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• Clinical Article •
Altered spontaneous brain activity in patients with borderline personality disorder: An activation likelihood estimation Meta-analysis of resting-state fMRI studies
SHU Yanping  ZHANG Qin  HOU Yongzhe  LI Da 

Cite this article as: SHU Y P, ZHANG Q, HOU Y Z, et al. Altered spontaneous brain activity in patients with borderline personality disorder: An activation likelihood estimation Meta-analysis of resting-state fMRI studies[J]. Chin J Magn Reson Imaging, 2025, 16(10): 14-20. DOI:10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2025.10.003.


[Abstract] Objective To investigate consistent alterations in spontaneous brain activity in patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI), in order to further explore the potential neurobiological mechanisms underlying BPD.Materials and Methods Relevant literature published before May 8, 2025, was systematically searched using amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation/fractional ALFF (ALFF/fALFF) and regional homogeneity (ReHo) analytical methods to assess changes in resting-state brain function in BPD patients. Based on strict inclusion and exclusion criteria, the activation likelihood estimation (ALE) method was used to integrate and analyze brain regions exhibiting aberrant spontaneous neural activity in BPD patients compared to healthy controls (HCs), using GingerALE 3.0.2 software.Results A total of six studies met the inclusion criteria, involving 293 BPD patients and 197 HCs. By combining ALFF/fALFF and ReHo data, the results showed significantly increased spontaneous activity in the left lentiform nucleus, left parahippocampal gyrus, and bilateral cuneus in BPD patients compared to HCs (P < 0.05). In contrast, decreased activity was observed in the right cuneus, right posterior cingulate cortex, left cingulate gyrus, left precuneus, left middle frontal gyrus, and left superior frontal gyrus (P < 0.05).Conclusions This ALE meta-analysis identified abnormal spontaneous brain activity across multiple brain regions in BPD patients, contributing to a deeper neuroimaging-based understanding of BPD and offering valuable insights for future clinical interventions.
[Keywords] borderline personality disorder；resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging；magnetic resonance imaging；activation likelihood estimation；Meta-analysis；spontaneous neural activity

SHU Yanping1   ZHANG Qin2   HOU Yongzhe1   LI Da1*  

1 Department of Psychiatry of Women and Children, Second People's Hospital of Guizhou Province, Guiyang 550000, China

2 Department of Radiology, Second People's Hospital of Guizhou Province, Guiyang 550000, China

Corresponding author: LI D, E-mail: lida925202506@163.com

Conflicts of interest   None.

Received  2025-06-02
Accepted  2025-09-03
DOI: 10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2025.10.003
Cite this article as: SHU Y P, ZHANG Q, HOU Y Z, et al. Altered spontaneous brain activity in patients with borderline personality disorder: An activation likelihood estimation Meta-analysis of resting-state fMRI studies[J]. Chin J Magn Reson Imaging, 2025, 16(10): 14-20. DOI:10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2025.10.003.

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