The contributions of neuroticism and childhood maltreatment to hyperbolic temperament

Zanarini and colleagues have proposed that hyperbolic temperament, involving a preponderance of negative emotions and cognitions combined with a need for those dysphoric inner states to be validated and understood, underlies borderline symptomatology. This study examined neuroticism and childhood maltreatment as predictors of hyperbolic features measured 10 years later in a clinical sample. Neuroticism and childhood maltreatment were significant and independent predictors of prospective hyperbolic temperament. These findings expand upon the hyperbolic temperament model of borderline phenomenology by depicting its developmental antecedents.