What's the effect of social context on individuals with BPD or APD?

A new paper out from our lab - congratulations to Reuma Gadassi and Avigal Snir, the principal authors. The paper, entitled "Out of the Frying Pan, Into the Fire: Mixed Affective Reactions to Social Proximity in Borderline and Avoidant Personality Disorders in Daily Life" is now slated for publication in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology. Here's the summary paragraph of that paper; a link to the paper itself appears below.

" Individuals’ affective reactions to social proximity serve as

guides for their social behavior (Kashdan & Collins, 2010). When

reactions are positive, they signal rewards or safety (Gilbert et al.,

2008) and foster positive approach behaviors. When they are

negative, they signal punishments or danger, and foster avoidance

behaviors. Among healthy individuals, for whom the primary

reactions are positive, progress toward meeting their belongingness

(Baumeister & Leary, 1995) and acceptance (Downey &

Feldman, 1996) needs moves in a relatively unimpeded manner.

For individuals with personality disorders, for whom affective

reactions to social proximity are mixed, the progress toward acceptance

is much more bumpy. They sense the rewards, and at

times feel the safety. However, these are often laced with anxiety

(in APD), anger (in BPD), and shame (both disorders). Clinically,

these results suggest that interventions for BPD or APD should

devote considerable attention to the regulation of these particular

negative emotions as they arise within relationships (including the

therapy relationship itself; cf., Levy et al., 2006; Rafaeli, Bernstein,

& Young, 2011)."

Read the paper itself here.