Borderline Personality Disorder Symptoms in College Students: The Complex Interplay between Alexithymia, Emotional Dysregulation and Rumination

Both Emotional Cascade Theory and Linehan's Biosocial Theory suggest dysregulated behaviors associated with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) emerge, in part, because of cycles of rumination, poor emotional recognition and poor emotion regulation. In this study we examined relationships bet...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2016-06, Vol.11 (6), p.e0157294-e0157294
Main Authors: Meaney, Rebecca, Hasking, Penelope, Reupert, Andrea
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Affective Symptoms - epidemiology
Alexithymia
Analysis
Biology and Life Sciences
Borderline personality disorder
Borderline Personality Disorder - epidemiology
College students
Colleges & universities
Emotions
Feeding and Eating Disorders of Childhood - epidemiology
Female
Health aspects
Humans
Internet
Male
Medicine and Health Sciences
Mental depression
Native peoples
Personality
Personality disorders
Psychiatry
Psychopathology
Risk factors
Rumination
Social Sciences
Students
Students - statistics & numerical data
Substance use
Suicides & suicide attempts
Universities - statistics & numerical data
Young Adult
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Summary:Both Emotional Cascade Theory and Linehan's Biosocial Theory suggest dysregulated behaviors associated with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) emerge, in part, because of cycles of rumination, poor emotional recognition and poor emotion regulation. In this study we examined relationships between rumination, alexithymia, and emotion regulation in predicting dysregulated behaviors associated with BPD (e.g. self-harm, substance use, aggression), and explored both indirect and moderating effects among these variables. The sample comprised 2261 college students who completed self-report measures of the aforementioned constructs. BPD symptoms, stress, family psychological illness, and alexithymia exerted direct effects on behaviors. Symptoms had an indirect effect on behaviors through rumination, alexithymia and emotional dysregulation. In addition, the relationship between symptoms and dysregulated behaviors was conditional on level of rumination and alexithymia. Implications for early identification and treatment of BPD and related behaviors in college settings are discussed.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0157294