Social perception in borderline personality disorder: the role of context

The purpose of this study was to examine social and nonsocial context processing in persons with borderline personality disorder (BPD). A secondary goal was to examine social perception in this population. The performance of 23 individuals with DSM-IV-diagnosed BPD was compared to a nonclinical control sample of 40 individuals. The participants were asked to perform both a social perceptual task that requires social context processing and a nonsocial context processing task. Social perception was examined using the Profile of Nonverbal Sensitivity (PONS). The results demonstrate that the group with BPD was impaired on all tasks relative to the control group. Yet their reaction time improved when provided with social context. Implications for future research are discussed.