Impulsivity dimensions, emotion dysregulation, and borderline personality disorder features among Italian nonclinical adolescents

BACKGROUND: Contemporary theorists have suggested that impulsivity and emotion dysregulation are two of the core features of BPD. The aim of this study was to evaluate the relationships between Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) features, impulsivity, and emotion dysregulation in adolescence. METHODS: 1,157 nonclinical adolescents were administered the Borderline Personality Inventory, following which three groups of adolescents with high (high-BPD; n = 29), average (average-BPD; n = 31), and low (low-BPD; n = 31) levels of BPD features were selected. Participants in these three groups were administered the UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale (UPPS-P) and the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS). RESULTS: UPPS-P Negative and Positive Urgency scales, as well as the DERS total score, significantly discriminated high-BPD adolescents from both other groups. The differences in UPPS-P Negative and Positive Urgency between high-BPD adolescents and both control groups remained significant when partialing out the variance associated with the DERS; However, when partialing out the variance associated with Positive and Negative Urgency, high-BPD adolescents reported significantly higher DERS scores than only the low-BPD control group (and not the average-BPD group). Finally, although the differences in Positive Urgency between high-BPD adolescents and both control groups remained significant when partialing out the variance associated with Negative Urgency, the between group differences in Negative Urgency did not remain significant when controlling for the variance associated with Positive Urgency. CONCLUSIONS: These findings highlight the relevance of both emotion dysregulation and two dimensions of impulsivity (negative and positive urgency) to BPD features in adolescence, providing evidence for a unique association between BPD features and Positive Urgency in particular. These findings add to the literature in this area, suggesting that the tendency to act rashly in the context of intense positive affect may have unique relevance to BPD features in adolescence.