No abstract

This study employed an Experience Sampling Methodology (ESM) to test whether various elements of affective instability can predict future suicide ideation in patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) and a history of recurrent suicidal behavior. Eighty-two individuals with BPD and a history of recurrent suicidal behavior were followed prospectively for one month during which time they recorded their current mood states, 6 times daily over three weeks. Accounting for a set of robust suicide risk factors in multiple regression analyses, only negative mood intensity was significantly related to intensity of self-reported suicide ideation and to number of suicidal behaviors over the past year. Other elements of affective instability examined (e.g., mood amplitude, dyscontrol, and reactivity) were not associated with future suicide ideation or with recent suicidal behavior. Affective instability in patients with BPD is highly variable from one individual to another and is characterized by high levels of intense negative mood. These negative mood states, versus other aspects of mood variability, seem to be more closely tied to the occurrence of suicidal ideation and behavior.

Dissociation occurs in about two thirds of people with borderline personality disorder (BPD) but is still not well understood by clinicians. In the past decade, however, research has used new measures of dissociation that provide some of the detail that clinicians need to understand and treat the dissociative symptoms of patients with BPD. In particular, this review examines BPD's comorbidity with the dissociative disorders, the neurobiology of dissociation in BPD, the role of trauma and disorganized attachment in the etiology of dissociation in BPD, and the clinical assessment and treatment of dissociation in BPD.