Exteroception and the perceived (dis)connection of the body and the self: Implications for the understanding of dissociative self-experiences in borderline personality disorder.
Personality disorders March 1, 2025 Annette Löffler, Dieter Kleinböhl, Dorothee Maria Gescher et al.
People with current borderline personality disorder (BPD) are more prone to out-of-body experiences (OBEs) than those with remitted BPD or nonclinical controls. In a study of 22 participants with current BPD, 16 with remitted BPD, and 20 nonclinical controls, experimentally induced OBEs showed higher proneness in the current BPD group. Processing of pain and emotional sounds was not affected by the induced dissociative experiences. Changes in clinical dissociation were linked to the degree of body-self detachment in the current BPD group. The findings suggest that altered processing of external sensory information contributes to dissociative self-experiences in BPD, and this appears to normalize when the disorder remits.