A Computational Phenotype of Disrupted Moral Inference in Borderline Personality Disorder

Jenifer Siegel,Owen Curwell-Parry,Steve Pearce,Kate Saunders,Molly Crockett

doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2020.02.311

Jenifer Siegel, Owen Curwell-Parry + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2020.02.311

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Abstract

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a serious mental disorder characterized by marked interpersonal disturbances, including difficulties trusting others and volatile impressions of others’ moral character, often resulting in premature relationship termination. We tested a hypothesis that moral character inference is disrupted in BPD and sensitive to Democratic Therapeutic Community (DTC) treatment.

Highlights

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a serious mental disorder characterized by marked interpersonal disturbances, including difficulties trusting others and volatile impressions of others’ moral character, often resulting in premature relationship termination
We identify a computational phenotype that may characterize some aspects of BPD pathology and is sensitive to a common treatment
democratic therapeutic community (DTC) treatment was associated with more uncertain, flexible beliefs about putatively harmful social partners, suggesting that DTC may improve social interactions in BPD by increasing participants’ openness to learning about partners who exhibited potentially threatening social interactions

Summary

Introduction

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a serious mental disorder characterized by marked interpersonal disturbances, including difficulties trusting others and volatile impressions of others’ moral character, often resulting in premature relationship termination. METHODS: Participants with BPD (n = 43; 20 untreated and 23 DTC-treated) and control participants without BPD (n = 106) completed a moral inference task where they predicted the decisions of 2 agents with distinct moral preferences: the “bad” agent was more willing than the “good” agent to harm others for money. Participants rated their subjective impressions of the agent’s moral character and the certainty of those impressions. The results provide mechanistic insights into social deficits in BPD and demonstrate the potential for combining objective behavioral paradigms with computational modeling as a tool for assessing BPD pathology and treatment outcomes

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