Autobiographical Memory Specificity and Non-Suicidal

Self-Injury in Borderline Personality Disorder

Kris Van den Broeck1,2, Laurence Claes2, Guido Pieters1,2, Ann Berens3, & Filip

Raes2

1UPC KU Leuven; 2University of Leuven; 3PZ Duffel

Grant 1900114N

Overgeneral memory (OGM)• Autobiographical Memory Task (Williams & Broadbent, 1986)

o Happy – ‘that one time, when I broke my racquet in that thrilling tiebreak against my brother’

• Patients with MDD/PTSD:o Happy – ‘each time I play tennis’

• Affect-regulation strategy?

• Memory Specificity Training (MeST; Raes et al., 2009)

• Mixed findings in BPD

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI)• “Any socially unaccepted behaviour

including deliberate and direct injury to one’s own body surface without suicidal intent” (APA, 1994).

• NSSI frequency vs NSSI diversity

• Core affect-regulation strategy of BPD patients? (89% engaged in NSSI; 70% multiple methods; Zanarini et al., 2008)

Startup et al. (2001)• Hypothesis: OGM and parasuicidal gestures

(PS ! >< NSSI) are positively related.

• OGM and PS frequency were negatively related, r = -.47, p < .05.

• Not replicated by Renneberg et al. (2005); Maurex et al. (2010)

Our study• Aim: examining the association between assumed

affect-regulation strategies

• Hypothesis:o Based on Startup et al. (2001): BPD patients not

engaged in NSSI will show more OGMo Alternatively, given that OGM and NSSI are both

associated with (avoidant) affect-regulation, OGM and NSSI may also be positively related.

• Exploratory: how does NSSI diversity relate to OGM?

Methods

Participants

• N = 53 (8 males)• 18-51 years of age

(M = 29.47; SD = 8.45)

• From UPC KU Leuven (77.36%) and PZ Duffel (22.64%)

Instruments

• SCID-II• Autobiographical

Memory Test (AMT)• Self-Injury

Questionnaire – Treatment Related(SIQ-TR)

Results

  Lifetime NSSI (n = 44)

No lifetime NSSI (n =

9)F p

N specific memories 14.73 14.44 .103 .749N categoric memories .84 1.33 1.402 .242

The mean numbers of specific and categoric memories retrieved by participants who reported lifetime NSSI compared to those who did not.

Note. NSSI = non-suicidal self-injury; N = number of [specific/categoric] memories.

Results

  2 3 41. Age -.37** .35* -.42**2. S - -.73** .26$

3. GC -.55** - -.34*4. N# NSSIs-LT .10 -.28 -

Correlations between age, the number of specific and general categoric memories, and the number of different lifetime NSSI methods. Correlations below the diagonal are controlled for age.

Note. NSSI = non-suicidal self-injury; S = number of specific memories retrieved during Autobiographical Memory Test administration; GC = number of general categoric memories retrieved; N# NSSIs-LT = number of different NSSI methods used during lifetime.$ p = .06, * p < .05, ** p < .01.

Discussion• Frequency of NSSI is not associated with

OGM (no replication of Startup et al., 2002).

• Yet, NSSI diversity is negatively correlated with OGM balance-model: behavioural vs cognitive coping? therapeutical implications: treating one affects the other!

Discussion• Older patients show less (lifetime!) NSSI diversity and are

less specific.o With respect to OGM: replicationo With respect to NSSI diversity:

• Increasing OGM affects memory for NSSI diversity?• Selection bias?• Mortality effect?• Cohort effect?

• The association between NSSI diversity and OGM disappears when age is partialled out.o Spurious correlationo BPD patients develop cognitive coping skills when

growing older (by therapy?)

Results

  M SD RangeN / % specific memories 14.68/ .87 2.38/ .13 7 – 18

N / % general categorical memories

.92/ .05 1.14/ .07 0 – 6

N / % general extended memories

.42/ .02 .77/ .04 0 – 4

N / % no memory retrievals .49/ .03 .93/ .06 0 – 3

N / % same event retrievals .40/ .02 .63/ .04 0 – 2

N omissions 1.09 1.30 0 – 6Note. N = number of [type of answers on the Autobiographical Memory Test]; % = proportion of [type of answers on the Autobiographical Memory Test]. In computing %, we do not take into account omissions, e.g., % specific memories is = N specific memories / (18 – N omissions), with 18 being the total number of cues of the Autobiographical Memory Test.

Descriptive statistics of the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT).

Results

  Recent

(during the last month)

Lifetime

Prevalence

N / % Scratching 13 / 24.5 30 / 56.6N / % Bruising 9 / 17.0 23 / 43.4N / % Cutting 17 / 32.1 39 / 73.6N / % Burning 3 / 5.7 15 / 28.3N / % Biting 4 / 7.5 13 / 24.5N / % Total NSSI 28 / 52.8 44 / 83.00 25 / 47.2 9 / 17.01 16 / 30.2 11 / 20.82 8 / 15.1 11 / 20.83 2 / 3.8 8 / 15.14 2 / 3.8 7 / 13.25 - 7 / 13.2

Frequencies and percentages of recent and lifetime NSSI in our sample, arranged by different NSSI methods, and by the number of different NSSI methods that were used during the period of interest, as measured by the Self-Injury Questionnaire – Treatment Related (SIQ-TR).