Comparison of Executive Functions and Difficulties in Emotional Regulation in Addicts with High and Low Borderline Personality Traits

Abstract

This study was performed aimed to compare the executive functioning and difficulties with emotional regulation in addicts with high and low borderline personality traits. The plan of the study was causal- comparative. The research sample population consisted of all men who had drug abuse in 2013 who referred to addiction centers. 80 addicted persons were selected by available sampling and by using questionnaire of borderline personality traits (STB) in two groups of 40 as abusers with high and low borderline traits. The Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the scale of difficulty in emotional regulation of the two groups were performed. Then data were analyzed in SPSS Version 20 using multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and test LSD. The results showed that addicts with a high proportion of borderline traits, have a poorer performance than addicts with low borderlines attributes in the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the number of retained in perseveration (P =0/010) and total error (P=0/002) is higher. Also abusers with higher borderline traits, have higher scores in the emotional difficulties regulation (P = 0/002) than addicts with low borderline of traits. The results showed that the addicts with a high boundary characteristic have poorer performance in executive functioning and higher levels of emotional difficulties in emotional regulation that this may be the result of the impact of drug dependency on their neurological function that may lead to weaker performance of these people compared to low borderline traits addicts.