Alexithymia behaves as a personality trait over a 5-year period in Finnish general population

Objective: Temporal stability is a basic assumption underlying any personality trait construct. Previous research on the stability of alexithymia has led to a controversy over whether alexithymia should be viewed as a state-dependent phenomenon or as a stable personality trait. The aim of this 5-year longitudinal study was to examine the temporal stability of alexitbymia in the general population in Finland. Methods: Alexithymia was measured with the 20-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) at the baseline and 5 years later. Results: The test-retest correlations of the TAS-20 total and factor-specific scores at the baseline and at the 5-year follow-up ranged from moderate to high in both genders, reflecting a rather high relative stability of the TAS-20 scores over a period of 5 years. Conclusions: The findings of our study suggest that alexithymia behaves like a stable personality trait in the general population. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.