Relationship between personality disorder symptoms and temperament in the young male general population of South Korea.

The aim of the present study was to identify the characteristics of temperament and character in personality disorder symptoms in the young male general population. A total of 585 male subjects from the same community were included in the study (mean age, 19.06 ± 0.26 years). There was no difference in socioeconomic and educational background. Subjects completed the Personality Dis- order Questionnaire-IV+ (PDQ-IV+) and Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI). There were unique correlations between each personality disorder symptom and four temperament pro- files. When classification was done through three cluster symptoms by DSM-IV, cluster A symp- toms were most strongly associated with low reward dependence (r = −0.46), cluster B with high novelty seeking (r = 0.33), and cluster C with high harm avoidance (r = 0.47). The character dimen- sion, self-directedness was the most powerful predictor of the presence of any personality disor- ders. In homogenous male general population, unique combinations were found between temperament and each personality disorders. Although the subjects were relatively young and therefore their characters had not yet fully matured, character played an important role in the pres- ence of personality disorder. Temperament can be used to differentiate the personality symptoms and characters used to predict the presence of personality disorder.