Personality Disorders

Everybody has a personality, or a characteristic manner of thinking, feeling, behaving, and relating to others. When personality traits are maladaptive and result in significant social and/or occupational impairment or subjective distress they constitute a personality disorder. The classification of personality disorders within authoritative diagnostic manuals though is undergoing significant shift, from the categorical syndromes of DSM-IV and ICD-10 to dimensional traits within DSM-5 Section III and ICD-11. The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the rationale for this shift, compare and contrast the DSM-5 Section III and ICD-11 trait models, as well as consider their assessment, etiology, outcomes, and treatment. The chapter ends with two case vignettes that illustrate the descriptive capacity of the trait models.