Personality and psychosis: use of the Standardized Assessment of Personality

The Standardized Assessment of Personality, a semistructured interview for use with an informant, was used with a relative or a close friend to determine the premorbid personality of 100 consecutive patients admitted with major psychiatric disorders - major affective disorders (18 manics, 35 depressives), schizophrenia (28) and other functional psychoses (19). Forty-four per cent of the entire sample had an abnormal personality as defined by the presence of one of 10 prominent traits to a marked degree. A further 6% had the same traits to a lesser degree. The proportion of patients with an abnormal personality (all types) was comparable across the four diagnostic groups (manics 39%, depressives 54%, schizophrenics 39%, other functional psychotics 37%). However, if one included all traits (marked and mild), patients with an affective disorder had more between them than did the non-affective groups. This difference was largely accounted for by cyclothymic, anxious and obsessional traits. The schizophrenics and other functional psychotics had surprisingly few prominent traits and, in particular, a schizoid personality rarely preceded a schizophrenic illness.