Self-Differentiation; however, little is known about possible mediation factors. The goal of this work is to test in a non-clinical population of adults the mediation role of Fear of Intimacy and Adult Attachment in the relationship between Alexithymia and Self-Differentiation. A sample of 258 participants self identified as gay or lesbian, aged 20–50 years (M: 30.29; SD: 7.27), 45% of whom were males, completed self-reported measures of Alexithymia (TAS-20), Self-Differentiation (SDI), Fear of Intimacy (FIS); and Insecure Adult Attachment (RAAS). Our results show that Alexithymia predicts Self-Differentiation both directly and indirectly, through Fear of Intimacy and Insecure adult attachment. In addition, Fear of Intimacy directly influences Self-Differentiation, and also mediates the relationship between Alexithymia and Adult Attachment which, in turn, negatively predicts Self-Differentiation. In conclusion, Alexithymia predicts Self-Differentiation while Fear of Intimacy and adult attachment may act as mediators of the report. Limitations of the study and directions of future research are described.

     

References to Mental States in Mother–Child Conversation in the Second Year of Life

Research into social influences on young children’s growing understanding of others’ inner states has highlighted the value of early conversational exchanges. This longitudinal study was aimed at investigating whether and how mothers changed their inner state words when children were 16 months olds (T1) and 4 months later (T2), and the children’ s ability to use references to mental states at 20 months. Overall language measures (e.g. number of words, mean length utterances) and internal state labels were analyzed during play interactions at T1 and T2 for the mothers, and at T2 for the children. Results highlighted that the mothers partially modified their mentalistic vocabulary over 4 months. Moreover, the use of maternal references directed to the other at T1 is linked to the children’s ability to use references with a commentary function at T2. Conversation with the caregivers during daily activity may constitute, for children, a key practice to enhance their metarepresentation skills.     

Parental Mediation of COVID-19 News and Children’s Emotion Regulation during Lockdown

Journal of Child and Family Studies - The COVID-19 outbreak resulted in a large amount of emotionally charged messaging that is believed to have a tremendous psychological impact, particularly on...     

Effects of pointing on the recall of simultaneous and sequential visuospatial arrays: a role for retrieval strategies?

The present four experiments examined the effects of pointing movements towards the target locations in a modified free recall task. Three factors were manipulated: the order of the move/no-move trials (blocked or mixed), the type of stimuli presentation (simultaneous or sequential) and the size of the to-be-recalled configurations (7-9 and 5-7 items). Results showed that pointing significantly decreased visuospatial performance both with a mixed and a blocked design. However, in the blocked condition the interference effect of pointing was load-dependent (being inversely related to array size) and occurred only when participants pointed to all stimuli in the first block. Post hoc analyses supported the conclusion that pointing movements interfered with the on-line development of appropriate retrieval strategies, like parsing the configurations into smaller chunks or creating global visual images.     

The relationship between motor development,gestures and language production in the second year of life: A mediational analysis

This longitudinal study investigated the relationships between motor, gestural and linguistic abilities using two parent report instruments. Motor skills at 12 months significantly correlated with language production at 16, 20 and 23 months, but these associations were mediated by the use of representational gestures.     

Pointing movements both impair and improve visuospatial working memory depending on serial position

Two experiments investigated the effects of pointing movements on the item and order recall of random, horizontal, and vertical arrays consisting of 6 and 7 squares (Experiment 1) or 8 and 9 squares (Experiment 2). In the encoding phase, participants either viewed the items passively (passive-view condition) or pointed towards them (pointing condition). Then, after a brief interval, they were requested to recall the locations of the studied squares in the correct order of presentation. The critical result was that, for all types of arrays, the effects of the encoding condition varied as a function of serial position: for the initial and central positions accuracy was higher in the passive-view than in the pointing condition (confirming the standard inhibitory effect of pointing movements on visuospatial working memory), whereas the reverse pattern occurred in the final positions—showing a significant advantage of the pointing condition over the passive-view condition. Findings are interpreted as showing that pointing can have two simultaneous effects on the recall of spatial locations, a positive one due to the addition of a motor code and a negative one due to the attentional requirements of hand movements, with the net impact on serial recall depending on the amount of attention resources needed for the encoding of each position. Implications for the item-order hypothesis and the perceptual-gestural account of working memory are also discussed.     

Intimate Partner Violence in Same-Sex Relationships and The Role of Sexual Minority Stressors: A Systematic Review of the Past 10 Years

To clarify the role of sexual minority stressors on intimate partner violence in same-sex relationships, the authors undertook a systematic review of literature on this topic from 2005 to 2015. Our results indicate different forms of intimate partner violence (physical, psychological, sexual) tend to co-occur in same-sex relationships, bidirectional violence might be a common pattern; and internalized homophobia, degree of “outness,” stigma consciousness, and experiences of discrimination based on sexual orientation are all related to intimate partner violence. However, these associations are not fully supported by all studies. Our findings emphasize the importance of integrating risk factors typical of sexual minorities with the risk factors predictive of intimate partner violence in heterosexual couples. Therefore, intervention and prevention programs must be designed so as to address and reduce the stress typical of sexual minorities.     

Profiles of bystanders' motivation to defend school bully victims from a self‐determination perspective

This study was aimed at exploring which latent profiles emerge based on ratings of self‐determined motivation to defend victims of bullying, and to explore if they are related to bystander roles and victimization in bullying, as well as student–teacher relations. Data were collected from 1,800 Swedish and Italian students, with an age range between 10 and 18 years (M = 12.6, standard deviation = 1.74). The students completed a survey in their classrooms. Latent profile analysis was used to explore the possible clusters of individuals with similar ratings on the motivational variables. Multivariate analysis of variances were conducted to explore differences between the profiles in relation to their roles when witnessing bullying and to student–teacher relationships. Four latent profiles emerged. The profiles represented respondents (a) high in prosocial motivation, (b) high in externally extrinsic motivation, (c) intermediate in externally extrinsic motivation, and (d) with identified/introjected motivation. Multivariate analyses showed that reports of bystander roles when witnessing bullying, teacher–student relationships, and bullying victimization, significantly differed over the motivational profiles. The bystanders were unevenly distributed across the four groups and most individuals were categorized in the prosocial motivation group. Female and male bystanders were evenly distributed across clusters. The prosocial motivation group experienced victimization to a lesser extent than the other profile groups. Students in the intermediate externally extrinsic group were more likely to take the pro‐bully and outsider role during bullying. Concerning student–teacher relationships, the prosocial motivation group reported the closest relationships with their teachers, while the intermediate externally extrinsic group reported the most conflictual relationships.