List of contributors; Foreword; Preface Mark A. Lumley; Acknowledgements; Part I. History, Assessment, and Cultural Shaping of Alexithymia: 1. History of alexithymia: the contributions of psychoanalysis Graeme J. Taylor; 2. Assessment of the alexithymia construct Angela Sekely, R. Michael Bagby and Piero Porcelli; 3. The cultural shaping of alexithymia Andrew Ryder, Momoka Sunohara, Jessica Dere and Yulia E. Chentsova-Dutton; Part II. Emotion and Cognitive Processing: 4. Emotion knowledge and emotion regulation in alexithymia Olivier Luminet and Giorgia Zamariola; 5. Memory and executive functions in alexithymia Nicolas Vermeulen, Irena Domachowska and Kristy A. Nielson; 6. Language processing in alexithymia Carlotta Welding and Dalya Samur; Part III. Clinical Issues and Somatic and Psychiatric Pathology: 7. Alexithymia and physical illness Piero Porcelli and Graeme J. Taylor; 8. Attachment, trauma, and alexithymia Adriano Schimmenti and Vincenzo Caretti; 9. Relations between alexithymia and depressive and anxiety disorders and personality Kirsi Honkalampi, Domenico De Berardis, Federica Vellante and Heimo Viinamäki; 10. Alexithymia and maladaptive regulatory behaviors in substance use disorders and eating disorders Kristen P. Morie and Nathan Ridout; 11. Social and interpersonal implications of alexithymia Delphine Grynberg, Sylvie Berthoz and Geoffrey Bird; 12. Therapeutic issues John S. Ogrodniczuk, David Kealy, George A. Hadjipavlou and Kristjana Cameron; Part IV. Biological Considerations: 13. Neuroimaging studies of alexithymia Katharina S. Goerlich and André Aleman; 14. Electrophysiology of alexithymia Katharina S. Goerlich; 15. Genetic factors and endocrine and immune system functioning associated with alexithymia Michiko Kano, Hans Jörgen Grabe and Jan Terock; 16. Processing emotions in alexithymia: a systematic review of physiological markers Georgia Panayiotou, Maria Panteli and Elke Vlemincx; 17. Alexithymia and body awareness Olga Pollatos and Beate M. Herbert; 18. Conclusions and future directions Graeme J. Taylor, R. Michael Bagby and Olivier Luminet; Index.