TITLE:
Empirical Evidence for a New Class of Personality Disorder: The Safety-Oriented Personality Style or Phobicentric Psychopathology (SOPS/PCP) and Impact on Personality Psychology
AUTHORS:
Patrick Bickersteth, Xinxin Zhang, Qi Guo
KEYWORDS:
Fear-Anxiety, Big 5, DSM, Emotion-Based, Contemporary Integrative Interpersonal Theory, Interpersonal Relatedness & Self-Definition
JOURNAL NAME:
Psychology,
Vol.9 No.7,
July
10,
2018
ABSTRACT: This study is aimed at establishing that the Safety-Oriented Personality Style (SOPS) or Phobicentric Psychopathology (PCP) is an actual mental disorder representing a disproportionate, self-focused pattern of reacting to ordinary fear-anxiety situations. SOPS/PCP is most similar to Neuroticism in the widely accepted Big 5 model. The presentation of personality within a dimensional structure is in contradistinction to that of the lately criticized category-based Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM). Nonetheless contrasting both Big 5 and DSM, a neuro-biological theory provided the SOPS/PCP construct with etiological capability to empirically explain progress of the condition from normal to dysfunctional functioning, thus linking it with day-to-day emotional life. From a sample of 406 adults, who participated in confirming respectively that SOPS/PCP is present outside the clinical setting and is a real-world empirical condition, 100 individuals were randomly selected to examine the reliability and validity of the SOPS/PCP Individual Questionnaire (SOPSIQ). The results confirmed SOPS/PCP is an actual mental disorder, which is absent in some people and supported all the hypotheses in relation to the research objectives. In rivalry with three prominent formulations of personality, DSM, Big 5 and Interpersonal Relatedness & Self-Definition (IR), which is related to Contemporary Integrative Interpersonal Theory (CIIT), that of SOPS/PCP is presented as aspiring to be a more accurate elucidation of personality. Implications discussed also include suggesting DSM’s new categorical-dimensional platform is fatally flawed and questioning the investigative legitimacy of both the Big 5 and IR/CIIT. Among other ideas, it is suggested that SOPS/PCP might provide Big 5 with a presumptive etiological base; and that the behavior-to-theory approach of SOPS/PCP would be more research-friendly than the theory-to-behavior orientation prevalent in personality research. By describing personality functioning and its supporting theory as emotion-rooted this study recommends such a perspective makes it more practical to reliably define, track and eventually treat personality disorders.