• To test psychodynamic hypotheses about the etiology of the borderline syndrome, female borderline patients were asked whether they remembered their mothers and fathers as having responded with approval, disinterest, or criticism to dependent and independent behaviors. Comparisons were made with a group of normal controls and with a group of neurotics and patients with personality disorders. The main finding was that borderline patients remembered their fathers as neglectful. The recollections did not support an overprotection hypothesis.