Efficacy of Interpersonal Psychotherapy on Major Depressive Disorder, Alexithymia and Emotional Disclosure

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the effectiveness of Interpersonal Psychotherapy in dealing with issues of alexithymia and emotional disclosure in individuals with MajorDepressive Disorder (MDD). Experimental research design was used. The sample for the current study was comprised of 40 participantsdiagnosed with MDD with age range of 18-35 years (M=29.18, SD=8.90) from different hospitals of Lahore city who were divided into experimental and control groups with 20 participantsin each group. Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) (Kroenke et al., 2001), Bermond-Vorst AlexithymiaQuestionnaire (BVAQ) (Vorst & Bermond, 2001) and Distress Disclosure Index (DDI) (Kahn & Hessling, 2001) were used to measure MDD, alexithymia and emotional disclosure, respectively. In order to analyze results, descriptive analysis, linear regression analysis, and paired sample t-test were used for the current study. The summary of results showed that alexithymia is significantly predicting lack of emotional disclosure in individuals with MDD. There was a significant post testdifferencebetween experimental and control group on studies variables. It was also indicated that both groups are likely to have significant difference on the studied variables on post testing.