Dysfunctional personality traits in a clinical sample

The assessment of dysfunctional personality traits is a crucial area of research in clinical psychology, particularly for understanding how these traits impact mental health and therapeutic outcomes. Disordered personality traits have been found to be strongly associated with psychopathological distress and the occurrence of multiple disorders, meaning that general personality dysfunction may be related to psychopathological symptoms beyond personality disorders (PD) (Hengartner et al., 2014). In fact, research has specifically shown that maladaptive personality traits are associated with clinical disorders and may help in the diagnosis of a variety of disorders (Heath et al., 2018). Dysfunctional personality traits, as evaluated through standardized measures like the VDS30, provide a window into personality structures that may predispose individuals to certain mental health issues and affect therapy outcomes. The first aim of this research is to provide further insight into the association between symptoms of clinical disorders and dysfunctional personality profiles. Secondly, the research aims to explore the changes of dysfunctional personality traits over the course of therapy for patients with and without PDs. While personality is conceptualized as being very stable over time, longitudinal studies do find changes in personality traits over our lifespan, especially when looking at facet-level traits and dysfunctional personality traits (Bleidorn et al., 2022). However, while studies show that personality pathology does change as we age (Ruiz et al., 2020, Vergauwe et al., 2023), little is known about changes in dysfunctional personality traits as a response to therapy. Studies have found that changes in BPD symptoms occur alongside changes in normal personality traits (Wright et al., 2015). While treatment level did not account for all of the change, the results found by Wright et al. (2015) indicate that treatment may directly or indirectly be able to change personality traits. This research seeks to assess dysfunctional personality profiles in a clinical population and explore how these relate to specific diagnoses and therapeutic success. Moreover, the study will investigate how dysfunctional personality traits evolve over the course of therapy, comparing changes of patients with PDs to those without. We also aim to determine if alterations in personality traits are accompanied by changes in symptom severity, as measured by both the VDS90 and HEALTH-79, regardless of PD status. Additionally, the research will examine to what extent changes in dysfunctional personality traits are determined by the quality of the therapy and changes in symptom severity.