Personality Disorders

This edited, multi-authored text brings together all that is known about Systems Training for Emotional Predictability and Problem Solving (STEPPS), a group treatment program for outpatients with borderline personality disorder. The book describes the program, the evidence that is supportive of STEPPS, and its implementation in a variety of settings and countries. Created at the University of Iowa in 1995, STEPPS combines cognitive-behavioral therapy, skills training, and psychoeducation with a systems component for family, friends, and significant others. The 5-month-long program is easily learned and delivered by therapists from a wide range of theoretical orientations. Data show that STEPPS is effective and produces clinically important improvement. The program is well accepted by patients and therapists. STEPPS is listed in the US Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA) National Registry of Evidence-based Practices (NREPP). The program is embraced by the health care systems in the United Kingdom and The Netherlands and is used in correctional settings.Less

Personality pathology—which is characterized by a pervasive, maladaptive, and inflexible pattern of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors—has long been defined as a set of categories that are distinct from each other a “normal” personality. Research over the past three decades has challenged that assumed separation and instead suggested that abnormal personality is merely a maladaptive extension of the same features that describe the personality of all humans. This volume surveys cutting-edge research on the science of basic personality and demonstrates the application of these ideas and methods to conceptualizing pathology. It first provides a historical overview as well as the present state of the personality disorder literature. Ensuing chapters then highlight critical issues in the assessment and conceptualization of personality, its development across the life course, and biological underpinnings. In this way the chapters are inherently useful as a primer of the present knowledge concerning the basic science of personality from specific genes to complex social interactions. Furthermore, each chapter aims toward not only elucidating current understandings of personality but demonstrating its direct application to clinical diagnosis and conceptualization.Less