PERSONALITY-RESEARCH IN DENMARK

Psychiatric population research in Denmark has been facilitated by the existence of various national registers, especially the National Psyc hiatric Register and the Adoption and Twin Registers. A number of impo rtant American-Danish collaborative studies have been performed in the areas of the schizophrenic spectrum disorders, alcoholism, antisocial personality, and suicide using high-risk and adoption samples. The Na tional Psychiatric Register has also been used in prevalence studies o f inpatient populations. Other than notable case studies of criminal p sychopaths, no well-designed clinical studies on personality disorders have been carried out in Denmark. Epidemiological studies on phenotyp ical differences and similarities in early-separated twin and psycholo gical studies on men with sex cromosome aberrations have contributed t o the understanding of normal personality and genetics. Overall the Da nish contributions to the research in the behavioral domain suggest st rong genetic and biological factors in normal and in abnormal personal ity. Further, the studies suggest that if genetic factors are not take n into account, then studies on environmental predisposing factors are confounded with hereditary factors.