The impact of childhood traumas, depressive and anxiety symptoms on the relationship between borderline personality features and symptoms of adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in Turkish university students

Abstract

Background: Previous studies reported that there is a significant association between attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in childhood and borderline personality disorder (BPD) in adulthood.

Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship of borderline personality features (BPF) and ADHD symptoms while controlling the effect of childhood traumas, symptoms of depression and anxiety in adulthood on this relationship in Turkish university students.

Methods: A total of 271 Turkish university students participated in this study. The students were assessed through the Turkish version of the Borderline Personality Inventory (BPI), the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS), the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ-28), the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI).

Results: Correlation analyses have revealed that severity of BPF is related with adult ADHD symptoms, emotional, physical abuse and depression scores. Hierarchical regression analysis has indicated that depressive symptoms, emotional and physical abuse and the severity of ADHD symptoms are the predictors for severity of BPF.

Conclusions: Findings of the present study suggests that clinicians must carefully evaluate these variables and the relationship between them to understand BPF and ADHD symptoms in university students better. Together with depressive symptoms, emotional and physical abuse may play a mediator role on this relationship. Further studies are needed to evaluate causal relationship between these variables in both clinical and non-clinical populations.

Keywords: Adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder; Borderline personality features; Childhood traumas; University students.