The investigation of the relationship between self-esteem and alexithymia among inpatients being treated for substance dependenc

The aim of this study is to examine the relationship between self-esteem and alexithymia among inpatients being treated for substance dependence. A total of 100 inpatients hospitalized at the TCASA clinics of a private foundation hospital in Istanbul were randomly selected on a voluntary basis. In addition to a sociodemographic data form prepared by the researcher, Toronto Alexithymia Scale was used to evaluate alexithymia and Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale was used to evaluate self-esteem as data collection tools in this cross-sectional study. According to the results of the study, there was a statistically significant relationship between self-esteem and alexithymia in patients who had substance dependence. This shows that levels of alexithymia increases as the level of self-esteem increases. In addition, as self-esteem increases, the difficulty in recognizing emotions and expressing emotions increases. Similarly, a positive relationship was observed between alexithymia and recognizing and expressing emotions. In addition, as the difficulty in recognizing emotions increases the difficulty in expressing emotions also increases and as the difficulty in expressing emotions increases by the extrovert thinking increases. The study results are discussed in consideration of similar studies in the literature.