Comparison of different strategies to decrease negative affect and increase positive affect in women with borderline personality disorder

Background: In this study we compared the effect of different emotion regulation strategies on positive and negative emotions in patients with borderline personality disorder.

Methods: Emotion regulation strategies were a distracting task, individual positive memory imagery, individual soothing imagery, and a neutral comparison condition. During two separate sessions, 17 participants watched either neutral or negative movie segments before using these strategies.

Results: All three strategies influenced emotions into a favorable direction as compared to the neutral comparison condition. The positive memory image increased positive emotions significantly stronger than counting colors and distracting.

Discussion: Different strategies seem to have similar effects in decreasing negative emotions. Positive emotions may be affected in particular by positive and soothing imagery techniques.