Personality Disorders, Attachment and Psychodynamic Psychotherapy

Abstract

While attachment has been a fruitful and critical concept in understanding enduring individual templates for interpersonal relationships, it does not have a well-understood relationship to personality disorders, where impairment of interpersonal functioning is paramount. Despite the recognition that attachment disturbances do not simply reflect nonoptimal caretaking environments, the relationship of underlying temperamental factors to these environmental insults has not been fully explored. In this paper we provide an alternate model for the role of neurobiological temperamental factors, including brain circuitry and neuropeptide modulation, in mediating social cognition and the internalization and maintenance of attachment patterns. The implications of these altered attachment patterns on personality disorders and their neurobiological and environmental roots for psychoanalytically based treatment models designed to ameliorate difficulties in interpersonal functioning through the medium of increased access to mature forms of mentalization is discussed.

Insecure Attachment, Maladaptive Personality Traits, and the Perpetration of In-Person and Cyber Psychological Abuse

“…Attachment theory has received increasing attention from researchers investigating characteristics of individuals who perpetrate IPV. Negative mental representations of the self and others that underpin insecure attachment can act as maladaptive templates for intrapersonal (e.g., identity and self-direction) and interpersonal (e.g., empathy and intimacy) problems, which in turn may influence trajectories of personality development and psychological functioning (Bowlby, 1973; Weinstein, Perez-Rodriguez, & Siever, 2014).…”

Theory of Mind in Bipolar Disorder, with Comparison to the Impairments Observed in Schizophrenia

“…Patients with impaired theory of mind are, therefore, unlikely to understand the impact of their behavior on others, and this may contribute to their willingness to indulge in reckless or dangerous activities ( 74 , 75 ). Moreover, difficulty in understanding the perspective of others may be an impediment to some psychological interventions ( 76 , 77 ). Regarding the next phase of research, we make the following suggestions.…”

Personality Disorders and Attachment Trauma in Adolescent Patients with Psychiatric Disorders

“…BPD is characterized by difficulties in the concept of the self, affect regulation, self-harming behaviors and episodic aggression. These problems in individuals with BPD manifest most prominently in interpersonal contexts (Weinstein et al, 2014 ) and they clearly resemble the contradictory and disoriented behaviors observed in disorganized infants (Beeney et al, 2017 ). Attachment theorists have already proposed that the unresolved attachment status provides a fertile ground for the onset of personality pathology (Buchheim & Diamond, 2018 ; Buchheim et al, 2017 ; Levy et al, 2015 ; Weinstein et al, 2014 ).…”

“…These problems in individuals with BPD manifest most prominently in interpersonal contexts (Weinstein et al, 2014 ) and they clearly resemble the contradictory and disoriented behaviors observed in disorganized infants (Beeney et al, 2017 ). Attachment theorists have already proposed that the unresolved attachment status provides a fertile ground for the onset of personality pathology (Buchheim & Diamond, 2018 ; Buchheim et al, 2017 ; Levy et al, 2015 ; Weinstein et al, 2014 ). Unresolved states of mind are associated with an individual’s perception of being abandoned and alone due to the failed protection by attachment figures.…”