Associating Internalizing and Externalizing Symptom Features With the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 Brief Form (PID-5-BF) in a Large Community Sample

Abstract

The Personality Inventory for DSM-5-Brief Form (PID-5-BF) is a relatively novel measure assessing maladaptive personality traits. We examined whether PID-5-BF traits are associated with non-personality measures of wellbeing in N = 661 Canadian adults in the community. Depression, anxiety, and perceived stress measures were obtained, as were indices of alcohol and cannabis use. Symptoms of depression and perceived stress were associated with all PID-5-BF dimensions, except for antagonism. Anxiety symptoms were associated with negative affectivity (NA) and, to a lesser extent, psychoticism. A younger age and female sex were related to higher depression and stress scores. In contrast to the models assessing depressive, anxiety and stress symptoms, in which NA was the strongest contributor, no significant contribution of internalizing traits (i.e., PID-5-BF NA) on substance use outcomes was found when externalizing traits were included in the models. Specifically, binge drinking and cannabis use were associated with higher disinhibition scores and lower psychoticism scores. Regression models were substantially weaker for substance use than for the mood and stress symptoms. Younger individuals used more cannabis and males engaged in more binge drinking. These findings largely confirm PID-5-BF’s construct validity, and indicate that various indices of wellbeing (not necessarily personality-associated measures) are associated with personality traits, as measured with the brief from of PID-5-BF.