Personality Disorders

Overview

Personality disorders are complicated mental health conditions that affect how one thinks, feels, and behaves. This can make it hard to form relationships, handle stress, or even enjoy everyday things. There are 10 different types of personality disorders, each with its unique challenges. These conditions are often hard to diagnose as individuals do not understand the severity of their unusual personality traits. While they can be tough to manage, with the right help, many people with personality disorders can improve their lives.

What are Personality Disorders?

Personality disorders are intricate mental health conditions that influence one's way of thinking, speaking and behaving. These individuals feel emotions intensely, often exhibiting disruptive and unusual patterns of dealing in a relationship. These patterns can make it hard to form relationships, handle stress, or even enjoy everyday things.
It may also cause an individual to have a distorted perception of themself, reality and others, affecting relationships across every setting - work, social life and family. One must remember that these are not choices; they are often influenced by experiences, genetics and how your brain works.

Types of Personality Disorders

Personality disorders are classified into 10 types, each of which is organised into 3 main clusters by the standard reference publication for mental illnesses. These cluster of personality disorder types include the following:

Cluster A Personality Disorders

The personality disorders in this cluster are characterised by having odd and unusual behaviours and thoughts. It includes the following:

Schizoid Personality Disorder

People having this personality disorder prefer solitude, where they find comfort in their own company. These individuals also do not seek any relationships with others.

Paranoid Personality Disorder

Here, an individual experiences paranoia, or the extreme distrust or fear of others. This may make them think and believe that others always want to harm or exploit them.

Schizotypal Personality Disorder

A person with this personality disorder experiences queer thoughts, resulting in them behaving and speaking distinctively. This also makes it difficult for them to keep intimate relationships with others.

Cluster B Personality Disorders

The following personality disorders are characterised by emotional and dramatic behaviour and thoughts that change over time:

Borderline Personality Disorder

A person here finds it challenging to manage their emotions, making them whimsical. This can also cause them to be uncertain about how they perceive themselves. Living with this personality disorder can also impact one’s romantic or family relationships.

Antisocial Personality Disorder

People with this disorder believe that violating, exploiting, and manipulating others’ rights can validate their well-being. These individuals can also have problems with substance misuse, being financially or socially responsible, and controlling the emotions of anger and hostility.

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

An individual here lacks a sense of empathy, requiring to be admired by others at all times. This behaviour can stem from deeply ingrained insecurity or low self-worth as a result of neglectful parenting. These people believe that they deserve special treatment as they outshine everybody.

Histrionic Personality Disorder

It is characterised by an individual being dramatic and having strong emotions to get the attention of others. They also have unstable self-esteem and a sense of sense that solely depends on others’ validation.

Cluster C Personality Disorders

This cluster contains personality disorders that are characterised by fearful and anxious behaviours and thoughts, involving the following:

Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder

A person with this disorder of personality requires everything in the right order and under control. Seeking perfectionism, these individuals cannot be flexible. They may refuse to compromise with others, have rigid beliefs, and do things in their specific ways

Avoidant Personality Disorder

A person with APD is very shy and always tends to believe that they are not at par with others. These people have a fear of rejection and avoid people for the same reason.

Dependent Personality Disorder

Individuals with DPD tend to depend on others uncontrollably, and demand to be taken care of by them. For this reason, these people put up with mistreatment
as they do not want to lose a relationship.

Symptoms of Personality Disorders

Each personality disorder type exhibits different symptoms, however, personality disorders generally involve certain similar problems. This can include struggling to keep up with a relationship, being empathetic or respectful to others, requiring attention and demanding to be taken care of, having low or high self-esteem, having an identity crisis, having no self-awareness, or being emotionally detached.

The following table highlights the different symptoms and signs associated with various personality disorder types:

Personality Disorder Types	Signs and Symptoms
Paranoid Personality Disorder	Suspicious of others, feelings of mistrust, holds grudges for a long time, feels that their partner is disloyal
Schizoid Personality Disorder	Mostly asexual, enjoys one's own company, uninterested in picking up social cues
Schizotypal Personality Disorder	Overthinking everything in an unusual way, has social anxiety, is fearful of hearing a voice out of the blue, and thinks strange things
Borderline Personality Disorder	Feels lonely almost all the time, fear of being alone, has fluctuating moods, forms deeper yet unstable relationships, a poor perception of oneself
Anti-social Personality Disorder	Is rebellious and non-empathetic, enjoys violating others rights, impulsive behaviour and always resorts to hostility
Histrionic Personality Disorder	Forms emotional or sexual connection with people to get attention, heavily concerned with physical appearance, speaks and behaves dramatically, is led on by people easily
Narcissistic Personality Disorder	Speaks very highly of oneself, conceited and often looks down upon other people, believes that others are jealous of them, requires special treatment and favouritism everywhere they go
Avoidant Personality Disorder	Sensitive to rejection or criticism, wants to be isolated, is afraid of embarrassment, disapproval, and being mocked at, is like participating in projects that involve teamwork, extremely shy in social settings, very low self-esteem and poor self-image
Dependent Personality Disorder	Lack of self-confidence, submissive and clingy, dependent on others, requires to be taken care of, demands comforting and advising to make the smallest of decisions, puts up with abuse or mistreatment, needs to always be in a relationship as soon as one ends
Obsessive-compulsive Personality Disorder	Focusing on trivial details, rules, and orderliness, rigid and stubborn, cannot complete a project without having reached perfection, inflexible and controlling

Causes of Personality Disorders

Medical experts believe that personality disorders result from a blend of factors, including the external environment, genetics, verbal abuse, brain changes and childhood trauma. In most of the cases, it is seen that genes play a major role in causing personality disorders. Risk factors include certain personality traits (including wanting to be involved in harmful activities or staying away from them), parental neglect, childhood verbal or physical abuse, and emotional unavailability of a guardian.

Diagnosis of Personality Disorders

Personality disorders are often challenging to diagnose as people tend to believe there could be nothing wrong with their way of thinking or behaviour. Keeping this condition undiagnosed can affect one's relationship, resulting in unemployment or divorce. Personality disorders are often also associated with other conditions such as substance use, anxiety and depression.

Usually, one reaches out to a psychiatrist or psychologist who performs a physical examination to diagnose the disorder. They ask general and broad questions, focusing on the patient's response (if it is defensive) and the environment the questions create (hostility). The questions mostly deal with the patient's relationships, history of any abuse, impulse control, employment history and reality testing. Answering these questions helps the healthcare provider get an insight into their behaviour; if not, they may be required to collect more information from their parents or friends.

Treatment for Personality Disorders

Personality disorders are difficult to treat in the realm of psychiatry, as patients believe their behaviour is not alarming (eventually refusing to seek treatment). In addition, modern medicine has not been able to find the right treatment options for the disorders, resulting in accessibility. However, healthcare providers may prescribe medications to combat other linked conditions such as anxiety and depression.

Talk therapy or psychotherapy is also another treatment option to manage the symptoms of personality disorders. This helps to deal with changing and troubling behaviour, emotions and thoughts, and letting one identify themselves. Individuals with borderline personality disorder are often recommended dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) while those with histrionic personality disorder are suggested cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).

Prevention of Personality Disorders

Presently, there is no way to prevent the occurrence of personality disorders. However, one must not refrain from seeking professional help as soon as the symptoms appear. They may also reach out to their friends, partners and family for their emotional support as they choose the path of recovery.

Myths and Facts About Personality Disorders

Following are the myths and facts about personality disorders:

Myth 1: Personality Disorders are Not Real, It is a Choice
Fact: Personality disorders are not a conscious choice; they are complex mental health conditions that affect how a person feels, behaves and thinks. It is caused by biological and environmental factors, developing mostly during adolescence or childhood.

Myth 2: People with Personality Disorders are Dangerous and Manipulative
Fact: While some behaviours associated with certain personality disorders may be challenging to understand, most individuals with these conditions are not inherently manipulative or dangerous. They often struggle with intense emotions, unstable relationships, and impulsive behaviours, which can lead to harmful patterns.

Myth 3: Individuals with Personality Disorders are Attention Seekers
Fact: While some personality disorders (such as histrionic personality disorder) may appear attention-seeking, the underlying desire to seek attention is often a reflection of a deep-seated fear of abandonment or rejection.

Myth 4: It is Almost Difficult to Become Friends or Date a Person with Personality Disorders
Fact: Relationships can be challenging for individuals with personality disorders, however, with therapy and self-awareness, they can learn healthier ways of relating to others.