Running head: EXPLORATION OF A PROFESSIONAL JOURNAL ARTICLE IN PSYCHOLOGY

Exploration of a Professional Journal Article in Psychology Bradley Wallace PSY100028VA016-1134-001/Psychology of Adjustment Dr. Guy Vitaglione Strayer University May 12, 2013

Exploration of Journal Article

The article chosen for this assignment was from the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry in 2005. This article is a research article on borderline personality in teenagers and if the gender of the teen makes a difference. This article gives a brief description on the background, the methods used for the research, the results of the research as well as the conclusions. This article states that other research has been done on this topic, however, the research rarely uses Axis II diagnoses in the teens (Bradley, Zittel, & Weten, 2005). The method of research used in the article, the authors collected information from a big random mix of experienced clinicians in North America. They asked the clinicians to randomly select one of their patients who have recently had mild to severe of any kind of long lasting maladaptive personality patterns regardless of any other criteria. Out of 294 patients 28.4% of those patients were diagnosed with an Axis II disorder (Bradley, Zittel, & Weten, 2005). The clinicians were given a checklist of things to look for and rate each item, as well as if it were present or not as it pertained to their client. The researchers then used DSM-IV decision rules to make their diagnosis. For statistical analysis they created a combined account of all the teens in the sample meeting DM-IV rules for borderline personality disorder from the Axis II criteria. The information was then rearranged in descending order of prominence to center on the subjects with the highest rankings. And the same was done for boys. The researchers also used an empirical clustering technique to find naturally occurring groupings of subjects who met the criteria for DSM-IV for borderline personality disorder (Bradley, Zittel, & Weten, 2005).

Exploration of Journal Article In reading this article, its a rather confusing task if you are not part of the field. The research is specific to the borderline personality disorders and other similar issues. This article talks about the criteria used and specific scales used to measure and determine who does and does not have borderline personality disorder or other disorders similar. The research that was completed for this article led to three major findings. The first finding was that borderline personality disorder diagnosis does seem to be relevant to teenagers and gives a combined picture, prominently in females. The second finding was the expression of borderline personality disorder in males and females. The females with borderline personality disorder expressed their symptoms by being emotionally dramatic and by internalizing their emotions. The males on the other hand showed their symptoms more behaviorally than emotionally. The third finding was that borderline personality disorder is mixed among the sexes (Bradley, Zittel, & Weten, 2005). This article focused on borderline personality disorder which is a personality disorder that has mostly unstable and turbulent emotions, elevated anger, and fears of being left alone. A person with borderline personality disorder finds it hard to cope with the world around them. Borderline personality disorder is somewhere between depression and bipolar disorder. This is a mood disorder with how a person interacts with other people. This article falls very well into the psychological field as it deals with the emotions and mental state of patients. Borderline personality disorder is in the text book under personality disorders in Chapter 14: Psychological Disorders (Santrock, 2006). This article is different from similar articles in non-scholarly magazines and newspapers because this article is a lot longer than something typically seen in a nonscholarly magazine. The author(s) of such articles in scholarly sources are generally

Exploration of Journal Article experts in the field in which they are writing about. Scholarly articles typically are reviewed, critiqued and evaluated before its published. The scholarly articles are always properly cited throughout the work. The language in scholarly articles are typically language that those in the particular field would understand and not for the everyday person to fully understand or comprehend. Non-scholarly works are usually shorter articles with a writer who is a journalist. The non-scholarly article is written in terms that every day people can read, understand and comprehend and do not generally follow a specific format. These articles are only reviewed by an editor before being published for the general public. This typically makes it much easier to determine if an article is scholarly or non-scholarly.

Exploration of Journal Article References: Bradley, R., Zittel Conklin, C., & Westen, D. (2005). The borderline personality diagnosis in adolescents: gender differences and subtypes. Journal Of Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 46(9), 1006-1019. doi:10.1111/j.14697610.2004.00401.x Santrock, J. (2006). Human adjustment: 2007 custom edition. Boston, MA: McGrawHill.