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Personality structure in the paranoid psychoses of later life

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 April 2020

R Howard  and
R Levy
R Howard
Affiliation:
Section of Old Age Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, DeCrespigny Park, Camberwell, London, SE5 8AF, UK
R Levy
Affiliation:
Section of Old Age Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, DeCrespigny Park, Camberwell, London, SE5 8AF, UK
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Summary

Abnormal premorbid personality has long been considered to be an important feature of patients who develop schizophrenia, or schizophrenic-like psychoses late in life. Schizoid and paranoid personality traits in particular are repeatedly reported to have preceded the development of psychosis by many years. Such personality abnormalities have been viewed as part of a schizophrenic spectrum disorder, causally invoked in the aetiology of psychosis, or even regarded as an adaptive protection of vulnerable individuals against psychotic breakdown. An ICD-10 diagnosable personality disorder, however, is seen in only about 50% of patients who develop a paranoid psychosis late in life. The premorbid personality abnormalities encountered in late-onset paranoid states and delusional disorder are different from those reported in schizophrenia and there appears to be a genetic basis for these differences. The role of such personality disturbance in the aetiology of psychosis is controversial but probably only minor.

Keywords

premorbid personalitypersonality disorderlate-life paranoid states or late paraphrenialate-onset schizophrenia

Information

Type
Review
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 8 , Issue 2 , 1993 , pp. 59 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © Elsevier, Paris 1993

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