About this Research Topic
Image credit: © Agathe Nermond
Adolescents with a borderline personality disorder (BPD) represent a major public health issue, going well beyond the well-known risk of suicidal behaviors and non-suicidal self-injuries. Poor physical health also results from the constellation of risky behaviors that emerge at adolescence and difficulties to build a trusted care relationship (with delay/discontinuity in care and poor compliance). Providing continuous care that integrates all the different actors involved in the adolescent’s life (e.g., family members, health providers, welfare, school, or judiciary systems) may be particularly challenging. Unlike other emerging chronic psychiatric disorders (such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia) there are few validated therapeutic interventions dedicated to adolescents with borderline personality disorders. Conducting research programs to increase our knowledge of this disorder is an essential step before promoting such interventions.
Many questions remain to be answered in adolescents with borderline personality disorders, starting from both risk and protective factors involved in the onset and course of the disorder. Investigations of adolescents with borderline personality disorders should integrate a developmental framework and include a better understanding of key aspects of normal adolescent socio-emotional development (such as emotion regulation, identity shaping, interpersonal skills). Future research should better understand the interplay between temperamental, adverse childhood experiences and attachment issues driving the course of the disorder and its transgenerational transmission. In line with this, more should be done to understand the continuity between borderline personality disorder in adolescents and childhood-onset psychiatric/developmental disorders. The impact of borderline personality traits on the usual care of adolescents with psychiatric disorders (e.g., depressive, eating or psychosomatic disorders) but also chronic somatic conditions are also worth studying. Finally, a better understanding of the specific needs of patients and their families is essential to develop effective interventions for this specific group.
Authors are welcome to submit contributions to advance the general knowledge of borderline personality disorders in adolescence. The following themes will be of special interest for this Research Topic:
• Natural course of the disorder; association with childhood-onset psychiatric disorders and developmental impairments
• Cognitive, physiological and circadian impairments
• Trajectories in health care system: determinants factors for delay, discontinuity and poor compliance in care provided.
• Innovative organizational interventions
• Individual and/or group psychotherapies and family-focused interventions
• Preventive programs
• Pharmacological treatments
Adolescents with a borderline personality disorder (BPD) represent a major public health issue, going well beyond the well-known risk of suicidal behaviors and non-suicidal self-injuries. Poor physical health also results from the constellation of risky behaviors that emerge at adolescence and difficulties to build a trusted care relationship (with delay/discontinuity in care and poor compliance). Providing continuous care that integrates all the different actors involved in the adolescent’s life (e.g., family members, health providers, welfare, school, or judiciary systems) may be particularly challenging. Unlike other emerging chronic psychiatric disorders (such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia) there are few validated therapeutic interventions dedicated to adolescents with borderline personality disorders. Conducting research programs to increase our knowledge of this disorder is an essential step before promoting such interventions.
Many questions remain to be answered in adolescents with borderline personality disorders, starting from both risk and protective factors involved in the onset and course of the disorder. Investigations of adolescents with borderline personality disorders should integrate a developmental framework and include a better understanding of key aspects of normal adolescent socio-emotional development (such as emotion regulation, identity shaping, interpersonal skills). Future research should better understand the interplay between temperamental, adverse childhood experiences and attachment issues driving the course of the disorder and its transgenerational transmission. In line with this, more should be done to understand the continuity between borderline personality disorder in adolescents and childhood-onset psychiatric/developmental disorders. The impact of borderline personality traits on the usual care of adolescents with psychiatric disorders (e.g., depressive, eating or psychosomatic disorders) but also chronic somatic conditions are also worth studying. Finally, a better understanding of the specific needs of patients and their families is essential to develop effective interventions for this specific group.
Authors are welcome to submit contributions to advance the general knowledge of borderline personality disorders in adolescence. The following themes will be of special interest for this Research Topic:
• Natural course of the disorder; association with childhood-onset psychiatric disorders and developmental impairments
• Cognitive, physiological and circadian impairments
• Trajectories in health care system: determinants factors for delay, discontinuity and poor compliance in care provided.
• Innovative organizational interventions
• Individual and/or group psychotherapies and family-focused interventions
• Preventive programs
• Pharmacological treatments
Keywords: Borderline Personality Disorder, Adolescent, BPD
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
