Women involved in the criminal justice system often present with complex and overlapping psychological, social, and developmental needs. Histories of childhood adversity and victimization are common in justice-involved populations, and research has linked cumulative adverse childhood experiences with later serious and persistent offending (Dierkhising et al., 2013; Fox et al., 2015). Yet the presence of trauma does not make offending inevitable. Most people who experience adversity do not go on to offend, and criminal behavior develops through multiple individual, relational, situational, and social influences. The clinically useful question is therefore not whether trauma ’causes’ offending, but how trauma-related vulnerabilities may interact with other factors in a particular woman’s life.
Trauma and Borderline Personality Traits
Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is associated with difficulties involving emotion regulation, impulsivity, interpersonal instability, identity, and sensitivity to rejection or abandonment (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). Childhood adversity is also consistently associated with BPD. A meta-analysis of 97 studies found substantially greater reported childhood adversity among people with BPD than among non-clinical and other psychiatric comparison groups (Porter et al., 2020). More recent systematic-review evidence similarly supports an association between childhood abuse, emotion dysregulation, and BPD-related difficulties, while also emphasizing limitations in causal inference (Thornton et al., 2025).
These findings matter in forensic settings because trauma may shape how some individuals perceive and respond to threat, distress, rejection, and conflict. Emotion dysregulation can make intense affect more difficult to manage, while impulsivity may increase the likelihood of rapid, poorly considered responses. Interpersonal instability can further complicate situations involving perceived abandonment, coercion, or conflict. However, these characteristics are not synonymous with violence or criminality. BPD should not be used as a shorthand explanation for offending, and diagnosis alone cannot establish why an offence occurred.
Why Gender Matters
A gender-responsive perspective is particularly important when considering women in criminal justice settings. Women who offend may have histories involving victimization, mental health difficulties, unstable relationships, substance use, poverty, or other forms of social disadvantage, although no single pathway characterizes all women (Bloom et al., 2004). Research with detained adolescents has also identified gender differences in relationships among sexual abuse, post-traumatic stress symptoms, and delinquent behavior (Chaplo et al., 2016). These findings support careful attention to women’s developmental and relational contexts without reducing offending to victimization.
This distinction is important clinically and ethically. Explaining behavior is not the same as excusing it. A trauma-informed formulation can hold both realities at once: an individual may be responsible for harmful behavior while also having psychological and developmental needs that are relevant to assessment, treatment, and prevention. Formulation asks what functions a behavior served, what preceded it, what maintained it, and which factors could realistically be changed.
From Diagnosis to Individual Formulation
Forensic assessment is therefore strengthened when clinicians move beyond diagnostic labels and examine mechanisms. Two women with similar BPD symptoms may have very different offence pathways. For one, offending may occur during acute interpersonal conflict and intense emotional arousal. For another, the behavior may be planned, instrumental, substance-related, or primarily shaped by environmental and criminogenic pressures. Treating these presentations as equivalent because both women meet criteria for the same diagnosis risks overlooking the factors most relevant to future risk and rehabilitation.
A formulation-led approach can integrate trauma history, emotional regulation, impulsivity, attachment and relationship patterns, substance use, current stressors, social support, and established criminogenic needs. It can also identify protective factors. This creates a more clinically useful bridge between a person’s history and the practical question of what may reduce future harm.
Implications for Rehabilitation
Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is relevant because it directly targets emotion regulation, distress tolerance, mindfulness, interpersonal effectiveness, and maladaptive behavioral responses. DBT has been adapted for correctional settings, including work with women and girls (Nee & Farman, 2007; Trupin et al., 2002). Broader evidence supports DBT for difficulties associated with BPD, although study designs and populations vary (Panos et al., 2014).
The limits of this evidence are as important as its promise. Improvements in emotional regulation or BPD symptoms should not automatically be interpreted as reductions in reoffending. Psychological treatment cannot by itself resolve housing instability, unsafe relationships, substance-related environments, unemployment, or other practical barriers to reintegration. DBT is therefore best understood as one possible component of a wider rehabilitation plan rather than a complete forensic intervention.
Trauma-informed practice also requires more than asking whether trauma occurred. Services should avoid unnecessarily recreating experiences of powerlessness, recognize potential trauma responses, provide clear and predictable boundaries, and support the development of safer coping strategies. At the same time, trauma-informed care should remain compatible with accountability, risk management, and attention to the impact of offending on victims.
Prevention Beyond the Offence
The strongest implication is preventative. If emotional dysregulation, impulsivity, unstable relationships, and trauma-related responses contribute to risk for some women, intervention should not begin and end with the offence itself. Earlier identification of psychological difficulties, accessible trauma-informed services, and support for adaptive emotion regulation may reduce the accumulation of vulnerabilities long before criminal justice involvement. Within correctional and community services, rehabilitation should continue this work while addressing the social and criminogenic factors that influence reintegration.
Female offending is too complex to be explained by either trauma or personality pathology. A more defensible approach is to understand how developmental experiences, psychological vulnerabilities, present circumstances, and criminogenic factors interact with the individual. Moving beyond the offence in this way does not minimize responsibility. It makes assessment more precise and creates a stronger basis for rehabilitation and prevention.
Diana-Irina Iordache, MSc, is a forensic psychology graduate of Goldsmiths, University of London. For more information, contact her at [email protected]. Her ORCID is 0009-0007-6091-273X.
References
American Psychiatric Association. (2022). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed., text rev.).
Bloom, B., Owen, B., & Covington, S. S. (2004). Women offenders and the gendered effects of public policy. Review of Policy Research, 21(1), 31–48. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1541-1338.2004.00056.x
Chaplo, S. D., Kerig, P. K., Modrowski, C. A., & Bennett, D. C. (2016). Gender differences in the associations among sexual abuse, posttraumatic stress symptoms, and delinquent behaviors in a sample of detained adolescents. Journal of Child & Adolescent Trauma, 10(1), 29–39. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40653-016-0122-z
Dierkhising, C. B., Ko, S. J., Woods-Jaeger, B., Briggs, E. C., Lee, R., & Pynoos, R. S. (2013). Trauma histories among justice-involved youth: Findings from the National Child Traumatic Stress Network. European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 4(1), Article 20274. https://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v4i0.20274
Fox, B., Perez, N. M., Cass, E., Baglivio, M. T., & Epps, N. (2015). Trauma changes everything: Examining the relationship between adverse childhood experiences and serious, violent and chronic juvenile offenders. Child Abuse & Neglect, 46, 163–173. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2015.01.011
Nee, C., & Farman, S. (2007). Dialectical behaviour therapy as a treatment for borderline personality disorder in prisons: Three illustrative case studies. Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology, 18(2), 160–180. https://doi.org/10.1080/14789940601104792
Panos, P. T., Jackson, J. W., Hasan, O., & Panos, A. (2014). Meta-analysis and systematic review assessing the efficacy of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT). Research on Social Work Practice, 24(2), 213–223. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049731513503047
Porter, C., Palmier-Claus, J., Branitsky, A., Mansell, W., Warwick, H., & Varese, F. (2020). Childhood adversity and borderline personality disorder: A meta-analysis. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 141(1), 6–20. https://doi.org/10.1111/acps.13118
Thornton, A., Gardner, K. J., Graham-Kevan, N., Parkinson, J., Rynne, R., Slankauskas, N., Pritchard, C., Baxter, K., Tranter, H., & Holland, O. (2025). The relationship between adverse childhood experiences, emotion dysregulation and personality disorder traits: A systematic review and mediation analysis. Journal of Affective Disorders, 389, Article 119618. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2025.119618
Trupin, E. W., Stewart, D. G., Beach, B., & Boesky, L. M. (2002). Effectiveness of a dialectical behaviour therapy program for incarcerated female juvenile offenders. Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 7(3), 121–127. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-3588.00022
