COMPARING METHODS TO MODEL STABILITY AND CHANGE IN PERSONALITY AND ITS ...

117 Pages·2012·1.44 MB·English

by  Aidan Wright

The Pennsylvania State University
The Graduate School
College of the Liberal Arts

COMPARING METHODS TO MODEL STABILITY AND CHANGE IN
PERSONALITY AND ITS PATHOLOGY

A Dissertation in
Psychology

by
Aidan Gregory Craver Wright

© 2012 Aidan Gregory Craver Wright

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy

August 2012
ii

The dissertation of Aidan Gregory Craver Wright was reviewed and approved* by the following:

Aaron L. Pincus
Professor of Psychology
Dissertation Advisor
Chair of Committee

David E. Conroy
Professor of Kinesiology and Human Development and Family Studies

Kenneth N. Levy
Associate Professor of Psychology

D. Wayne Osgood
Professor of Sociology

Melvin M. Mark
Professor of Psychology
Head of Department of Psychology

*Signatures are on file at the Graduate School.
iii

ABSTRACT
As it stands now, the psychopathology of personality disorders (PD) is at a crossroads,
and there is little agreement on the best way to conceptualize and define PD. This lack of
consensus has led to problems not only in the basic definition of PD, including the accurate
description of the structure, course, and risk/protective factors of the disorders, but this
disagreement also threatens the advance of future science, and imperils attempts to develop
appropriate assessment and effective interventions for this debilitating group of disorders. The
current work builds on past cross-sectional work that has shown that PD and personality traits
are consistently and significantly related, and longitudinal work that has shown that both PD and
personality are plastic and change across time. Three studies using the Longitudinal Study of
Personality Disorders were conducted to address questions about the long-term stability of
interpersonal aspects of personality, the implications of PD symptom distribution on models
relating personality and PD, and the longitudinal relationship between personality and PD. Each
of these questions has important bearing on the manner in which we understand the development
of personality, PD, and the relationship between the two. The results of these studies demonstrate
that 1) interpersonal style is highly stable but mutable, depending in part on how change and
stability are operationalized; 2) non-normal distributional assumptions provide a better fit for
models of the relationship between PD and normative personality structure; and 3) individual
growth in personality is associated with concurrent growth in avoidant PD symptoms. Results of
the proposed study have implications for the ongoing efforts to establish the appropriate
definition, diagnosis, and treatment of PD.
iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
List of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………..vi

List of Tables.….….….….….…………………………………………………………………vii

Acknowledgements ..…………………………………………………………………………viii

Dedication………...……………………………………………………………….……………x

Chapter 1: General Introduction…………………………………………………………..……1

Chapter 2: Interpersonal Development, Stability, and Change in Early Adulthood…………...4

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………….4
Standard Approaches to Measuring Development, Stability, and Change……..7
Circumplex Parameters: Multivariate Tests of Development, Stability, and
Change………………………………………………………………………....11
Method.………………………………………………………………………………..16
Participants.…….……………………………………………………………...16
Procedure.……………………………………………………………………...17
Measures……………………………………………………………………….17
Analysis and Results…………………………………………………………………...18
Standard Analyses of Stability/Change………………………………………...18
Stability and Change of Circumplex Parameters………………………………23
Discussion……………………………………………………………………………...26
Limitations……………………………………………………………………..30
Future Directions…………………………………………………………….…31
Conclusion………………………………………………………………….…..32

Chapter 3: An Empirical Examination of Distributional Assumptions Underlying the
Relationship between Personality Disorder Symptoms and Personality Traits…….…40

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………...40
Continuity and Discontinuity in Personality and its Pathology……………….40
Abnormal Personality, Non-Normal Distributions, and Alternative Models.....43
The Current Study…………………………………………………………..…46
Method……………………………………………………………………….……..…48
Participants………………………………………………………………….....48
Procedure…………………………………………………………………..…..48
Measures…………………………………………………………………….....49
Results………………………………………………………………………………....50
Model Fit……………………………………………………………………....51
PAGE
v

Substantive Comparison of Models…………………………………………...52
Discussion……………………………………………………………………………..55
Implications for Modeling…………………………………………………….55
Implications for the Relationship between Personality and PD………………56
Limitations…………………………………………………………………….60
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….60

Chapter 4: A Parallel Process Growth Model of Avoidant Personality Disorder Symptoms and
Personality Traits……………………………………………………………………...70
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………...70
The Current Study…………………………………………………………….73
Method………………………………………………………………………………..74
Participants……………………………………………………………………74
Procedure……………………………………………………………………...75
Measures………………………………………………………………………75
Data Analysis………………………………………………………………….76
Results…………………………………………………………………………………78
Discussion……………………………………………………………………………..79
Limitations…………………………………………………………………….82

Chapter 5: General Conclusion………………………………………………………………..87

References……………………………………………………………………………………..92
vi

LIST OF FIGURES

FIGURE PAGE

2.1 The interpersonal circumplex…………………………………………………………38

2.2 Example of structural summary parameters of a cosine curve……………………….39

3.1 Normal distribution fit to observed narcissistic personality disorder features……….66

3.2 Poisson and negative-binomial distributions fit to observed LSPD narcissistic
personality disorder features………………………………………………………….67

3.3 Representation of negative-binomial hurdle model for LSPD narcissistic
personality disorder symptoms……………………………………………………….68

3.4 Scatter plots of personality trait scores and NPD features…………………………...69

4.1 Conceptual diagram of the parallel process growth model…………………………..86
vii

LIST OF TABLES
TABLE PAGE

2.1 Descriptive statistics and rank order stability coefficients for the
interpersonal scales…………………………………………………………………….33

2.2 Growth models for the interpersonal scales……………………………………………34

2.3 Descriptive statistics for ipsative and circular variables……………………………….35

2.4 Correlations of circumplex measures with flux……………………………………….36

2.5 Correlations of structural summary statistics and IPC dimensions with spin,
pulse, D2, and q-correlations…………………………………………………………...37

3.1 Summary of Akaike and Bayesian information criteria for estimated models………..62

3.2 Summary of coefficients from models regressing personality disorder
symptoms on personality traits………………………………………………………...64

4.1 Parameter estimates and indices of fit for the five estimated parallel process
growth models…………………………………………………………………………85
viii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Agency without communion is no virtue; there are many who share this accomplishment
with me and who deserve my thanks. The data for these papers was graciously provided by
Mark F. Lenzenweger, who is remarkable for his generosity, kindness, and continues to be a
phenomenal collaborator. I am also indebted to the participants of the Longitudinal Study of
Personality Disorder, wherever they may find themselves. More broadly, I am grateful for the
faculty, staff, and graduate students of the Pennsylvania State University Department of
Psychology and Psychological Clinic, it is an idyllic environment in which to study and grow.
The contributions of clients and patients deserve mentioning, their lessons are in some ways the
most valuable and they permeate my thinking. I am honored and thankful to have David E.
Conroy, Kenneth N. Levy, and Wayne Osgood on my dissertation committee, and for their help
and advice along the way. This project would not have been possible without funding provided
by the National Institute of Mental Health (F31MH087053), the help provided by the PSU
Grants Office, and many others who supported that process.
All of my friends have taught me much, and I appreciate all the fun we have had over the
years. I appreciate the camaraderie and friendship offered by the graduate students from the
Personality Laboratory, and the additional mentorship offered by Emily B. Ansell, Nicole M.
Cain, and Mark R. Lukowitsky. Special thanks are due to Christopher J. Hopwood, who, as fate
would have it, was not a labmate, but continues to be a cherished colleague and friend.
I am indebted to my wife, Rachel L. Bachrach, for sharing her kindness, wit, humor, and
sharp mind. She propels me to work hard, and I owe her more than anyone for her love and
support. I look forward to our life together every day. Through some combination of genes and
environment, I have acquired from my parents and grandparents a strong, but late-blooming
ix

work-ethic, a knack for both pragmatism and flights of fancy, an analytical mind, and a keen
interest in the human condition. For these gifts, and their continued love and support, I am
grateful.
Most of all, I thank Aaron L. Pincus. Luckily for me, he can be coaxed in to taking
gambles from time to time, and I think this one has paid off. I cannot express how grateful I am
for his mentoring; he shares his compassion, wisdom, time, and effort generously, and expects
relatively little in return. He has been an unparalleled teacher, collaborator, advisor, and friend.
x

DEDICATION

To Rachel