The author suggests that while borderline and narcissistic patients may exhibit different psychopathology and life-adjustments, they seem to have similar disorders of affects and moods. He identifies several such disturbances: (1) a sense of inappropriateness, a contradiction between what is reported and what is experienced; (2) a sense of injustice, prevalent among narcissistic patients, or of alienation, prevalent among borderline patients; (3) a pervasive sense of boredom characterized by perceptual ambiguity and a sense of being locked into an eternal, meaningless present; (4) overt anger; (5) depersonalization; (6) a sense of emptiness, which the author traces to the fragmentation and dispersal of affects which these patients experience. Hartocollis recommends that disturbances of affect, viewed in a developmental hierarchy, may be used as clues to diagnosis, and as the basis for prescribing medication. They can also form the focus of interpretations in the context of an established psychotherapeutic relationship.