Normal personality traits and comorbidity among phobic, panic and major depressive disorders

High comorbidity among anxiety and depressive conditions is a consistent bu t not well-understood finding. The current study examines how normal person ality traits relate to this comorbidity. In the Baltimore Epidemiologic Cat chment Area Follow-up Study, psychiatrists administered the full Schedules for Clinical Assessment in Neuropsychiatry to 320 subjects, all of whom com pleted the Revised NEO Personality Inventory. The disorders of interest wer e simple phobia, social phobia, agoraphobia, panic disorder. and major depr ession. Analyses were carried out with second-order generalized estimating equations. The unadjusted summary odds ratio (SOR - or weighted mean odds r atio) for all five disorders was 1.72 (95% confidence interval = 1.21-2.-16 ). Neuroticism, introversion, younger age, and female gender were all signi ficant predictors of prevalence of disorders. After adjustment for the rela tionships between these personality and demographic predictors and prevalen ce, the association among disorders was much with high extraversion had a S OR 213% as high (95% CI = 102-444%) as those with low extraversion (1.60 vs . 0.75). Therefore, neuroticism and introversion are associated with increa sed comorbidity due to relationships in common with the prevalence of the d ifferent disorders. In contrast. extraversion is associated with increased comorbidity per se. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reser ved.