Dimensional models of personality disorder

Abstract

There is little doubt that someday the classification of personality disorder will be dimensional. The failures of the categorical model are so many and are so well established that it is difficult to imagine that this model will ultimately survive. This paper provides a brief discussion of the major alternative proposals for a dimensional classification of personality disorder. It is possible that the authors of a future edition of a psychiatric diagnostic manual will simply choose one of these alternative proposals. However, the ideal solution might be to develop a common, integrative representation including the important contributions of each of the models.

Keywords: Personality disorder; categorical; classification; dimensional.