Papers by Elsa Ronningstam
Suicide and Life Threatening Behavior, Dec 1, 2016
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
For clinicians, the assiduous and sustained resistance to change common in patients with narcissi... more For clinicians, the assiduous and sustained resistance to change common in patients with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) has been especially noticeable and trying. However, until recently the natural course of NPD has not received much attention in the clinical and empirical literature, and there is very little documented knowledge about the factors that might contribute to changes.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders
Change in treatment of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) has been considered difficult to a... more Change in treatment of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) has been considered difficult to attain. Aspects of narcissistic pathology, including interpersonal enhancement, avoidance, aggressivity, and control, have contributed to challenges in forming a therapeutic alliance and pursuing treatment towards attainable goals for change and remission. This study, based on a qualitative review of therapists’ case reports of individual psychotherapy with eight patients diagnosed with NPD, is the first to identify and explore patterns, processes, and indicators of change in pathological narcissism. All patients showed significant improvement in personality and life functioning, including engagement in work or education and long-term close relationships, with remission of the NPD diagnosis. The process of change was gradual, with some noticeable changes occurring in specific life contexts. Additional factors indicating and contributing to change included patients’ motivation and commitme...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Clinical Forensic Psychology, 2022
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Disorders, 2020
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Practice Innovations, 2021
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021
Background: Clinical and empirical research evidenced a complex link between pathological narciss... more Background: Clinical and empirical research evidenced a complex link between pathological narcissism and the suicidal process in adulthood. Given the relevance of suicidality and the peculiar narcissistic vicissitudes of adolescence, the proposed research investigated the relationship between pathological narcissism analyzed from the multi-dimensional perspective of the Diagnostic Interview for Narcissism (DIN) and suicidal ideation conducted in a sample of Italian Adolescents. Methods: One hundred and three Italian male and female adolescents between 12 and 18 were administered the DIN, SCIDII, CSSRS, and Kiddie-SADS with six months follow-up. Results: The correlation, t-test, multiple regression analyses evidenced the association of narcissistic affective states and mood with both suicidal ideation and lethality of conduct. The increase in the dimension of grandiosity is associated with the passage to potentially highly lethal suicidal gestures. Conclusions: Suicidal ideation and ...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders, 2021
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Frontiers in Psychiatry, 2021
Introduction:Suicide is the outcome of a process starting with the experiences of an unbearable p... more Introduction:Suicide is the outcome of a process starting with the experiences of an unbearable pain or hopelessness, passing from suicidal ideation and planning, to possible para-suicidal behaviors or actual attempts. Recent studies have evidenced the necessity to integrate approaches based on the identification of psychopathological diagnoses and other variables as possible predictors of suicidal conduct with a more clinically based approach. A clinical assessment is needed that focuses on the patients' mental state with respect to thoughts concerning death and suicide. In particular, a qualitative assessment of motivations underlying the suicidal process could represent an effective guide for clinicians engaged in the difficult field of preventing adolescents' suicidal gestures. Most instruments investigating the suicidal motivation are self-report measures, possibly resulting in a lack of sufficiently valid assessment of this area. In the present work, we present the Mot...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders, 2020
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Psychodynamic Psychiatry, 2018
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders, 2001
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders, 2020
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of Personality Disorders, 2011
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 2019
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association
Psychodynamic psychotherapy has an important role in suicide prevention. The psychoanalytic study... more Psychodynamic psychotherapy has an important role in suicide prevention. The psychoanalytic study of suicide has taught us a great deal about the human experience and the process of suicidality. There is also much to be learned from other fields of study and from empirical research that can be integrated into psychoanalytic therapies. Central to the psychoanalytic approach to suicide has been understanding the patient’s internal subjective experience of unbearable emotional or psychic pain and the urgent need for relief. Emotional pain can include intense affects such as shame, humiliation, self-hate, and rage. Factors that can increase vulnerability to suicidal states include problems with early attunement, dissociation and deficits in bodily love and protection, conscious and unconscious fantasy, and certain character traits and dynamics. Empirical research has confirmed many basic psychoanalytic concepts about suicide, including escape from unbearable pain as the primary driver o...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Scandinavian Psychoanalytic Review, 2020
ABSTRACT When a patient dies by suicide while in treatment, there are a wide range of reactions f... more ABSTRACT When a patient dies by suicide while in treatment, there are a wide range of reactions from therapists involved in the patient’s treatment. Intrapsychic, interpersonal and systemic responses sustain or impair the bereavement process. At times this loss can be experienced traumatically such that it interferes with the therapist’s grieving process and undermines their capacity to mourn and grow. In this paper we discuss the therapist’s experience of the patient’s suicide as a traumatic loss that challenges the coping defenses and affects bereavement and growth.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, 2018
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Medicina, 2019
Psychotherapy with suicidal patients is inherently challenging. Psychodynamic psychotherapy focus... more Psychotherapy with suicidal patients is inherently challenging. Psychodynamic psychotherapy focuses attention on the patient’s internal experience through the creation of a therapeutic space for an open-ended exploration of thoughts, fears, and fantasies as they emerge through interactive dialogue with an empathic therapist. The Boston Suicide Study Group (M.S., M.J.G., E.R., B.H.), has developed an integrative psychodynamic approach to psychotherapy with suicidal patients based on the authors’ extensive clinical work with suicidal patients (over 100 years combined). It is fundamentally psychodynamic in nature, with an emphasis on the therapeutic alliance, unconscious and implicit relational processes, and the power of the therapeutic relationship to facilitate change in a long-term exploratory treatment. It is also integrative, however, drawing extensively on ideas and techniques described in Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Mentalization Based Treatment (MBT), Cognitive-Behav...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Papers by Elsa Ronningstam