title: [New approaches for understanding borderline personality disorder].
abstract: The concept of Borderline Personality Disorders was developed from North-American psychiatric and psychoanalytic thought. During recent years different contributions on this disorder emerged from several psychological paradigms. Four current trains of research are reviewed: Approaches based upon the five-factor-model of personality, Linehan's behavioristic approach, interpersonal concepts as shown by Benjamin and a self-developed subject-centered approach focussing on the patients' subjective theories of illness. These models converge into a concept which interprets Borderline Personality Disorders as disturbances of personal identity. The patients fail when attempting to overcome the tension between being a person and being a subject in their interpretation of the world and themselves. At the end of the article consequences for therapy are highlighted.
authors.affiliation: Klinisches Institut und Klinik für Psychosomatische Medizin und Psychotherapie der Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Frommer
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Reissner
mesh_terms: D001883:Borderline Personality Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology / Q000628:therapy; D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D011574:Psychoanalytic Theory; D011613:Psychotherapy; D012649:Self Concept