Hierarchical taxonomy of psychopathology across development: Associations with personality

Abstract Normal-range personality provides a framework for the hierarchical organization of psychopathology. However, little is known about how personality-psychopathology associations differentiate across this hierarchy. The developmental aspects of this hierarchy and its personality framework are also understudied. We used National Comorbidity Survey data to construct bass-ackwards comorbidity models in age groups ranging from adolescence to middle adulthood and related the resulting dimensions to neuroticism, extraversion, and openness. Neuroticism showed stronger associations with internalizing versus externalizing and with broader versus narrower psychopathology dimensions. Extraversion showed comparatively weaker associations at all levels of psychopathology hierarchy. Openness was generally unrelated to psychopathology. Results were consistent across age groups, suggesting that psychopathology hierarchy and its relations with personality are largely stable across adolescence and adulthood.