Borderline Disorder

An Overview of Personality Disorders p.1

Nowadays, psychologists have made several researches about personality disorders which are defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV), as ÐŽ§a long-standing and maladaptive pattern of perceiving and responding to other people and to stressful circumstancesЎЁ (Bienenfeld, 2005). According to Lakasing, personality disorders are the result of inherited and environmental factors, such as, the association of these disorders with unacceptable physical health as a consequence of smoking, consuming drugs and drinking alcohol; he also states that in the United States personality disorders affect 10-15% of the adult US population.(2006, p5). The DSV-IV defines ten different types of personality disorders, grouped into three clusters, which are distinct by letters A, B and C (Lakasing, 2006).

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The writer will start with cluster A or Eccentric which includes people with high probability of harm others because of the violent jealousy in paranoid personality disorders (P.D). This cluster has two types of personality disorders; the first one is Paranoid, which is a disorder more common in men, and this people think others want to make a complot against them. The second one is Shizoid, also common in men, who have little interest in having human contact.

An Overview of Personality Disorders p.2

After dividing cluster A in two disorders, the DSV-IV classified cluster B or Dramatic, which leads to drug and alcohol problems, in four different disorders. The first one to be mention is the Antisocial, this disorder is recurrent in men, and the most disturbing of the personality disorders because they do not worry about other people. The second dramatic disorder is Borderline more frequently in women, their mood varies constantly, they are impulsive people, and think that they are always the victim. The third one is Narcissists, common in men, people with this disorder want others admire them, and they are arrogant.

The last group is cluster C or Anxious, is associated with anxiety and fear, this cluster has only two personality disorders. Dependant is the first one, more common in women; they think that their capacity is not good enough to take responsibilities. Obssesive-Compulsive is the second one, more common in men; they are perfectionist, rigid, pedantic and cautious. After mentioning the different types of personality disorders, this research paper will focus on one of the personality disorders.

Borderline Personality Disorder History p.3

Borderline Personality Disorder is defined by the American Psychiatric Association as, ÐŽ§a pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image, and affect, and marked impulsivity that begins by early adulthood and is present in a variety of contextЎЁ (Howell 2002). When Borderline enters the world of psychiatric notions, was introduced to define a particular state neither psychotic nor neurotic. Borderline personality disorder was used just to substitute terms; such as, ambulatory schizophrenia which was brought up in 1941, by Zylboorg a psychiatric that used this term to identify a group of people with schizophrenia symptoms, yet with out needed of hospitalization. Pseudo neurotic schizophrenia was another transitional name of BPD, which was introduced to the psychiatric community by Hoch and Polatin in 1949, to define people that looked neurotic, but under close examination became schizophrenic. Around the 1960ÐŽ¦s borderline was used to refer to ÐŽ§borderline schizophreniaЎЁ (Goldstein, 1983, p.313).

In the 1980ÐŽ¦s BPD was a controversial topic in psychiatric because there were a lot of meanings for this disorder, which gave psychiatrics a hard time to make an agreement about BPD definition. The fact that psychiatrics could not make an arrangement respect of BPD definition, made this disorderÐŽ¦s legitimacy and trustworthiness questionable.

Borderline Personality Disorder History p.4

By 1983 an official psychiatric nomenclature was made for BPD by DSM-III (Goldstein, 1983, p.312). Since studies about schizophrenia advanced, relevant evidences made public that BPD was never involved into schizophrenia, and borderline personality disorder became a new category with an increasing literature in psychodynamic and psychoanalytic theories (Howell, 2002, p.4). There is another psychiatric that plays the most important role in BPD history his name is Kernberg who made the term Borderline Personality Disorder popular. Kernberg was followed by Gunderson and his collages in 1975; ÐŽ§they defined six characteristics features of borderline patients. These are: intense affect (depressive or hostile), impulsive behavior, certain social adaptiveness, brief psychotic experiences under stress, loose thinking in unstructured situations, and interpersonal relationships that vacillate between transient superficiality and intense dependencyÐŽ¦ (Goldstein, 1983, p.319).

Borderline Personality Disorder History p.5

The most recently studies reports that borderline personality disorder has significant manifestations of dissociated self-states because of its alternation between masochistic/victim and receptor/ executor self-states, and its nine criteria that are also signs of dissociation-based disorder, this criteria are:

„X Frantic efforts to avoid expected abandonment

„X Unstable and intense interpersonal relationships

„X Markedly and persistently unstable self-image

„X Impulsivity in at least 2 areas that are potentially self-damaging (eg, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving)

„X Recurrent suicidal behaviors or threats or self-mutilation

„X Affective instability

„X Chronic feelings of emptiness

„X Inappropriate and intense anger

„X Transient paranoia or dissociation (p.2).

Moreover, Howell notes that borderline personality disorder