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Hautle LL, Kurath J, Jellestad L, Lüönd AM, Wingenbach TSH, Frühholz S, Jansson B, Niedtfeld I, Pfaltz MC. Individuals with and without child maltreatment experiences are evaluated similarly and do not differ in facial affect display at zero- and first-acquaintance. Borderline Personal Disord Emot Dysregul 2023; 10:17. [PMID: 37210564 DOI: 10.1186/s40479-023-00222-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/26/2022] [Accepted: 04/27/2023] [Indexed: 05/22/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Individuals with a history of child maltreatment (CM) are more often disliked, rejected and victimized compared to individuals without such experiences. However, contributing factors for these negative evaluations are so far unknown. OBJECTIVE Based on previous research on adults with borderline personality disorder (BPD), this preregistered study assessed whether negative evaluations of adults with CM experiences, in comparison to unexposed controls, are mediated by more negative and less positive facial affect display. Additionally, it was explored whether level of depression, severity of CM, social anxiety, social support, and rejection sensitivity have an influence on ratings. METHODS Forty adults with CM experiences (CM +) and 40 non-maltreated (CM-) adults were filmed for measurement of affect display and rated in likeability, trustworthiness, and cooperativeness by 100 independent raters after zero-acquaintance (no interaction) and 17 raters after first-acquaintance (short conversation). RESULTS The CM + and the CM- group were neither evaluated significantly different, nor showed significant differences in affect display. Contrasting previous research, higher levels of BPD symptoms predicted higher likeability ratings (p = .046), while complex post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms had no influence on ratings. CONCLUSIONS The non-significant effects could be attributed to an insufficient number of participants, as our sample size allowed us to detect effects with medium effect sizes (f2 = .16 for evaluation; f2 = .17 for affect display) with a power of .95. Moreover, aspects such as the presence of mental disorders (e.g., BPD or post-traumatic stress disorder), might have a stronger impact than CM per se. Future research should thus further explore conditions (e.g., presence of specific mental disorders) under which individuals with CM are affected by negative evaluations as well as factors that contribute to negative evaluations and problems in social relationships.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lara-Lynn Hautle
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Jennifer Kurath
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Lena Jellestad
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Antonia M Lüönd
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Tanja S H Wingenbach
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- School of Human Sciences, Faculty of Education, Health, and Human Sciences, University of Greenwich, London, UK
| | - Sascha Frühholz
- Department of Psychology, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Billy Jansson
- Department of Psychology and Social Work, Mid Sweden University, Östersund, Sweden
| | - Inga Niedtfeld
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine, Medical Faculty Mannheim at, Central Institute of Mental Health, Heidelberg University, J5, 68159, Mannheim, Germany
| | - Monique C Pfaltz
- Department of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry and Psychosomatic Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
- Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
- Department of Psychology and Social Work, Mid Sweden University, Östersund, Sweden.
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Meulemeester CD, Lowyck B, Boets B, van der Donck S, Verhaest Y, Luyten P. "Feeling Invisible": Individuals With Borderline Personality Disorder Underestimate the Transparency of Their Emotions. J Pers Disord 2023; 37:213-232. [PMID: 37002937 DOI: 10.1521/pedi.2023.37.2.213] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 04/04/2023]
Abstract
The present study investigated transparency estimation, that is, the ability to estimate how observable one's emotions are, in patients diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD) (n = 35) and healthy controls (HCs; n = 35). Participants watched emotionally evocative video clips and estimated the transparency of their own emotional experience while watching the clip. Facial expression coding software (FaceReader) quantified their objective transparency. BPD patients felt significantly less transparent than HCs, but there were no differences in objective transparency. BPD patients tended to underestimate the transparency of their emotions compared to HCs, who in turn overestimated their transparency. This suggests that BPD patients expect that others will not know how they feel, irrespective of how observable their emotions actually are. We link these findings to low emotional awareness and a history of emotional invalidation in BPD, and we discuss their impact on BPD patients' social functioning.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Benedicte Lowyck
- University Psychiatric Hospital UPC KU Leuven, Campus Kortenberg, and Department of Neurosciences, Faculty of Medicine, KU Leuven, Belgium
| | - Bart Boets
- Center for Developmental Psychiatry, Department of Neurosciences, KU Leuven, Belgium
| | | | - Yannic Verhaest
- University Psychiatric Hospital UPC KU Leuven, Campus Kortenberg, and Department of Neurosciences, Faculty of Medicine, KU Leuven, Belgium
| | - Patrick Luyten
- Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, KU Leuven, Belgium
- Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London, United Kingdom
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Hepp J, Kieslich PJ, Wycoff AM, Bertsch K, Schmahl C, Niedtfeld I. Mouse-tracking reveals cognitive conflict during negative impression formation in women with Borderline Personality Disorder or Social Anxiety Disorder. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0247955. [PMID: 33662030 PMCID: PMC7932102 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0247955] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/24/2020] [Accepted: 02/17/2021] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Individuals with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) or Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) suffer from substantial interpersonal dysfunction and have difficulties establishing social bonds. A tendency to form negative first impressions of others could contribute to this by way of reducing approach behavior. We tested whether women with BPD or SAD would show negative impression formation compared to healthy women (HCs). We employed the Thin Slices paradigm and showed videos of 52 authentic target participants to 32 women with BPD, 29 women with SAD, and 37 HCs. We asked participants to evaluate whether different positive or negative adjectives described targets and expected BPD raters to provide the most negative ratings, followed by SAD and HC. BPD and SAD raters both agreed with negative adjectives more often than HCs (e.g., ‘Yes, the person is greedy’), and BPD raters rejected positive adjectives more often (e.g., ‘No, the person is not humble.’). However, BPD and SAD raters did not differ significantly from each other. Additionally, we used the novel process tracing method mouse-tracking to assess the cognitive conflict (via trajectory deviations) raters experienced during decision-making. We hypothesized that HCs would experience more conflict when making unfavorable (versus favorable) evaluations and that this pattern would flip in BPD and SAD. We quantified cognitive conflict via maximum absolute deviations (MADs) of the mouse-trajectories. As hypothesized, HCs showed more conflict when rejecting versus agreeing with positive adjectives. The pattern did not flip in BPD and SAD but was substantially reduced, such that BPD and SAD showed similar levels of conflict when rejecting and agreeing with positive adjectives. Contrary to the hypothesis for BPD and SAD, all three groups experienced substantial conflict when agreeing with negative adjectives. We discuss therapeutic implications of the combined choice and mouse-tracking results.
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Affiliation(s)
- Johanna Hepp
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Medical Faculty Mannheim, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Pascal J Kieslich
- Department of Psychology & Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES), School of Social Sciences, University of Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany
| | - Andrea M Wycoff
- Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, United States of America
| | - Katja Bertsch
- Department of Psychology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Munich, Germany
| | - Christian Schmahl
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Medical Faculty Mannheim, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Inga Niedtfeld
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Medical Faculty Mannheim, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
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