Social cognition impairment associated to a borderline personality disorder subtype linked to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

INTRODUCTION

Social cognition (SC) impairment in patients with BPD could be increased by comorbidity with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Comorbidity in neurodevelopmental disorders and its influence on SC impairments could result in greater severity, worse response to treatment and worse evolution of the disorder. The aim of this work is to study SC deficits, through Theory of Mind (ToM) errors associated with BPD linked to ADHD.

METHODS

87 BPD patients with and without ADHD associated were assessed with the Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC). Statistical associations between. MASC and ADHD symptomatology was analyzed.

RESULTS

BPD patients with ADHD showed fewer correct mentalization responses and more overmentalization errors than BPD patients without ADHD. A direct and significant statistical relationship between undermentalization errors and childhood inattention were found.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results showed a complete picture of the SC errors observed in this subgroup of BPD patients with ADHD symptomatology, with both overmentalization and undermentalization errors observed. The fact that this subgroup of BPD patients, related to neurodevelopmental disorders, showed different types of ToM errors reflects the complexity and heterogeneity that may characterize this subgroup of patients. This highlights the importance and effort of this work to improve the phenotyping of this subgroup of patients with BPD linked to ADHD, improving early diagnosis and individualized treatment for these patient profiles.