Agreeableness, conscientiousness, and psychoticism: distinctive influences of three personality dimensions in adolescence

Personality traits as predictors for treatment response to sertraline among unmedicated obsessive-compulsive Disorder: A 12-weeks retrospective longitudinal study

The effectiveness of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) as a primary treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) remains uncertain. Even after undergoing standard SSRIs treatment, 40%-60% of individuals with OCD persistently endure symptoms. Recent studies proposed that personality traits may influence the diversity of OCD treatment results. Thus, in this retrospective study, we evaluated the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) scores of 51 untreated patients with OCD and 35 healthy controls. The Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS) was employed to assess OCD symptom severity at weeks 0, 2, 4, 8, and 12 of sertraline treatment. The primary outcome focused on the reduction rate of Y-BOCS scores (response: ≥25%; marked response: ≥50%). Our findings revealed that individuals with OCD demonstrated a significantly higher neuroticism score compared to healthy controls. Correlation analyses exposed a positive link between psychoticism and the duration of the disease. Moreover, family history strongly correlated with both obsessive thoughts and the total Y-BOCS score. Subsequent univariate Cox proportional analyses indicated that both low neuroticism and high extraversion traits could forecast the response to sertraline. Furthermore, only a high extraversion trait was linked to a marked response. Our results support the idea that personality traits may contribute to OCD vulnerability and predict sertraline treatment outcomes.

Adolescent personality traits, low self-esteem and self-harm hospitalisation: a 15-year follow-up of the Norwegian Young-HUNT1 cohort

Affective disorders are closely related to self-harm and suicidal behaviours. Less is known about how adolescent personality traits and self-esteem influence the development of later self-harm. We examined associations between personality traits such as neuroticism, psychoticism and extroversion, and self-esteem, in adolescence, and the risk of future self-harm hospitalisation. Baseline information from 13 to 19-year-old participants in the Norwegian Young-HUNT1 study in 1995-97 (n = 8965) was linked to endpoint data recorded from participants' hospital records, describing self-harm hospitalisation episodes within the catchment area. Crude and adjusted hazard ratios (HR) were estimated by Cox regression analyses. A one-unit increase on the 0-6 scale for neuroticism was associated with a HR of 1.29, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.14-1.47. Corresponding HR for psychoticism was 1.30, 95% CI 1.03-1.63 per unit increase, and for extroversion risk was reduced (HR 0.89, 95% CI 0.77-1.04). Positive perception of self-esteem was more strongly associated with reduced risk of self-harm hospitalisation (HR per unit increase on the 0-12 scale was 0.74, 95% CI 0.68-0.82). Additional adjustment for alcohol use and symptoms of combined anxiety and depression symptoms attenuated effect estimates, in particular for neuroticism (HR 1.13, 95% CI 0.96-1.32) and psychoticism (HR 1.07, 95% CI 0.82-1.40). In contrast, self-esteem associations remained largely the same after adjustment. Our results indicate that brief assessments of personality and self-esteem might add additional relevant information, and could be included as a supplement to standard suicidal risk assessment in adolescents.

Using Item Response Theory for the Development of a New Short Form of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised

The present work aims at developing a new version of the short form of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised, which includes Psychoticism, Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Lie scales (48 items, 12 per scale). The work consists of two studies. In the first one, an item response theory model was estimated on the responses of 590 individuals to the full-length version of the questionnaire (100 items). The analyses allowed the selection of 48 items well discriminating and distributed along the latent continuum of each trait, and without misfit and differential item functioning. In the second study, the functioning of the new form of the questionnaire was evaluated in a different sample of 300 individuals. Results of the two studies show that reliability of the four scales is better than, or equal to that of the original forms. The new version outperforms the original one in approximating scores of the full-length questionnaire. Moreover, convergent validity coefficients and relations with clinical constructs were consistent with literature.

Extraversion and neuroticism related to the resting-state effective connectivity of amygdala

The amygdala plays a key role in emotion processing. Its functional connectivity with other brain regions has been extensively demonstrated to be associated with extraversion and neuroticism. However, how the amygdala affects other regions and is affected by others within these connectivity patterns associated with extraversion and neuroticism remains unclear. To address this issue, we investigated the effective connectivity of the amygdala using Granger causality analysis on the resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data of 70 participants. Results showed that extraversion was positively correlated with the influence from the right inferior occipital gyrus (IOG) to the left amygdala, and from the bilateral IOG to the right amygdala; such result may represent the neural correlates of social interactions in extraverts. Conversely, neuroticism was associated with an increased influence from right amygdala to right middle frontal gyrus and a decreased influence from right precuneus to right amygdala. This influence might affect the modulations of cognitive regulation function and self-referential processes in neurotic individuals. These findings highlight the importance of the causal influences of amygdala in explaining the individual differences in extraversion and neuroticism, and offer further insights into the specific neural networks underlying personality.

Infant SES as a predictor of personality--is the association mediated by intelligence?

Background

Although research into the continuity and change of personality traits during a lifespan has been fairly extensive, little research has been conducted on childhood predictors of adult personality.

Purpose

We aimed to investigate the association between infant socioeconomic status (SES), and Eysenck personality traits in adulthood. An additional aim was to investigate whether intelligence and education may mediate this association.

Methods

SES of 9125 children in the Copenhagen Perinatal Cohort was recorded at a 1-year examination. A subsample of this cohort, comprising 1182 individuals, participated in a follow-up at 20–34 years and was administered the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) which includes measures of neuroticism, extraversion, psychoticism and the so-called lie-scale. Associations of SES with each of the four personality traits were analysed by bivariate and partial correlations, and the mediating effects of intelligence and years of education were analysed.

Results

Higher SES in infancy was associated with lower neuroticism (r = −0.06; p = 0.05), lower lie-scale scores (r = −0.11; p = 0.0002), and higher psychoticism (r = 0.09; p = 0.003). However, analyses of mediation revealed no direct effect of infant SES on any of the adult personality traits, but only indirect effects mediated by intelligence and years of education, with intelligence being the main mediating factor.

Conclusion

Only weak associations were observed between infant SES and personality in young adulthood, and the observed associations were mediated by adult intelligence and educational level. Thus, factors associated with infant SES or family background appears to have weak direct effects on personality development.