Dialectical Behavior Therapy and the Treatment of Emotion Dysregulation

Shelley McMain and Lorne M. Korman
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
and the University of Toronto
Linda Dimeff
University of Washington
and the Behavioral Technology Group

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a disorder characterized by severe
disturbances in emotion regulation. In Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT),
affect dysregulation is seen as a consequence of a transaction between a biological predisposition to emotion vulnerability and invalidating environmental experiences. In the past few years, a growing body of research has accumulated demonstrating the efficacy of DBT in treating severely disordered, chronically suicidal, and substance-dependent individuals with BPD. This article describes a DBT approach to the treatment of emotion regulation in individuals with BPD. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Clin
Psychol/In Session 57: 183–196, 2001.
Keywords: borderline personality disorder; emotion dysregulation; Dialectical
Behavior Therapy; affect regulation
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