Can Frontal Lobe Trauma Cause the BPD?

Written by Dr. Leland Heller

QUESTION:

Dr. Heller:

I have to thank you for having such a helpful and informative website. I do have one pressing question, though. I know a girl who told me that she was "thrown through a wall" when she was nine years old, causing skull fragments to damage her prefrontal cortex. She is asserting that this damage to the part of her brain that "controls emotion" has caused her to be a sociopath.

I know that the term sociopath is archaic and is now represented with Antisocial Personality Disorder. I am a psychology student and through my research she fits the criteria for Borderline Personality Disorder and NOT Antisocial. Could this damage to her prefrontal cortex have caused BPD? Or at least helped her become more susceptible to it? Thank you in advance for your response.

DR. HELLER'S ANSWER:

While frontal lobe damage may have contributed to her symptoms (particularly the severity), the force of the head injury could easily have caused damage elsewhere in the brain, in this case the limbic system. A very high percentage of those with BPD have had significant head injuries.

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