Shirley Yen's research focuses on identifying predictors of suicidal behavior in adolescents. She is particularly interested in examining how emotion dysregulation is associated with suicidal ideation and behaviors. She is also interested in whether borderline personality disorder (BPD) can be reliably diagnosed in adolescents.

Biography

Shirley Yen is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Brown University. She is a graduate of the University of Chicago (BA) and Duke University (PhD). She has a career development award to examine borderline PD traits and family environment among adolescent suicide attempters. In the preceding four years, she has served as project director/co-investigator at the Brown site of the Collaborative Longitudinal Personality Disorders Study, and has published several papers on predictors of suicidal behavior in a personality disorder sample. Prior to that, she has been involved in several studies involving BPD, including a pilot double-blind placebo study of combined DBT/fluoxetine, and a study of affect regulation in women with BPD.

Institutions

Bh

Research Description

Shirley Yen is currently supported by a Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award (K-23) application to further her development as an independent research scientist with a programmatic line of research that examines the phenomenology of suicidal behaviors. Borderline personality disorder (BPD) represents a significant risk factor for repeat suicide attempts and suicide deaths, yet there has been no prospective study of BPD among adolescent suicide attempters. Her research seeks to examine the associations between affective traits consistent with BPD, family functioning, and adolescent suicidality.

Shirley Yen's study examinse a model, heavily influenced by Linehan's biosocial theory of BPD and by prominent developmental theories, in which the combination of individual dispositional factors (affective processing consistent with BPD) and environmental factors (invalidating family environment) is hypothesized to predict adolescent suicidal behavior (ideation and attempts). A naturalistic, descriptive, six-month follow-up study of 120 adolescents who had been hospitalized for suicidal behavior will be implemented to examine this model. Weekly or monthly ratings on key predictor and outcome variables will be obtained via four assessments over the six-month interval to allow for time-varying analyses. This study would address a significant gap in knowledge, as it would be the first prospective study to examine BPD traits as well as the first study to examine key predictor variables dynamically, in suicidal adolescents.

Awards

Phi Beta Kappa, University of Chicago, 1990
Graduate Fellowship, Duke University, 1992-1997
Predissertation Fellowship, International Social Science Research Council, 1996-1997
Graduate Student Fellow, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, People's Republic of China, 1996-1997.
Young Investigator's Award, Association for Clinical Psychosocial Research, 2001

Affiliations

American Psychological Association (APA)
International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders

Funded Research

Current PI:
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH); Dispositional Affect, Family Environment and Adolescent Suicidality; $794,899 direct; 5/05.

Current Co-I:
NIMH: Collaborative Longitudinal Study of Personality Disorders; $944,564 direct; 5/05.

NIMH: Emotional Processing in Borderline Personality Disorder; $154,593 direct Brown; 6/04

Past PI:
Social Science Research Council; A cross-cultural comparison of depressive symptom manifestation; approx $25,000; 6/95.

Executive Committee on Research, Brown University; Emotional experiencing in women with borderline personality disorder; $15,000; 1999.

Selected Publications

• Yen, S., McDevitt-Murphy, M.E., Shea, M. (in press). Depression and personality. In: Stein, D.J. Kupfer, D.J., Schatzberg, A.F. eds. The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Mood Disorders. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Publishing Inc.(IN PRESS)
• Shea, M.T., & Yen, S. (in press). Models of relationship between personality dimensions, disorders and depression. In: Kennedy, S., Rosenbluth, M., Bagby, M.R., eds. Personality Disorders and Depression. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Publishing Inc.(IN PRESS)
• Yen, S., Pagano, M.E., Shea, M.T., et al. (2005) Recent life events preceding suicide attempts in a personality disorder sample: Findings from the Collaborative Longitudinal Personality Disorders Study. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 73, 99-105.(2005)
• Yen, S., Shea, M.T., Sanislow, C.A., et al. (2004) Borderline personality disorder criteria associated with prospectively observed suicidal behavior. American Journal of Psychiatry, 161, 1296-1298.(2004)
• Simpson, E., Yen, S., Costello, E., et al. (2004). Combined Dialectical Behavior Therapy and Fluoxetine pharmacotherapy in patients with Borderline Personality Disorder: Is there an additive effect? Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 65, 379-385.(2004)
• Shea, M.T., Stout, R.L., Yen, S., et al. (2004) Associations in the course of personality disorders and Axis I disorders over time. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 113, 499-508.(2004)
• Shea, M.T., & Yen, S. (2003). Stability as a distinction between Axis I and II disorders. Journal of Personality Disorders, 17, 373-386.(2003)
• Rettew, D.C., Zanarini, M.C., Yen, S., et al. (2003). Childhood antecedents of avoidant personality disorder: A retrospective study. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 42, 1122-1130.(2003)
• Zlotnick, C., Johnson, D., Yen, S., et al. (2003). Clinical features and impairment in women with borderline personality disorder (BPD) with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), BPD without PTSD, and other personality disorders with PTSD. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 191, 706-713.(2003)
• Yen, S., Shea, M.T., Pagano, M., et al. (2003). Axis I/II disorders as predictors of prospective suicide attempts: Findings from the Collaborative Longitudinal Study of Personality Disorders. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 112, 375-381.(2003)
• Johnson, D.M., Shea, M.T., Yen, S., et al. (2003). Gender differences in borderline personality disorder: Findings from the Collaborative Longitudinal Personality Disorders Study. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 44, 284-292.(2003)
• Yen, S., & Siegler, I.C. (2003). Self-blame, social introversion, and male suicides: Prospective data from a longitudinal study. Archives of Suicide Research, 7, 17-27.(2003)
• Phillips, K.A., Yen, S., & Gunderson, J.G. (2002). Personality disorders. In: Hales R.E.,Yudofsky S.C., eds. The American Psychiatric Press Textbook of Psychiatry, Fourth Edition. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press Inc, pp. 803-832.(2002)
• Yen, S., Zlotnick, C., & Costello, E. (2002). Affect regulation in women with borderline personality disorder traits. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 190, 693-696.(2002)
• Yen, S., Shea, M.T., Battle, C., et al. (2002). Traumatic exposure and posttraumatic stress disorder in borderline, schizotypal, avoidant and obsessive-compulsive personality disorders: Findings from the Collaborative Longitudinal Personality Disorders Study. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 190, 510-518.(2002)
• Yen, S., & Shea, M.T. (2001). Recent developments in research of trauma and personality disorders. Current Psychiatry Reports, 3, 52-58.(2001)
• Yen, S., Robins, C.J., & Lin, N. (2000). A cross-cultural comparison of depressive symptom manifestation: China and the United States. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 68, 993-999.(2000)