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Emotional Reactivity to Personally-Relevant and Standardized Sounds in Borderline Personality Disorder

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Abstract

Theoretical conceptualizations highlight emotional reactivity as a core problem for borderline personality disorder (BPD); however, empirical work investigating emotional reactivity in BPD has produced mixed and inconclusive findings. The current study aimed to clarify emotional reactivity in adults diagnosed with BPD (N = 22) and healthy controls (HCs; N = 31) using a controlled, laboratory experiment that assessed multiple indices of emotional reactivity (i.e., subjective, psychophysiological, and facial expressive) in response to auditory stimuli (i.e., standardized vs. personally-relevant; pleasant vs. unpleasant sounds). The BPD group was characterized by higher self-reported arousal and lower valence to personally-relevant unpleasant sounds compared to HCs. Supporting study hypotheses, participants in the BPD group showed heightened skin conductance responses, specifically to unpleasant personally-relevant sounds, compared to HCs. No differences were found between BPD and HC groups on facial expressive responses. Findings replicate and extend previous studies on this topic, and highlight the need to further refine the characterization of emotional reactivity in BPD to include personally-relevant unpleasant stimuli.

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Notes

  1. Please note that these averages were computed using the raw counts + 1.

  2. These are true means of the rounded intensity averages for each block.

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Acknowledgments

This study was funded by the Brout Family Foundation.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University Medical Center, Box 3026, Durham, NC, 27705, USA

    M. Zachary Rosenthal, Andrada D. Neacsiu & Jose Larrauri

  2. Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    M. Zachary Rosenthal & Caitlin Fang

  3. University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA

    Paul J. Geiger

  4. Star Center, Greenwood Village, CO, USA

    Roianne Ahn

Authors
  1. M. Zachary Rosenthal
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  2. Andrada D. Neacsiu
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  3. Paul J. Geiger
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  4. Caitlin Fang
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  5. Roianne Ahn
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  6. Jose Larrauri
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to M. Zachary Rosenthal.

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Conflict of Interest

M. Zachary Rosenthal, Andrada D. Neacsiu, Paul J. Geiger, Caitlin Fang, Roianne Ahn and Jose Larrauri declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Informed Consent

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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No animal studies were carried out by the authors for this article.

Appendix

Appendix

  1. 1.

    Accordion.

  2. 2.

    Air conditioner rattling.

  3. 3.

    Home alarm.

  4. 4.

    Fire alarm.

  5. 5.

    Baby coughing.

  6. 6.

    Banjo.

  7. 7.

    Bathtub filling.

  8. 8.

    Birds in forest.

  9. 9.

    Single bird chirping.

  10. 10.

    Small stream.

  11. 11.

    Walking in leaves.

  12. 12.

    Car alarm.

  13. 13.

    Fog horn.

  14. 14.

    Horns in traffic.

  15. 15.

    Cat meow.

  16. 16.

    Cat purr.

  17. 17.

    Cell phone ringing.

  18. 18.

    Change counter.

  19. 19.

    Church bells (multiple).

  20. 20.

    Clothes dryer.

  21. 21.

    Dishwasher.

  22. 22.

    Water draining.

  23. 23.

    Pencil scribbling.

  24. 24.

    Rhythmic drum beat.

  25. 25.

    Electric razor.

  26. 26.

    Fan.

  27. 27.

    Fire truck (siren and horn).

  28. 28.

    Flute.

  29. 29.

    Gargle.

  30. 30.

    Guitar.

  31. 31.

    Gulp.

  32. 32.

    Gun shots.

  33. 33.

    Hairdryer.

  34. 34.

    Hammer and saw.

  35. 35.

    Handsaw.

  36. 36.

    Harmonica.

  37. 37.

    Harp.

  38. 38.

    High voltage (electricity).

  39. 39.

    Kitchen disposal.

  40. 40.

    Laughter.

  41. 41.

    Lawnmower.

  42. 42.

    Motor idling.

  43. 43.

    Motorcycle race.

  44. 44.

    Motorcycle revving engine.

  45. 45.

    Organ and choir.

  46. 46.

    Organ.

  47. 47.

    Paper tearing.

  48. 48.

    Piano.

  49. 49.

    Rain.

  50. 50.

    Refrigerator hum.

  51. 51.

    River/stream.

  52. 52.

    Saxophone.

  53. 53.

    Shower turning on.

  54. 54.

    Shower running.

  55. 55.

    Silverware clanking.

  56. 56.

    Air raid siren.

  57. 57.

    Sneeze.

  58. 58.

    Water running in a sink.

  59. 59.

    Teeth grinding.

  60. 60.

    Truck reversing.

  61. 61.

    Television turning on and humming.

  62. 62.

    Typerwriter (slow).

  63. 63.

    Typewriter (fast).

  64. 64.

    Hand vacuum.

  65. 65.

    Violin.

  66. 66.

    Washer/dryer running.

  67. 67.

    Water draining.

  68. 68.

    Waves lapping.

  69. 69.

    Wind chimes.

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Rosenthal, M.Z., Neacsiu, A.D., Geiger, P.J. et al. Emotional Reactivity to Personally-Relevant and Standardized Sounds in Borderline Personality Disorder. Cogn Ther Res 40, 314–327 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-015-9736-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-015-9736-y

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