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Forgiveness in the Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder: A Quasi‐Experimental Study
Author(s) -
Sandage Steven J.,
Long Beverly,
Moen Richelle,
Jankowski Peter J.,
Worthington Everett L.,
Wade Nathaniel G.,
Rye Mark S.
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
journal of clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.124
H-Index - 119
eISSN - 1097-4679
pISSN - 0021-9762
DOI - 10.1002/jclp.22185
Subject(s) - forgiveness , psychology , borderline personality disorder , dialectical behavior therapy , clinical psychology , randomized controlled trial , distress , psychological intervention , personality , trait , psychiatry , psychotherapist , medicine , social psychology , computer science , programming language
Objective This pilot study evaluated a manualized group forgiveness module within dialectical behavior therapy (DBT). Method The study utilized a quasi‐experimental double pretest design with adults (N = 40; 88.1% female, 11.9% male) diagnosed with borderline personality disorder in outpatient DBT. Measures of forgiveness, attachment, and psychiatric symptoms were completed at 4 time points. Results Participants showed increases in all measures of forgiveness and decreases in attachment insecurity and psychiatric symptoms during the forgiveness module and maintained to the 6‐week follow‐up. These effects were not observed during the prior distress tolerance module. Latent change score modeling showed reductions in anxious attachment mediated the effect of changes in benevolent motivations to forgive and trait forgiveness scores on reductions in psychiatric symptoms. Conclusions Effect sizes were similar to meta‐analytic findings on (a) forgiveness interventions and (b) reductions in psychiatric symptoms in DBT. Participant feedback suggested elements for further development. A randomized controlled trial is needed.