Evaluating models of the personality–psychopathology relationship in children and adolescents

Behavioral problems in children with motor and intellectual disabilities: Prevalence and associations with maladaptive personality and marital relationship

“…Results showed no association of maladaptive personality traits with anxiety. Taken together, results in children with MID are similar to results of studies in a normal population in that lower scores on Compulsivity (Prinzie et al, 2003;Van Leeuwen et al, 2004), higher scores on Emotional Instability (Tackett, 2006) and Disagreeableness (Prinzie et al, 2010) are risk factors for developing behavioral problems, supporting the vulnerability model. These maladaptive personality traits may function as a diathesis by predisposing a child with MID for developing behavioral problems under specific circumstances.…”

“…One theoretical model proposed for the study between personality and behavioral problems is the vulnerability model (see e.g., Nigg, 2006;Tackett, 2006). According to this model, maladaptive personality traits are hypothesized as predisposing factors for the onset of behavioral problems (De Clercq et al, 2009;Widiger, 2011).…”

“…However, previous research has mainly focused on the associations between behavioral problems and measures of adaptive personality traits. For example, research in representative community samples has identified consistent relationships between low Conscientiousness, low Agreeableness, high Extraversion and to a lesser extent high Neuroticism (Prinzie et al, 2003;Prinzie, Van der Sluis, De Haan, & Deković , 2010;Tackett, 2006;Van Leeuwen, Mervielde, Braet, & Bosmans, 2004) and behavioral problems. Given the importance of personality in the forthcoming DSM-V (Widiger, 2011;Widiger & Mullins-Sweatt, 2009) and the fact that maladaptive personality traits have not yet been studied in children with MID, the third aim of this study was to investigate the association of behavioral problems with maladaptive personality traits.…”

“…A third aim was to examine of the association between behavioral problems and maladaptive personality traits. Based on the literature on personality traits in normal populations and in line with the vulnerability model, we hypothesized that low scores on Compulsivity, high scores on Emotional Instability and high scores on Disagreeableness would be related to behavioral problems (Prinzie et al, 2003(Prinzie et al, , 2010Tackett, 2006;Van Leeuwen et al, 2004). Fourth, we aimed to investigate the relationship between behavioral problems and marital stress and conflict.…”

Exploring the complexity of the childhood trait–psychopathology association: Continuity, pathoplasty, and complication effects

“…Recent longitudinal studies, however, have demonstrated a natural plasticity of personality symptoms both in adulthood (Cohen, Crawford, Johnson, & Kasen, 2005;Lenzenweger, 1999;Livesley, 2005;Skodol et al, 2005;Zanarini, Frankenburg, Hennen, Reich, & Silk, 2005) & Verhulst, 2003). In addition, a mass of literature reports on the substantial overlap between personality and psychopathology in adults (Widiger, 2003) and children (Tackett, 2006), including shared genetic etiological factors (Bienvenu, Hettema, Neale, Prescott, & Kendler, 2007;Krueger, Markon, Patrick, & Iacono, 2005). These research findings all suggest that personality and psychopathology are closely interconnected, given their similar nature and developmental course over time.…”