Borderline personality disorder: Disorder of trauma or personality, a review of the empirical literature.

This goal of this review was to explore empirical research examining the question of whether borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a disorder of “personality” or a disorder arising out of experiences of childhood trauma. The review highlighted the complexities in the relationship between childhood disorder (CT) and BPD and identified important implications for research and practice. Although relationships between specific trauma types and outcomes in adulthood are inconsistent, overall associations between CT and the development of BPD are strong and consistently identified. Research exploring the specific mechanisms through which CT may be related to the development of BPD in adulthood is beginning to untangle the complex web of interrelated factors such as heritable personality traits, affect regulation and dissociation, and trauma symptoms as mediators in the relationship between CT and BPD. Our strongest recommendation is for future researchers to further explore transdiagnostic factors such as the self capacity of affect regulation to further disentangle the complex pathways between CT, inherited personality traits, and the development of all forms of traumatogenic psychopathologies in adulthood.