Search

Individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) often experience deficits in social role functioning, which encompasses the ability to adhere to socially defined rules and norms of behaviour. Additionally, research suggests that coping styles influence the way individuals with BPD manage stress and that symptom presentation and functioning in individuals with BPD vary across genders. This study sought to explore these variables via moderated mediation, investigating the mediating influence of coping styles on the association between BPD symptoms and social role dysfunction and if these associations were further moderated by gender. Participants (N = 233) were outpatients attending a programme for personality dysfunction. Participants completed measures of BPD symptoms, coping styles and social role dysfunction. Moderated mediation indicated that for women, emotion-oriented coping and social diversion-oriented coping mediated the association between BPD symptoms and social dysfunction. While BPD symptoms were positively associated with emotion coping, which was positively associated with social role dysfunction, BPD symptoms were negatively associated with social diversion coping, which was negatively associated with social role dysfunction. For men, coping did not mediate the association between BPD symptoms and social role dysfunction. Our findings may indicate that social support and a healthy social network may play an important part in the ongoing social role functioning of women with BPD. From this, potential early therapeutic interventions targeting safe social engagement in times of stress may decrease the pervasive and persistent nature of social dysfunction in BPD. © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., (© 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a severe and complex disorder characterized by instability across many life domains, including interpersonal relations, behavior, and emotions. A core feature and contributor to BPD, emotion dysegulation (ED), consists of deficits in the ability to regulate emotions in a manner that allows the individual to pursue important goals or behave effectively in various contexts. Biosocial developmental models of BPD have emphasized a transaction of environmental conditions (e.g., invalidating environments and adverse childhood experiences) with key genetically linked vulnerabilities (e.g., impulsivity and emotional vulnerability) in the development of ED and BPD. Emerging evidence has begun to highlight the complex, heterotypic pathways to the development of BPD, with key heritable vulnerability factors possibly interacting with aspects of the rearing environment to produce worsening ED and an adolescent trajectory consisting of self-damaging behaviors and eventual BPD. Adults with BPD have shown evidence of a variety of cognitive, physiological, and behavioral characteristics of ED. As the precursors to the development of ED and BPD have become clearer, prevention and treatment efforts hold great promise for reducing the long-term suffering, functional impairment, and considerable societal costs associated with BPD.

Background and Objectives: Despite strong support for the role of emotional relief in deliberate self-harm (DSH), no research has examined the impact of emotional distress on the strength of the DSH-relief association. Thus, it remains unclear whether the association of DSH with emotional relief is stable across emotional contexts or context-dependent. This study aimed to examine if the implicit DSH-relief association is stronger in the context of emotional distress (relative to a neutral emotional context)., Methods: Young adult women with (n = 60) and without (n = 60) a history of recent recurrent DSH were randomly assigned to complete a novel version of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) assessing the DSH-relief association at baseline (following an initial neutral emotion induction) and again following either a neutral or negative (i.e., social rejection) emotion induction., Results: Consistent with hypotheses, the DSH-relief association was stronger among women with recent recurrent DSH (vs. those without DSH) at baseline. Contrary to hypotheses, however, whereas the DSH-relief association remained stable following both the neutral and negative emotion inductions among participants with DSH, it became stronger across both conditions for participants without DSH., Limitations: The use of a community sample of young adult women may limit generalizability to other relevant populations (e.g., clinical populations, young men, adolescents). Additionally, the negative emotion induction may not have been powerful enough to affect the strength of the learned DSH-relief association among individuals with a repeated history of DSH., Conclusions: Findings suggest that the repeated use of DSH to bring about emotional relief may engender associations of DSH with relief that are relatively insensitive to emotional context., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Locus of control (LOC) represents individuals' beliefs about how much control they have over outcomes in their life. Previous research has found an association between external LOC and psychopathology. Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is characterized by mood instability, identity disturbance and difficulties in impulse control., Aims: The aims of this study are to evaluate the relationship between BPD features and LOC in a non-clinical sample and to assess whether external LOC is associated with BPD features after controlling for symptoms of depression and anxiety., Methods: In a cross-sectional study of 328 university students, we assessed LOC, BPD features, depression and anxiety, as well as difficulties in emotion regulation and cognitive emotion regulation as potential mediators., Results: We found an association between external LOC and BPD features after controlling for symptoms of depression, anxiety and demographic covariates. Assessing for indirect effects through potential mediators, we found that difficulties in emotion regulation, but not cognitive emotion regulation, partially mediated the relationship between external LOC and BPD features., Conclusions: Findings provide support for a unique association between external LOC and BPD features and suggest a role for external LOC in related emotion regulation problems. Future investigations using experimental designs should examine potential causal associations and the effect of changing LOC on emotion regulation and features of BPD. Copyright © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., (Copyright © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)

Difficulties with emotion regulation are central to borderline personality disorder (BPD). Recent research suggests that avoidance of emotions in general, and emotion suppression specifically, may be commonly used among those who meet criteria for the disorder. Contemporary behavioral interventions for BPD incorporate cognitive and behavioral skills to increase emotional experiencing and acceptance while decreasing behaviors that function to escape or avoid from emotions. Few studies, however, have experimentally examined the effects of instructed emotion suppression and acceptance in BPD. The present study examined the effects of instructed use of different emotion regulation strategies on emotions, psychophysiology, and behavior in BPD. Participants with BPD, major depressive disorder (MDD), and nonpsychiatric controls (N = 193) were randomly assigned to either suppress or accept emotions during an audio recording of a social rejection scenario, and completed a behavioral measure of distress tolerance. BPD participants exhibited greater heart rate variability in the acceptance (vs. suppression) condition; this pattern was not evident within the other groups. These results suggest that deliberate use of acceptance-based emotion regulation strategies may have unique physiological effects among individuals with BPD., (Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)

This study examined the effects of avoidance- versus acceptance-oriented emotion regulation instructions among individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD; n = 48), major depressive disorder (MDD; n = 54), and non-psychiatric controls (NPC; n = 50) using ecological momentary assessment. Participants were randomly assigned to either accept or avoid negative emotions, and monitored their moods, urges, and distress tolerance several times per day over 6 days. Avoidance instructions resulted in reduced negative affect and urges for maladaptive behaviors uniquely among BPD participants. Together with past research, and consistent with treatment approaches emphasizing the short-term use of skills to avoid or distract from emotions (e.g., DBT; Linehan, 1993b, 2015), these findings suggest that avoidance of negative emotions may have temporary benefits for individuals with BPD. Acceptance-oriented strategies may take longer or may require more extensive training to be beneficial for emotional functioning in everyday life in BPD.

Despite the growing consensus that negative reinforcement in the form of emotional relief plays a key role in the maintenance of deliberate self-harm (DSH), most of the research in this area has relied exclusively on self-report measures of the perceived motives for and emotional consequences of DSH. Thus, the primary aim of this study was to extend extant research on the role of emotional relief in DSH by examining the strength of the association of DSH with emotional relief using a novel version of the Implicit Association Test (IAT). The strength of the DSH-relief association among both participants with (vs. without) DSH and self-harming participants with (vs. without) BPD, as well as its associations with relevant clinical constructs (including DSH characteristics, self-reported motives for DSH, BPD pathology, and emotion dysregulation and avoidance) were examined in a community sample of young adults (113 with recent recurrent DSH; 135 without DSH). As hypothesized, results revealed stronger associations between DSH and relief among participants with versus without DSH, as well as among DSH participants with versus without BPD. Moreover, the strength of the DSH-relief association was positively associated with DSH frequency and versatility (both lifetime and at 6-month follow-up), BPD pathology, emotion dysregulation, experiential avoidance, and self-reported emotion relief motives for DSH. Findings provide support for theories emphasizing the role of emotional relief in DSH (particularly among individuals with BPD), as well as the construct validity, predictive utility, and incremental validity (relative to self-reported emotion relief motives) of this IAT., ((c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).)

The present study examined the emotional reactivity of persons with heightened borderline personality (BP) features to social rejection and negative evaluation in the laboratory. Individuals with high levels of BP features (n = 30) and controls with low levels of BP features (n = 44) were randomly assigned to a condition involving negative evaluation based on writing (negative evaluation/academic), or a condition involving negative evaluation based on personal characteristics as well as social rejection (negative evaluation/social rejection). Hypothesis 1 was that high-BP individuals, but not low-BP controls, would show greater emotional reactivity to the negative evaluation/social rejection stressor, compared with the negative evaluation/academic (writing) stressor. Hypothesis 2 was that high-BP individuals would specifically show greater reactivity of shame- and anger-related emotions to the negative evaluation/social rejection stressor compared with the negative evaluation/academic stressor. Findings indicated that high-BP individuals showed heightened emotional reactivity to the social rejection stressor but not to the negative evaluation stressor, but the opposite pattern occurred for controls. In addition, there was evidence for heightened reactivity of irritability, distress, and shame for the high-BP group, specifically in the social rejection condition.

Background and Objectives: The purpose of this study was to examine the mediating role of interpersonal vulnerabilities in the association of borderline personality (BP) features with emotional reactivity to an interpersonal stressor., Methods: For this study, female university students with high (N = 23), mid (N = 23), and low (N = 22) BP features completed the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems-Personality Disorders-25 (IIP-PD-25). Self-reported emotions, skin conductance responses (SCRs), interbeat intervals, and heart rate variability measured emotional reactivity to a social rejection stressor., Results: BP features were positively associated with interpersonal dysfunction and predicted greater SCR reactivity and self-reported emotional reactivity. Interpersonal dysfunction mediated the association between BP features and physiological (SCRs), but not self-reported, emotional reactivity. In particular, scores on the interpersonal ambivalence subscale of the IIP-PD-25 mediated the association of BP features with SCR reactivity., Limitations: This study examined BP features in a non-clinical sample, and relied on a relatively small sample. Furthermore, the design of the present study does not capture the potential transaction between interpersonal vulnerabilities and emotional dysfunction., Conclusions: The findings of this study illuminate one potential mechanism underlying the heightened reactivity of persons with BP features to rejection, suggesting that interpersonal ambivalence plays a particularly important role in physiological reactivity., (Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Understanding the functions of nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) has important implications for the development and refinement of theoretical models and treatments of NSSI. Emotional and social vulnerabilities associated with five common functions of NSSI-emotion relief (ER), feeling generation (FG), self-punishment (SP), interpersonal influence (II), and interpersonal communication (IC)-were investigated to clarify why individuals use this behavior in the service of different purposes. Female participants (n = 162) with a history of NSSI completed online measures of self-injury, emotion regulation strategies and abilities, trait affectivity, social problem-solving styles, and interpersonal problems. ER functions were associated with more intense affectivity, expressive suppression, and limited access to emotion regulation strategies. FG functions were associated with a lack of emotional clarity. Similar to ER functions, SP functions were associated with greater affective intensity and expressive suppression. II functions were negatively associated with expressive suppression and positively associated with domineering/controlling and intrusive/needy interpersonal styles. IC functions were negatively associated with expressive suppression and positively associated with a vindictive or self-centered interpersonal style. These findings highlight the specific affective traits, emotional and social skill deficits, and interpersonal styles that may render a person more likely to engage in NSSI to achieve specific goals., (© 2012 The American Association of Suicidology.)

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is associated with poor social problem solving and problems with emotion regulation. In this study, the social problem-solving performance of undergraduates with high (n = 26), mid (n = 32), or low (n = 29) levels of BPD features was assessed with the Social Problem-Solving Inventory-Revised and using the means-ends problem-solving procedure before and after a social rejection stressor. The high-BP group, but not the low-BP group, showed a significant reduction in relevant solutions to social problems and more inappropriate solutions following the negative emotion induction. Increases in self-reported negative emotions during the emotion induction mediated the relationship between BP features and reductions in social problem-solving performance. In addition, the high-BP group demonstrated trait deficits in social problem solving on the Social Problem-Solving Inventory-Revised. These findings suggest that future research must examine social problem solving under differing emotional conditions, and that clinical interventions to improve social problem solving among persons with BP features should focus on responses to emotional contexts.

Emotional experiences immediately prior to (emotional antecedents) and following (emotional consequences) deliberate self-harm and suicide attempts in female inmates (N = 63) were examined. Anger was the antecedent emotion reported by the largest proportion of individuals who had engaged in deliberate self-harm (45.16%), suicide attempts (40.9%), and ambivalent suicide attempts (30%). Relief and other positive emotional shifts were more common in deliberate self-harm (41.94%) (involving no intent to die) than in suicide attempts or ambivalent suicide attempts, particularly for persons with borderline personality disorder. These findings underscore the utility of discriminating between deliberate self-harm and suicidal behavior and highlight the potential role of anger in triggering such behaviors.

Despite increasing attention to the phenomenon of deliberate self-harm (DSH), the literature currently lacks a unifying, evidence-based, theoretical framework within which to understand the factors that control this behavior. The purpose of the present paper is to outline such a framework-the Experiential Avoidance Model (EAM) of DSH. The EAM poses that DSH is primarily maintained by negative reinforcement in the form of escape from, or avoidance of, unwanted emotional experiences. Literature on factors that may lead to experiential avoidance is reviewed, along with the mounting empirical evidence that DSH functions to help the individual escape from unwanted emotional experiences. The EAM integrates a variety of research on emotions, experiential avoidance, and DSH within a clinically useful framework that sparks novel research directions.