Alopecia areata is a nonscarring hair disorder consisting in the sudden appearance of one or several circumscribed patches of hair loss. This often affects body image and carries a negative psychosocial impact for the patient. the pathogenesis of alopecia areata is not fully understood but psychosomatic factors such as emotional stress and specific personality traits have been suggested to play an important role in its development.

This study aims to understand the role of stressful events, attachment security, alexithymia and social support as factors triggering alopecia areata.

Participants were recruited from a psychiatric out-patient clinic of a general hospital (n = 7) and were assessed using Paykel's Interview for Recent Life Events, Experiences in Close Relationships Scale, 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale and Social Support Satisfaction Scale. all scales were adapted to the Portuguese population.

Alopecia areata tends to be associated with a low satisfaction in social support and high anxiety than avoidance in attachment relationships. Life events were important in 5 out of 7 patients studied and no association was found with alexithymia.

In our sample, poor social support, life events and anxious attachment were associated with Alopecia areata (in agreement with others previous studies), demonstrating the importance of psychosomatic factors in this disorder. Two patients that didn’t show a clear association with life events were under chronic stress situations (had mentally retarded children).