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Though social factors may not be direct causes of BPD (or other forms of mental illness), they are, at the least, important indirect influences. Social factors interact with BPD in several ways and cannot be overlooked. First, if borderline pathology originates early in life—and much of the evidence points in this direction—an increase in the pathology is likely tied to the changing social patterns of family structure and parent-child interaction. In this regard, it is worthwhile to examine social changes in the area of child-raising patterns, stability of home life, and child abuse and neglect.

Second, social changes of a more general nature have an exacerbative effect on people already suffering from the borderline syndrome. The lack of structure in American society, for example, is especially difficult for borderlines to handle, since they typically have immense problems creating structure for themselves. Women’s shifting role patterns (career versus homemaker, for example) tend to aggravate identity problems. Indeed, some researchers attribute the prominence of BPD among women to this social role conflict, now so widespread in our society. The increased severity of BPD in these cases may, in turn, be transmitted to future generations through parent-child interactions, multiplying the effects over time.

Third, the growing recognition of personality disorders in general, and borderline personality more specifically, may be seen as a natural and inevitable response to—or an expression of—our contemporary culture. As Christopher Lasch noted in The Culture of Narcissism,

Every society reproduces its culture—its norms, its underlying assumptions, its modes of organizing experience—in the individual, in the form of personality. As Durkheim said, personality is the individual socialized.1

For many, American culture has lost contact with the past and remains unconnected to the future. The flooding of technical advancement and information that swept over the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, much of it involving computers, PDAs, cell phones, and so on, often requires greater individual commitment to solitary study and practice, thus sacrificing opportunities for real social interaction. Indeed, the preoccupation—some would say obsession—with computers and other digital gadgetry, especially among the young in what is commonly called “social media” (Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube, etc.), may be resulting ironically in more self-absorption and less physical interaction; texting, blogging, posting, and tweeting all avoid eye contact. Increasing divorce rates, expanding use of day care, and greater geographical mobility have all contributed to a society that lacks constancy and reliability. Personal, intimate, lasting relationships become difficult or even impossible to achieve, and deep-seated loneliness, self-absorption, emptiness, anxiety, depression, and loss of self-esteem ensue.

The borderline syndrome represents a pathological response to these stresses. Without outside sources of stability and validation of worthiness, borderline symptoms of black-and-white thinking, self-destructiveness, extreme mood changes, impulsivity, poor relationships, impaired sense of identity, and anger become understandable reactions to our culture’s tensions. Borderline traits, which may be present to some extent in most people, are being elicited—perhaps even bred—on a wide scale by the prevailing social conditions. New York Times writer Louis Sass put it this way:

Each culture probably needs its own scapegoats as expressions of society’s ills. Just as the hysterics of Freud’s day exemplified the sexual repression of that era, the borderline, whose identity is split into many pieces, represents the fracturing of stable units in our society.2

Though conventional wisdom presumes that borderline pathology has increased over the last few decades, some psychiatrists believe that the symptoms were just as common early in the twentieth century. They claim