PREMORBID PERSONALITY IN PATIENTS WITH UNI-POLAR AND BIPOLAR AFFECTIVE-DISORDERS AND CONTROLS - ASSESSMENT BY THE BIOGRAPHICAL PERSONALITY INTERVIEW (BPI)

The relationship between premorbid personality and subtypes of affecti ve disorder was investigated by means of the Biographical Personality Interview (BPI) and by a self-rating scale. Interviewer and rater (BPI ) were blind to diagnosis. A total of 52 patients with unipolar depres sion or bipolar II disorder (D/Dm), 32 bipolar-I patients (DM) and 39 control subjects (C) were examined. Expert rating of ''typus melanchol icus'' features (BPI) were found to be more pronounced in D/Dm than in DM and C. ''Typus manicus'' features were also distinguished between both clinical groups, whereas anxious-insecure features were not signi ficantly different between the groups of patients. In contrast to the expert-rated personality variants, self-rating of personality features did not reveal any significant differences between the two clinical g roups. Potential sources of the discrepancies between the questionnair e data and the interview data are discussed. It is concluded that prem orbid features of ''typus manicus'' and ''typus melancholicus'' predic ted, respectively, a predominant manic and a predominant depressive co urse of an affective disorder.