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Related Experiment Videos

Brain activity to transitional objects in patients with borderline personality disorder.

Markus Kiefer1, Ute Neff2, Markus M Schmid2

  • 1Ulm University, Department of Psychiatry, Ulm, Germany. Markus.Kiefer@uni-ulm.de.

Scientific Reports
|October 15, 2017
PubMed
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Adults with borderline personality disorder (BPD) show unique brain responses to transitional objects (TOs) like stuffed animals. These responses are linked to attachment anxiety and depression, suggesting TOs aid in coping with abandonment fears and mood symptoms.

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Psychology
  • Clinical Psychology

Background:

  • Adults with borderline personality disorder (BPD) often form attachments to inanimate transitional objects (TOs), such as stuffed animals.
  • The neural mechanisms underlying the processing of these attachment-relevant objects in BPD remain largely unexplored.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the neural correlates of processing transitional objects (TOs) in adult patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD).
  • To determine the functional significance of these neural responses in relation to attachment anxiety and depressive symptoms.

Main Methods:

  • Event-related potential (ERP) recordings were used to measure brain activity.
  • Sixteen female BPD patients and 16 matched healthy controls viewed images of their TOs, familiar objects (FOs), and unfamiliar objects (UOs).

Related Experiment Videos

Main Results:

  • Patients with BPD exhibited a specific increase in frontal P3/Late Positive Potential (LPP) amplitude when viewing their TOs.
  • This ERP amplitude increase correlated significantly with attachment anxiety and depression scores in BPD patients.
  • Processing of attachment-related TO stimuli specifically modulated emotional stimulus evaluation, reflecting enhanced self-relevance processing in BPD.

Conclusions:

  • Transitional objects (TOs) play a significant role in the emotional regulation of individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD).
  • The observed neural responses suggest that TOs help BPD patients cope with attachment anxiety, fear of abandonment, and depressive symptoms.
  • These findings highlight the therapeutic potential of transitional objects in managing BPD-related emotional distress.