Effects of Motive-Oriented Therapeutic Relationship in the Early-Phase Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder

The present research aims at examining the effectiveness of a specific set of therapist relational interventions and attitudes, called the Motive-Oriented Therapeutic Relationship (MOTR), based on Plan Analysis (Caspar, 2007) in the early-phase treatment of patients diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder.

The investigators intend to include N = 80 outpatients diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, consulting at the Outpatient Personality Disorder Program of the Karl Jaspers Clinical Unit, in collaboration with the Institute of Psychotherapy, at the Department of Psychiatry-CHUV, University of Lausanne and in collaboration with the University of Berne, Switzerland. Patients are assigned by chance to two treatment conditions 1) Control condition (General Psychiatric Management; Gunderson & Links, 2008) and 2) MOTR-condition. The investigators hypothesize better results in the MOTR-condition, as compared to the control condition in terms of symptom reduction pre-post.

The conduct of the study represents a significant contribution to the understanding and enhancement of relationship aspects in the treatment of patients diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder which may be of potential benefit for these patients.