Trait and behavioral prototypes of personality disorder.

The author reports a survey of the clinical features used by psychiatrists to diagnose personality disorders. The purpose was to develop definitions of these disorders and to identify behavioral features that could be used as diagnostic criteria. Psychiatrists rated trait and behavioral items describing each disorder for the degree to which they were prototypical of the disorder. Judgments of the prototypical quality of traits and behaviors were found to be equally reliable. Given that behavioral criteria require less inferential judgment, subsequent revisions of criteria to assess personality disorders can employ behavioral criteria in the expectation of improved reliability without loss of validity.