Prototypic typology and the borderline personality disorder.

New York Hospital—Cornell Medical CenterNew York, New YorkBased on interview data from 76 outpatients, the implications of a prototypicrather than a classical model of personality-disorder classification were demon-strated for DSM-III (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 3rded.) Axis II Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). Heterogeneity of membershipis described, and conditional probabilities are used to demonstrate the relativeefficiency of single diagnostic criteria and combinations of criteria and the degreeof overlap among BPD and other personality disorders. The conditional proba-bility approach can be used to determine empirically the covariation of symptomsand to link the study of prototypicality to the individual patient rather than tothe group.

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