Rumination mediates the relationship between personality organization and symptoms of borderline personality disorder and depression

Abstract

This article presents two studies examining cross-sectional mediational models between self-report assessments of personality organization, rumination, borderline personality disorder symptoms and depressive symptoms. The relationship between rumination and symptoms of borderline personality disorder (BPD) and depression has been demonstrated by numerous empirical studies. In our research we used Kernberg's theoretical frame of personality organization (PO) where normal and pathological personality features are not distinct entities but make a spectrum of increasing severity. In the current study we hypothesized that the relationship between PO and borderline as well as depressive symptoms is mediated by rumination on non-clinical samples. According to our results a less structured personality appears to be associated with more borderline and depressive symptoms, a higher proneness to rumination, and the relationship between PO level and borderline-depressive symptoms is mediated by rumination. These results provide important insights regarding the concomitants of borderline and depressive symptoms, as well as their treatment.