Open AccessScreening for personality disorder: a comparison of personality disorder assessment by patients and informants
Author(s) -
Walters Paul,
Moran Paul,
Choudhury Partha,
Lee Tennyson,
Mann Anthony
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
international journal of methods in psychiatric research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.275
H-Index - 73
eISSN - 1557-0657
pISSN - 1049-8931
DOI - 10.1002/mpr.162
Subject(s) - personality , personality disorders , psychology , personality assessment inventory , clinical psychology , kappa , population , borderline personality disorder , psychiatry , medicine , social psychology , linguistics , philosophy , environmental health
The Structured Clinical Interview for DSM‐IV Personality Disorders (SCID‐II Version 2.0) is becoming the most favoured instrument to measure personality disorder but takes up to an hour to complete. The Standardized Assessment of Personality (SAP), an informant‐based measure, takes 10 to 15 minutes to complete. Both instruments have been validated independently. This study aimed to determine whether the SAP is a suitable screening instrument for personality disorder as measured by the SCID‐II. Fifty‐seven psychiatric patients were assessed for personality disorder using both the SAP and the SCID‐II. The SAP assessments were conducted blind to the results of the SCID‐II assessments. Agreement between the two instruments in this population was low (kappa = 0.3). The level of agreement differed between personality disorder categories, ranging from kappa = 0.4 (antisocial) to −0.1 (narcissistic). In this population of patients, the SAP proved to be a poor screen for the SCID‐II. The study highlights the discrepancy between informant and self‐report assessments for personality disorder. Copyright © 2004 Whurr Publishers Ltd.