Borderline personality as a self-other representational disturbance

Area of Science:

• Psychiatry
• Psychology
• Mental Health

Background:

• Borderline personality is characterized by interpersonal instability, affective dysregulation, and identity disturbance.
• Existing theories offer various perspectives on the underlying mechanisms of borderline personality disorder.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose that disturbances in mental representations are central to borderline psychopathology.
• To identify core features of borderline self-other representational disturbances.

Main Methods:

• Conceptual analysis of existing literature on borderline personality.
• Synthesis of research methodologies for assessing representational disturbances.

Main Results:

• Borderline psychopathology originates from impaired ability to maintain integrated internal images of self and others.
• Key features include unstable self-other representations, a core need for care, fear of mistreatment/subsumption, dichotomous thinking, and sadomasochistic interactions.

Conclusions:

• Borderline attributes exist on a continuum, not as discrete categories.
• Disturbances in mental representations are a unifying framework for understanding borderline personality disorder.