Comparison of neuropsychological deficits in individuals with borderline and narcissistic personality disorder symptoms and normal individuals

The Purpose of the research was to compare the neuropsychological deficits in individuals with borderline and narcissistic personality disorder symptoms and normal individuals.

The research design was causal-comparative. The sample of the study included 24 individual with borderline personality disorder symptoms and 22 individual with narcissistic personality disorder symptoms who through purposeful method were selected through patients who had referred to the Psychiatry clinic of Imam Khomeini Hospital and the Payvand counseling clinic in Songhor and were compared with 22 normal individual from the hospital and counseling center personnel. The dot-probe task, Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, Digit Span Task, Barratt Impulsiveness Scale, go/ no go test and Reading the Mind in the Eyes tests were used to collect data. Data were analyzed via using multivariate analysis of variance and Tukey post hoc test.

The results showed that there is a significant difference between the groups in the dependent variables. This means that individual with borderline and narcissistic personality disorder symptoms demonstrated more attention bias and impulsivity and impairment in theory of mind and executive functions compared to normal group. These deficits (except for working memory) were higher in individual with borderline personality disorder compared to individual with narcissistic personality syndrome.

Neuropsychological deficits in individuals with borderline and narcissistic personality disorder symptoms are more than normal individuals. Although, these deficits in individuals with borderline are more than individuals with narcissistic personality disorder symptoms.