a comparison of problem solving, working memory, and selective attention executive functions in patients with bipolar ii disorder, borderline personality disorder, and non-clinical samples

Introduction: the distinction between bipolar ii disorder (bd-ii) and borderline personality disorder (bpd) due to symptom overlap has always been a challenging issue among psychiatrists. in the present study, problem-solving functions, working memory and selective attention were compared in bd-ii patients, bpd and non-clinical samples to distinguish the two disorders. method: for this purpose, 30 bd-ii patients, 30 bpd and 30 non-clinical sample were selected by convenience sampling method. they were evaluated using executive function (efs) tests. data were analyzed using analysis of variance and tukey's post hoc test. results: except for selective attention, which was not significantly different in bd-ii patients compared to the non-clinical group (p>0/05); bd-ii patients and bpd in all efs had significantly lower performance than the non-clinical group (p<0/01, p<0/05). problem solving ability was significantly lower in bd-ii patients than in bpd patients (p<0/05). there was no significant difference between the two patient groups in working memory and selective attention (p>0/05). conclusion: these findings, provides evidence of differences in some of the efs in bd-ii patients and bpd; which may be related to different impulsivity in these two disorders. therefore, conducting research in other dimensions of efs is recommended to distinguish between these two disorders.