Avoidant personality disorder (APD) and borderline personality disorder (BPD) are the most frequent personality disorders (PDs) in clinical practice. Although BPD research dominates the field, both PDs are clearly associated with severe functional impairments and substantial treatment challenges. Few have investigated the relationship between core personality vulnerabilities across PDs. However, such research has high clinical relevance, could expand our understanding of the distinct nature of the disorders, and thus have important therapeutic implications. Central PD vulnerabilities have been conceptualized in two, possibly overlapping, constructs: mentalization and affect consciousness (AC). The interrelationship between mentalizing and AC and PD specific differences are, as yet, not well established. The present study investigated the relationship between mentalizing capacity and AC among 73 treatment-seeking patients with APD and/or BPD, 81% females. Mentalization was measured by assessment of reflective functioning (RF) from transcripts of the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). AC was measured by using the Affect Consciousness Interview (ACI). In this mixed PD sample, the RF and AC scores indicated poor functioning and correlations between RF and AC were low to moderately positive. In the PD-specific subgroups, correlations between RF and AC were positive (moderate to high) in the APD group (n = 26), but insignificant in the BPD group (n = 33). In conclusion, the positive relationship between RF and AC may not be generalized to all types of psychopathology. Our results indicate a strong relationship between impaired AC and poor mentalizing capacities among APD patients in particular.

中文翻译：

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回避型和边缘型人格障碍患者的反射功能与影响意识之间的关系。

回避型人格障碍（APD）和边缘型人格障碍（BPD）是临床实践中最常见的人格障碍（PD）。尽管 BPD 研究在该领域占据主导地位，但这两种 PD 显然都与严重的功能障碍和巨大的治疗挑战有关。很少有人调查过 PD 中核心人格脆弱性之间的关系。然而，此类研究具有高度的临床相关性，可以扩大我们对疾病不同性质的理解，因此具有重要的治疗意义。中央 PD 脆弱性已被概念化为两个可能重叠的结构：心智化和影响意识 (AC)。心理化与 AC 和 PD 特定差异之间的相互关系尚未完全确定。本研究调查了 73 名 APD 和/或 BPD 寻求治疗的患者（81% 为女性）的心理化能力与 AC 之间的关系。通过评估成人依恋访谈 (AAI) 记录的反思功能 (RF) 来衡量心理化。AC 是通过使用影响意识访谈 (ACI) 来测量的。在这个混合的 PD 样本中，RF 和 AC 分数表明功能较差，RF 和 AC 之间的相关性为低到中度正相关。在 PD 特定亚组中，RF 和 AC 之间的相关性在 APD 组（n = 26）中呈正相关（中到高），但在 BPD 组（n = 33）中不显着。总之，RF 和 AC 之间的正相关关系可能不会推广到所有类型的精神病理学。