Traits and categories of personality disorder

Categories of personality disorder

Current UK guidance says that when a health professional diagnoses personality disorder, they should categorise it. The categories relate to how severely it impacts your day-to-day life. And how it affects your relationships with others.

You may hear one of these terms to describe your experiences:

• Personality difficulty
• Mild personality disorder
• Moderate personality disorder
• Severe personality disorder

You may not agree with healthcare professionals. Or you may feel like none of these diagnoses reflect your experiences.

For example, you may feel misunderstood if they describe your experiences as mild. They might not feel mild to you.

But these terms are meant to help find the best treatment for you. And the language is always changing.

Traits of personality disorder

If you're diagnosed with personality disorder, your behaviour or experiences may also be described using traits.

Traits are not specific diagnoses in themselves. But they may help professionals find the best treatment for you.

The traits describe sets of feelings and behaviours. And they can overlap. Your diagnosis might include one trait, or a few different ones.

But if you're diagnosed with personality disorder, this doesn't mean all of these traits apply to you.

Experiencing difficult emotions - some doctors may describe this trait as negative affectivity.

They might include this trait in your diagnosis if they think that you:

• Experience emotions very intensely
• React very negatively to criticism, problems or setbacks
• Get easily frustrated and upset
• Have low self-esteem or self-confidence
• Find it difficult to trust other people

Feeling detached from others - some doctors may describe this trait as detachment. 

They might include this trait in your diagnosis if they think that you: 

• Avoid social interactions, friendships, relationships and intimacy
• Look for opportunities that involve little or no contact with others
• Find it difficult to talk about or express how you feel
• Are unresponsive to things that others might find emotional
• Struggle to feel pleasure or take interest in things, or find things enjoyable

Difficulty feeling empathy for others - some doctors may describe this trait as dissociality.

They might include this trait in your diagnosis if they believe that you: 

• Put your needs and desires above other people's
• Believe that there are special reasons that make you different, better or more deserving than others
• Have problems with empathy – for example, not feeling or showing guilt if you hurt someone
• Show signs of manipulative behaviour
• Want attention, and get very upset when you feel like people don't notice you

Impulsive behavior - some doctors describe this trait as disinhibition.

They might include this trait in your diagnosis if they believe that you:

• Make immediate decisions without thinking about the consequences for yourself or others
• Act impulsively and do things that could harm you, such as gambling, self-harm, using drugs or driving dangerously
• Get easily distracted and find it difficult to stay focused on or complete tasks
• Get bored easily and frustrated with routines
• Find it difficult to keep to deadlines, for example struggling to pay bills and getting into debt

Perfectionism - some doctors describe this trait as anankastia.

They might include this trait in your diagnosis if they believe that you:

• Need to keep everything in order and under control
• Set unrealistically high standards for yourself and others
• Find it difficult to be flexible in how you think about things
• Believe very strongly in rules, and about what is 'right' or 'wrong'
• Think yours is the best way of doing things
• Worry about you or others making mistakes
• Feel very anxious if things aren't 'perfect'
• Find it difficult to make decisions
• Struggle to maintain relationships if others do not conform to these standards

Borderline pattern - the borderline pattern trait has the same signs as borderline personality disorder (BPD).