How does mindfulness skills training work to improve emotion dysregulation in borderline personality disorder?
Carlos Schmidt, Joaquim Soler, Daniel Vega, Stella Nicolaou, Laia Arias, Juan C Pascual
Borderline Personality Disorder and Emotion Dysregulation September 2, 2024 DOI: 10.1186/s40479-024-00265-0 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Observational cohort Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 75 |
| Population | BPD outpatients |
| Intervention | Mindfulness skills training |
| Duration | 10-week intervention |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Keywords | Borderline personality disorders Dialectical behavior therapy Emotion regulation Mechanisms Mindfulness training Moderators |
| Citations | 10 |
| Key findings | Greater nonjudgment and body awareness than one's personal average predicted improvement in emotion dysregulation the following week, with decentering moderating this effect. |
Abstract
Mindfulness skills training is a core component of Dialectical Behavior Therapy and aims to improve emotion dysregulation (ED) in people with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). However, the underlying mechanisms of change are not fully understood. A total of 75 BPD outpatients participated in a 10-week mindfulness skills training. Multilevel models with a time-lagged approach were conducted to examine the temporal dynamics between the proposed mechanisms and ED. Decentering, nonjudgment, body awareness and attention awareness as putative mechanisms and ED as outcome were assessed on a session-by-session basis. Greater nonjudgment and body awareness showed within-person effects; participants who reported higher nonjudgement of inner experience and body awareness than their own personal average at a given week showed improvement in ED at the following week. Notably, decentering moderated these associations, such that increased nonjudgment and body awareness predicted improvements in ED more strongly in those participants with high decentering ability. Lastly, a bidirectional relationship between the mechanisms and ED was found; when participants were more emotionally dysregulated than their usual state, they showed less gain in the mechanisms at the following week. Knowing how mindfulness training works is relevant to optimize treatments. Clinicians may use strategies to increase these mechanisms when the goal is to improve emotion regulation difficulties in BPD.
Comparable studies
Other observational and cohort studies on meditation, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Using Self-Report Assessment Methods to Explore Facets of Mindfulness Undergraduate students | 2006 | Observational cohort | |
| Effectiveness of a meditation-based stress reduction program in the treatment of anxiety disorders Patients with generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia | 1992 | Observational cohort | n = 22 |
| Meditation experience is associated with increased cortical thickness Participants with extensive Insight meditation experience and matched controls | 2005 | Observational cohort | n = 20 |
| Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity Experienced meditators and matched meditation-naive controls | 2011 | Observational cohort | |
| Long-term meditators self-induce high-amplitude gamma synchrony during mental practice Long-term Buddhist practitioners and controls | 2004 | Observational cohort |
Citations in the library
Cites 9
- The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 2003
- Using Self-Report Assessment Methods to Explore Facets of Mindfulness Assessment January 27, 2006
- How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective Perspectives on Psychological Science October 14, 2011
- An empirical study of the mechanisms of mindfulness in a mindfulness‐based stress reduction program Journal of Clinical Psychology March 6, 2009
- The relationship between mindfulness and objective measures of body awareness: A meta-analysis Scientific Reports November 22, 2019
and 4 more in the library