Mood Disorders Patients Treated in a Day Hospital: Focus on Changes in Alexithymia and Openness to Emotions

Alexithymia and Openness to Emotions (OE) are strongly linked to mood disorders. Alexithymia represents the difficulty of giving words to emotions, whilst OE refers to cognitive representation, communication and regulation aspects of emotions. We investigated variables impacting both alexithymia and OE for mood disorder patients (N = 73), before and after a treatment period in a day psychiatric hospital. Significant score changes and, notably, significant impacts of perceived social support were expected.