Comparing the effectiveness of schema therapy and dialectical behavior therapy on cognitive emotion regulation in patients with borderline personality disorder.

Abstract

The present study aimed to compare the effectiveness of dialectical behavior therapy and schema therapy on cognitive emotion regulation in patients with borderline personality disorder. This study was conducted in terms of methodology as a quasi-experimental study with a pre-test-post-test design with parallel groups. The statistical population of the study included all patients with borderline personality disorder referring to clinics, psychiatric hospitals, and psychological and treatment centers in Tehran in the years 1403 to 1404. The study sample included 45 of these patients who were selected through purposive non-random sampling and then randomly assigned to three groups of 15 (two experimental groups and one control group). The first experimental group underwent 16 60-minute group schema therapy intervention sessions and the second experimental group underwent 16 60-minute dialectical behavior therapy intervention sessions, while the control group did not receive any therapeutic intervention during the study period. Data collection tools included the Structured Clinical Interview for Personality Disorders, Borderline Personality Inventory, and the Garnevsky and Kraij (2006) Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. The data obtained were analyzed using repeated measures analysis of variance. The results showed that there was a significant difference between the effectiveness of dialectical behavior therapy and schema therapy on cognitive emotion regulation in patients with borderline personality disorder, and schema therapy was a more effective method for reducing cognitive emotion regulation in patients with borderline personality disorder compared to dialectical behavior therapy. Accordingly, it can be concluded that schema therapy is more effective in improving cognitive emotion regulation in patients with borderline personality disorder compared to dialectical behavior therapy and can be considered as an efficient intervention in improving cognitive emotion regulation in these patients.