General Factors of Psychopathology, Personality, and Personality Disorder: Across Domain Comparisons

Joshua R. Oltmanns, Gregory T. Smith, Thomas F. Oltmanns, Thomas A. Widiger

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

84 Scopus citations

Abstract

Three separate and distinct literatures exist investigating general factors of psychopathology (p factor), personality (general factor of personality, GFP), and personality disorder (g-PD). Surprisingly, there has been little to no investigation regarding the convergence of these three distinct general factors. In the present investigation, two studies were conducted examining the convergence of the p factor, GFP, and g-PD. In Study 1, a combined model extracting all three factors from self-report data simultaneously found high convergence. The findings for the g-PD and GFP were replicated in Study 2 using multimethod data, wherein the GFP and the g-PD were extracted from a community sample of 1,630 older adults and correlated with an index of maladaptivity. The present findings support the position that general factors of psychopathology, personality disorder, and personality are likely to entail a common individual differences continuum, which may impact on how these general factors are to be understood.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)581-589
Number of pages9
JournalClinical Psychological Science
Volume6
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 1 2018

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This research was supported by National Institute on Aging Grants F31-AG055233 and R01-AG045231 and by National Institute of Mental Health Grant R01-MH077840.

Funding Information:
We thank the St. Louis Personality & Aging Network (SPAN) Study Lab for data collection, Michael Boudreaux for data management, and David Dueber and Michael Toland for statistical consultation. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. This research was supported by National Institute on Aging Grants F31-AG055233 and R01-AG045231 and by National Institute of Mental Health Grant R01-MH077840.

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2018.

Keywords

  • dimensional vs. categorical
  • individual differences
  • personality
  • personality disorder
  • psychopathology

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Clinical Psychology

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