Personality disorders in offenders: categorical versus dimensional approaches.

The present study focused on the consequences of cut-off scores in personality disorder diagnoses for their association with criminal behavior. Using ICD-10 personality disorder criteria eliminating offence-related symptoms, we studied the distributions of categorically diagnosed personality disorders and of dimensional personality disorder scores in a group of offenders and a noncriminal control group. Whereas the dimensional scores of the offender group differed significantly from those of the control group for all personality disorders under study, the frequency of categorical diagnoses differed significantly for two personality for two personality disorders only. Moreover, prediction of group membership (offenders vs. nonoffenders) from personality disorder scores was substantially more precise than prediction from categorical diagnoses. It is concluded that a dimensional approach to personality disorder diagnosis is not only superior theoretically but also yields more precise information about the specific associations with criminal behavior.     

Correlations between self-handicapping and self-defeating personality.

In this study scores on Strube's self-handicapping scale were correlated with scores on Schill's self-defeating personality scale. Berglas believes there are subtypes of self-defeating personality and that his concept of self-handicapping should be correlated with the three criteria which represent a self-protective component of self-defeating personality. Some support for Berglas' proposition was found, particularly for men. However, correlations with other components of self-defeating personality suggest the criteria thought to be self-protective may need to be reconsidered.     

Multiple Personality, Dissociation, and C. G. Jung''s Complex Theory

Jung's contributions to the study of 'dissociation' are outlined here for perhaps the first time. Jung is unique in recognising that the 'dissociability of the psyche' is a fundamental process that extends along the continuum from 'normal' mental functioning to 'abnormal' states. Dissociation is recognised by Jung as a universal and necessary psychic activity for the development of personality through the differentiation of functions. However, when the cohesion of consciousness is shattered by extreme childhood traumata, as it is in the development of multiple personality, this natural differentiation of function is intensified and the dissociative splits between autonomous forces in the psyche become more extreme. This increases the autonomy of these 'splinter psyches' from ego-consciousness and reveals their archetypal core. They then develop into the phenomenon of 'alternate personalities' in multiple personality. In a comparison of the major tenets of the complex theory with recent empirical research on multiple personality, it is demonstrated that essential characteristics of Jung's 'autonomous complexes' are congruent with the phenomenology of the 'alternate personalities' or 'personality states' of this disorder. This underscores the relevance of Jung's complex theory to present understanding of multiple personality. In addition, the phenomenon of multiple personality is, in turn, important for realising the central significance of dissociation in the complex theory and provides an excellent contemporary clinical example of the archetypal ground of the psyche.     

8. Reflections on the Journey

ABSTRACT In the context of the Dodge Morgan case study, we discuss holistic analysis of personality. In such analysis, apparently separate, even contradictory, approaches can be integrated to produce a metalevel understanding. In our analysis, a trait and a phenomenological model worked effectively in concert; qualitative and quantitative analyses produced a fruitful synergy. We consider the implications of multilevel understanding of personality for future investigations. We also consider the limitations of personality theory with respect to the construct of personality change, as well as the changes in the investigators' perspectives that occurred over the period of study of the Morgan data.     

Clinical use of the five-factor model: an introduction.

In the past decade, clinical psychologists have developed a renewed appreciation of the value of assessment. At the same time, personality psychologists have come to agree on a fundamental taxonomy of personality traits, the five-factor model. Articles in this special series describe the model and its measurement and discuss applications in three different settings: general clinical practice, a sexual behaviors consultation unit, and a behavioral medicine clinic. This introduction raises questions about the use of personality profiles in psychodiagnosis, the range of applicability of the five-factor model, the utility of personality feedback in psychotherapy, the stability of personality scores among psychotherapy patients, and the feasibility of using personality scores to select optimal forms of treatment. This special series is intended to stimulate research on such topics.     

Proactive personality and career success.

This study examined the relationship between proactive personality and career success by surveying a sample of 496 employees (320 men and 176 women) from a diverse set of occupations and organizations. Proactive personality was positively associated with both self-reported objective (salary and promotions) and subjective (career satisfaction) indicators of career success. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that proactive personality explained additional variance in both objective and subjective career success even after controlling for several relevant variables (demographic, human capital, motivational, organizational, and industry) that have previously been found to be predictive of career outcomes. These findings were consistent using both self-report and significant--other ratings of proactive personality.     

Psychodiagnosis of personality structure: psychotic personality organization.

Recent developments in Rorschach psychology, including nomothetic approaches focused on scores, ratios, and indices and idiographic approaches focused on content emerging from psychoanalytic theory, offer the Rorschach clinician a rich and potent interpretive methodology. This article examines the structural diagnosis of personality organization with a focus on psychotic personality structure. Rorschach approaches to the differential diagnosis of psychotic personality organization are presented. The Rorschach is viewed as indispensible in the differential diagnosis of personality organization, especially in the so-called "borderline" cases.     

Psychoanalytic patients in the U.S., Canada,and Australia: II. A DSM-III-R validation study

A study was conducted to validate our previous work on the DSM-III-R disorders diagnosed in patients in psychoanalysis in the U.S., Canada, and Australia and to determine which specific mood, anxiety, and personality disorders were the most common in these patients. The earlier study consisted of three surveys of psychoanalytic practice that together obtained data on 1,718 patients, through extensive mail surveys to analysts in the three countries. In the validation study, 206 patients were diagnosed using a different technique. Analysts similar in important respects to those who participated in the original surveys rated patients diagnostically before and after DSM-III-R training. After training, no significant changes appeared in the rates for any of the specific mood disorders. For the thirty disorders examined, training effects decreased the identification of the generalized anxiety disorder, and increased the identification of three personality disorders: avoidant, dependent, and personality disorder not otherwise specified. Thus, analysts slightly underdiagnosed the number of personality disorders, and some "anxious" patients appear to have qualified for personality disorders. Some limitations of the DSM-III-R notion of narcissistic personality are discussed, as are the importance and stability of the self-defeating (masochistic) personality disorder. The most common Axis I disorder in psychoanalytic patients was dysthymia, followed by major depression, recurrent. This study reinforces the findings of the original three surveys. Minor corrections were developed to adjust the original three surveys.     

Experimental manipulation of NEO-PI-R items.

Research assessing the relationship of the Five-factor model (FFM) of personality to personality disorder symptomatology has generally been consistent with theoretical expectations. Three exceptions, however, have been failures to confirm predicted associations of the NEO-Personality Inventory-Revised (NEO-PI-R) Conscientiousness scale with obsessive-compulsive personality disorder symptomatology, the NEO-PI-R Agreeableness scale with dependent symptomatology, and the NEO-PI-R Openness scale with schizotypal symptomatology. It was the hypothesis of this study that these findings might be due in part to a relative emphasis on adaptive rather than maladaptive variants of these domains of personality functioning within the NEO-PI-R. This hypothesis was tested by experimentally altering NEO-PI-R items to reverse their implications for maladaptiveness. The predicted correlations of the FFM were confirmed with the experimentally altered items in a sample of 86 adult psychiatric outpatients.     

GROUP DIFFERENCES IN PERSONALITY: META‐ANALYSES COMPARING FIVE U.S. RACIAL GROUPS

This research poses 2 applied questions: How large are racial group differences on personality scales and are these differences likely to cause adverse impact in personnel selection? We examined the extent to which racial groups differ across Big 5 personality factors and facets. Large‐scale, quantitative estimates based on over 700 effect sizes were meta‐analytically summarized. Multiple personality instruments and understudied racial groups, particularly Asian Americans and American Indians, were included in the meta‐analyses. Most group comparisons and personality scales yielded negligible differences and are not likely to cause adverse impact in selection. However, facet‐level analyses produced different d‐values, with some group comparisons showing moderate differences, suggesting that the use of personality measures in selection does not uniformly circumvent adverse impact concerns. The veracity of this conclusion depends on (a) the particular trait in question, (b) the composition of the applicant pool (i.e., which groups are to be compared with one another), (c) the effect size (i.e., d‐value), and (d) the selection ratio. For practitioners, we present a quantitatively informed summary of when and where to expect adverse impact to result from personality measures used in personnel selection.     

Predicting personality and behavior: a boundary on the acquaintanceship effect.

Recent research has shown that interjudge agreement in personality ratings increases with acquaintanceship. The present study sought to replicate and extend this finding by investigating the relation between acquaintanceship and behavioral prediction. A total of 138 undergraduate targets were videotaped while interacting with an opposite-sex partner in 3 situations. The targets also completed 5 personality measures. Results indicated that acquaintances' judgments predicted personality scores much better than did strangers' judgments, but acquaintances' and strangers' judgments did equally well at predicting behavior. Implications for research on the accuracy of personality judgments are discussed.     

DSM-III-R personality disorders and the five-factor model of personality: an empirical comparison.

The relationship between the five-factor model (FFM) of personality and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (rev. 3rd ed.; DSM-III-R) personality disorders was examined in a sample of 54 psychiatric outpatients. Correlations between raw scores on the NEO-Personality Inventory (NEO-PI) and the number of DSM-III-R personality disorder symptoms rated present using a semistructured interview were computed. In addition, correlations between NEO-PI scores and scores on two self-report personality disorder inventories were also examined to determine which results replicated across instruments. Results indicated that the FFM personality dimensions of Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Agreeableness were most apparent in the DSM-III-R conceptualizations of the personality disorders.     

Early maladaptive schemas of personality disorder subtypes.

This investigation attempted to examine the cognitive schemas of five distinct clusters that emerged from a cluster analysis of the personality disorder scales of the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II (Millon, 1987). Specifically, the degree to which early maladaptive schemas, as measured by the Cognitive Schema Questionnaire-Short Form (Young, 1994), could correctly identify empirically derived patterns of personality disorders was examined. Between-cluster differences centered on five personality components and five schemas. Discriminant analyses revealed two significant functions composed of cognitive schemas, which correctly identified 61.2% of the entire sample in terms of cluster group membership. The total proportion of variance in the two significant functions associated with cluster group differences was 76.8%. Findings are discussed in relation to the domain theory of personality disorders posited by Millon and Davis (1996).     

Evidence for genetic influences on personality from self-reports and informant ratings.

Self-report data on Extraversion (E) and Neuroticism (N), together with ratings by the co-twin, were obtained from a sample of 826 adult female twin pairs ascertained through a population-based twin register. Data were analyzed using a model that allowed for the contributions to personality ratings of the rater's personality (rater bias) as well as of the personality of the person being rated. For E, but not for N, significant rater bias was found, with extraverted respondents tending to underestimate, and introverted respondents tending to overestimate, the Extraversion of their co-twins. Good agreement between self-reports and ratings by the respondent's co-twin was found for both E and N. Substantial genetic influences were found for both personality traits, confirming findings from genetic studies of personality that have relief only on self-reports of respondents.     

On the subjectivity of personality theory.

Every theorist of personality views the human condition from the unique perspective of his own individuality. As a consequence, personality theories are strongly influenced by personal and subjective factors. These influences are partially responsible for the present day lack of consensus in psychology as to basic conceptual frameworks for the study of man. The science of human personality can achieve a greater degree of consensus and generality only if it begins to turn back on itself and question its own psychological foundations. The role of subjective and personal factors in this field can be studied and made more explicit by means of a psychobiographical method which interprets the major ideas of personality theories in the light of the formative experiences in the respective theorists' lives. This method is briefly illustrated by an examination of the influence of personal experiences on theoretical concepts in the work of Carl Jung, Carl Rogers, Wilhelm Reich, and Gordon Allport. The subjective factors disclosed by psychobiographical analysis can bee seen to interact with influences stemming from the intellectual and historical context within which the theorist work. The psychobiographical study of personality theory is only one part of a larger discipline, the psychology of knowledge, which would study the role of subjective and personal factors in the structure of man's knowledge in general.     

费尔贝恩人格客体关系理论的心理治疗观

英国精神分析学家费尔贝恩在修正与发展弗洛伊德和克莱因思想的基础之上,提出了一种纯粹的人格客体关系理论,他发展了一套修正的心理病理学思想。他认为,精神分裂是所有心理病理现象的基础;心理治疗的目标是要让病人从无意识中释放坏的客体和减少自我的分裂、达到人格的整合,而分析师与病人的关系则是心理治疗的中心。     

Openness and Job Performance in U.S.-Based Japanese Manufacturing Companies

The current study examined one possible explanation for the lack of stability found to date in the relationship between Openness to Experience, a second-order Big Five personality factor, and job performance. An organizational setting and geographic locale were chosen, a priori, to reflect a condition that would increase the potential for openness to serve as an advantageous personality disposition for job performance. Consequently, we studied job performance and openness among inhabitants of the southeast employed in U.S.-based Japanese manufacturing companies. A step-wise hierarchical regression analysis revealed that openness predicted unique variance in job performance for these employees above and beyond both cognitive aptitude, and the other four personality dimensions of the Big Five. Explanations for the finding and its implications on the study of personality-job performance linkages are discussed.     

Predicting personality disorder traits with the Defense Style Questionnaire in a normal sample.

This research examined the efficacy of the 40-item Defense Style Questionnaire (DSQ-40), measuring mature, neurotic and immature defense styles, to predict DSM-III-R personality disorders. The Coolidge Axis II Inventory, the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II, and the MMPI personality disorder scales were used to measure 11 personality disorders in a nonclinical sample. The results show that most personality disorders are positively associated with the highly maladaptive immature defense style, and negatively associated with the mature defense style. Multiple regression analyses reveal that the combined variance accounted for by the defense styles range from 12% to 42% on the CATI, 3% to 42% on the MCMI-II, and 2% to 32% on the MMPI-PD. However, specific personality disorders cannot be predicted with the defense styles on any measure.     

Empirical, theoretical, and practical advantages of the HEXACO model of personality structure.

The authors argue that a new six-dimensional framework for personality structure--the HEXACO model--constitutes a viable alternative to the well-known Big Five or five-factor model. The new model is consistent with the cross-culturally replicated finding of a common six-dimensional structure containing the factors Honesty-Humility (H), Emotionality (E), eExtraversion (X), Agreeableness (A), Conscientiousness (C), and Openness to Experience (O). Also, the HEXACO model predicts several personality phenomena that are not explained within the B5/FFM, including the relations of personality factors with theoretical biologists' constructs of reciprocal and kin altruism and the patterns of sex differences in personality traits. In addition, the HEXACO model accommodates several personality variables that are poorly assimilated within the B5/FFM.     

Jo-Jo, Josephine, and Joanne: a study of multiple personality by means of the Rorschach Test.

A comparison of three Rorschach protocols of a multiple personality case was presented. Basic features of the personality structures were examined with respect to the psychogram profiles. The evolution of the original personality into the successive ones was assessed both in terms of inter- and intra-protocol variations and thematic analysis. The implications of the Rorschach test findings for the treatment and theory of multiple personality syndrome were discussed.