ON THE QUESTION OF SPECIFIC PERSONALITY-C HARACTERISTICS IN PATIENTS WITH CROHNS-DISEASE - RESULTS OF A CLUSTER-ANALYSIS

The aim of this study was to find out, if patients with Crohn's diseas e share some personality traits or if it makes more sense to separate them into subgroups. Therefore, 52 patients took part in a psychoanaly tic interview. The interview was composed in order to check personalit y characteristics as they were named in the literature. However, there could not be found any specific personality traits, but a cluster ana lysis revealed 7 subgroups. Two larger subgroups, together 22 patients , consisted of patients with inhibited aggression, who were closely co nnected to their families and showed illness inciting stressful life e vents. Another subgroup, 11 patients, showed a marked undependend, agg ressive and illness-dissimulating behavior. The hypothesis of a specif ic personality structure has to be rejected.