Cognitive and Affective Representations of People and MCMI--II Personality Psychopathology

Abstract

Hibbard, Hilsenroth, Hibbard, and Wash (1995) found that affective, but not cognitive, dimensions of object representations were related to the severity of psychopathology among outpatients. In this study, the Social Cognition and Object Relations Scale (Westen, Barends, Leigh, Mendel, & Silbert, 1990) developed for interview data (Relationship Episodes; Luborsky,l990) was used to assess the object representations of 33 men and 38 women entering psychotherapy. The Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II was used to assess the personality traits of the 71 participants. The results support earlier findings that only affective dimensions of object representations are related to outpatient personality pathology.