Life Themes and Interpersonal Motivational Systems in the Narrative Self-construction

Linguistic markers of processing the first months of the pandemic COVID-19: a psycholinguistic analysis of Italian university students' diaries

A longitudinal psycholinguistic study was conducted with 107 students from different Italian universities that produced daily photo-diary entries for two weeks, one at the beginning and the other at the end of the first Italian lockdown period, imposed in view of the rapid dissemination of COVID -19. The task was to take a daily photo accompanied by a short description (text). The texts accompanying the photos were analysed using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) software to analyze linguistic markers representing psychological processes related to the experience of the pandemic and the lockdown, identifying potential changes in psycholinguistic variables useful for understanding the psychological impact of such harsh and extended restricted living conditions on Italian students. LIWC categories related to negation, anger, cognitive mechanisms, tentative discourse, past, and future increased statistically significantly between the two time points, while word count, prepositions, communication, leisure, and home decreased statistically significantly. While male participants used more articles at both time points, females used more words related to anxiety, social processes, past, and present at T1 and more related to insight at T2. Participants who lived with their partner showed higher scores on negative emotions, affect, positive feelings, anger, optimism, and certainty. Participants from southern Italy tended to describe their experiences from a collective and social perspective rather than an individual perspective. By identifying, discussing, and comparing these phenomena with the broader literature, a spotlight is shed for the first time on the psycholinguistic analysis of students at the national level who faced the first COVID -19 lockdown in Italy.

State of Mind Assessment in Relation to Adult Attachment and Text Analysis of Adult Attachment Interviews in a Sample of Patients with Anorexia Nervosa

BACKGROUND

Attachment theory represents one of the most important references for the study of the development of an individual throughout their life cycle and provides the clinician with a profound key for the purposes of understanding the suffering that underlies severe psychopathologies such as eating disorders. As such, we conducted a cross-sectional study with a mixed-methods analysis on a sample of 32 young women with anorexia nervosa (AN); this study was embedded in the utilized theoretical framework with the following aims: 1. to evaluate the state of mind (SoM) in relation to adult attachment, assuming a prevalence of the dismissing (DS) SoM and 2. to analyze the linguistic attachment profile emerging from the transcripts of the AAIs.

METHODS

Interviews were transcribed verbatim, coded, and analyzed using the linguistic inquiry and word count (LIWC) method.

RESULTS

The results were observed to be consistent with the referenced literature. The prevalence of a DS SoM (68.75%) is observed in the study sample, whereas the results of the lexical analysis of the stories deviate from expectations. Notably, the lexical results indicate the coexistence of the dismissing and entangled aspects at the representational level.

CONCLUSIONS

The study results suggest a high level of specificity in the emotional functioning of patients with AN, with a focusing on a pervasive control of emotions that is well illustrated by the avoidant/ambivalent (A/C) strategy described in Crittenden's dynamic-maturational model. These findings and considerations have important implications for clinical work and treatment, which we believe must be structured on the basis of starting from a reappraisal of emotional content.

Self-Actualization and the Integration of Psychedelic Experience: The Mediating Role of Perceived Benefits to Narrative Self-Functioning

There is a growing need in the field of psychedelic science for a unifying perspective of overall well-being to join seemingly disparate findings across clinical and non-clinical populations, and account for the unique role of post-psychedelic integration for promoting benefits. According to the eudaimonic perspective of well-being, the stories we create about who we are (self-insight) and who we can become (personal development) are key aspects of narrative self-functioning that either constrain or facilitate well-being. The present paper draws upon this perspective to investigate the relationship between extent of post-psychedelic integration and optimal well-being ( self-actualization), with perceived benefits to narrative self-functioning ( self-insight and personal development) as a mediator. The data for testing this model was collected from roughly 750 participants recruited from websites and social media forums. Because the sample contained clinical and non-clinical individuals, the model was able to be tested with mental health condition as a moderator. Results indicated that perceived benefits to narrative self-functioning is one pathway through which integration of psychedelic experience may promote optimal well-being for both clinical and non-clinical populations. Exploratory analyses indicated that integration techniques that are more self-referential in nature are the ones that indirectly relate to optimal well-being via perceived benefits. The results of the present study should be interpreted as a preliminary model for future longitudinal research to test, as our cross-sectional methods preclude any causal inferences to be made from these mediation analyses.

Narrative and Bodily Identity in Eating Disorders: Toward an Integrated Theoretical-Clinical Approach

Eating disorders (EDs) can be viewed as “embodied acts” that help to cope with internal and external demands that are perceived as overwhelming. The maintenance of EDs affects the entire identity of the person; the lack of a defined; or valid sense of self is expressed in terms of both physical body and personal identity. According to attachment theory, primary relationships characterized by insecurity, traumatic experiences, poor mirroring, and emotional attunement lead to the development of dysfunctional regulatory strategies. Although the literature shows an association between attachment style or states of mind, trauma, behavioral strategies, and various EDs, the debate is still ongoing and the results are still conflicting. Therefore, we believe it is important to examine and treat EDs by understanding which narrative trajectory intercepts distress in relation to narrative and embodied self-concept. Drawing on clinical observation and a narrative review of the literature, we focus on the construction and organization of bodily and narrative identity. Because bodily representations are the primary tools for generating meaning, organizing experience, and shaping social identity from the earliest stages of life, we focus on the role that bodily interactions and sensorimotor and proprioceptive patterns have played in the development of EDs. We consider the role that lack of attunement, insecure attachment, and relational trauma play in mentalizing, affecting self-representation and emotion regulation strategies. The paper also considers a semantic mode of trauma in EDs that involves a top-down pathway through beliefs and narratives about oneself based on lack of amiability, on devaluation, and on humiliation memories. Finally, we would like to highlight the proposal of an integrated model with multiple access model to psychotherapy that takes into account the complexity of ED patients in whom aspects related to dysregulation, body image disintegration, and post-traumatic symptoms are associated with a suffering sense of self and a retraumatizing narrative.

When Love Just Ends: An Investigation of the Relationship Between Dysfunctional Behaviors, Attachment Styles, Gender, and Education Shortly After a Relationship Dissolution

Much information is known about the long-term consequences of separation and divorce, whereas there is a paucity of studies about the short-term consequences of such experiences. This study investigates the adoption of dysfunctional behaviors (e.g., insistent telephone calls and text messages, verbal threats, and sending unwanted objects) shortly after a relationship dissolution. A total of 136 participants who declared to have been left by their former partner in the previous 6 months were included in this study (i.e., females: n = 84; males: n = 52; mean age = 30.38; SD = 4.19). Attachment styles were evaluated as explanatory variables when facing a relationship dissolution, in connection with a set of (1) demographic variables (i.e., gender, education, and current marital/relationship status), (2) dysfunctional behaviors, and (3) motivations on the basis of those behaviors. Results showed that a secure or dismissing attachment style, a higher education, and currently married (but awaiting separation) status were the protective factors in adopting such dysfunctional behaviors, while the preoccupied and fearful-avoidant subjects, especially females, tended to adopt dysfunctional behaviors (i.e., communication attempts and defamation) and reported fear of abandonment and need for attention as underlying motivations. Future study on longitudinal aspects of the relationship dissolution processes is required to have deeper insights into this phenomenon. This study sheds light on the relationship between adult attachment styles and the motivations behind the adoption of dysfunctional behaviors after a relationship dissolution.

Life Themes and Attachment System in the Narrative Self-Construction: Direct and Indirect Indicators

The narration is the instrument that allows individual to organize his experience through a process of attribution and sharing of meaning within social interactions and to translate the extraordinary in normativity. As regards the narrative content there are "narrative genres" that impose thematic constraints on the way of narrating, but these also allow creative variations. According to the theoretical-clinical hypothesis of Life Themes (LTs), Love, Value, Power, Freedom, and Truth are shared attractors of meaning recurring in Life Stories. The influence of attachment system on the development of autobiographical narratives is shown in literature. This article presents a qualitative study of the specific dimensions and valences of the LTs in the adult attachment narratives. The study is part of a broader research project that aims to systematize the theoretical model of LTs in the narrative Self-construction, to study its connections and applications in the field of attachment theory, and to build a useful operative tool in the clinical assessment of patients' stories. We also aimed to study the occurrence of the LTs in the Adult Attachment Interview transcripts, preliminarily exploring possible connections with Internal Working Models. 40 AAI transcripts of 20 men and 20 women (mean age was 33 years old), selected from a larger non-clinical sample employed in an adult attachment study, were analyzed using a phenomenological exploratory approach. For the research design we used a qualitative methodology that ensure a deep and intensive, rather than extensive, analysis, focusing on the complexity of meanings and discussing the results within the research group. Several indicators of LTs have been identified and the interpersonal dimensions were explored. An additional Theme emerged from the recurrence of some indicators: Ethic and Justice. In Dismissing subjects' narrations the theme Value (in terms of being valued) emerges mostly, while in the Preoccupied ones the theme Power (in terms of impositions received), accompanied secondarily by Value and Freedom, occurs more frequently. The most frequent thematic indicators in the F group are related to Love and Truth. Clinical implications of an explicative model of critical Themes are discussed.