Effects of Diagnostic Label Construction and Gender on Stigma About Borderline Personality Disorder

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is highly stigmatized. Although person-first labels are now used for most mental illnesses (e.g., a person with schizophrenia) rather than premodified noun labels (e.g., "he is a schizophrenic"), it is still common to hear people referred to as "borderlines." In a series of two experimental studies, we examined how diagnostic labels influence negative attitudes about BPD. In Study 1, we presented vignettes with no diagnostic label, a person-first label, or a premodified noun label and compared BPD vignettes to schizophrenia vignettes. In Study 2, we again examined the influence of diagnostic label on attitudes about BPD and manipulated the gender depicted in the BPD vignettes. In Study 1, negative attitudes related to anger and blame were greater for BPD than schizophrenia. Diagnosis and label construction did not interact. In Study 2, we found little evidence of gender effects, except that male 4 characters with BPD were considered more dangerous and evoked more fear, while female characters were viewed with greater pity. Gender and label construction did not interact. Although we expected that attitudes would be most negative in the premodified noun label condition and least negative in the person-first condition, this was not the case. In both Studies 1 and 2, the condition with no diagnostic label produced the greatest negative attitudes in some but not all stigma domains, while person-first and premodified noun labels did not differ. Results suggest that in some contexts, diagnostic labels reduce negative attitudes about BPD regardless of their specific construction.