No abstract

The issue of comorbidity within the Axis II personality disorders was explored using a large sample of university students who were administered the Coolidge Axis II Inventory (CATI). Comorbidity patterns with this normal sample were compared with recent clinical data reported by several other researchers. The results confirm the high degree of comorbidity within Axis II and the similarity in the comorbidity patterns with clinical and nonclinical samples. With the CATI, a 30.4% comorbidity rate was obtained for Histrionic and Narcissistic Personality disorders (Pd). The paranoid, passive-aggressive and borderline personality disorder traits were comorbid with several other Pds. For Cluster A, there was low comorbidity except for Paranoid Pd and Schizotypal Pd. With Cluster B, the co-occurrence was moderate to strong. A moderate amount of interrelationship was obtained for the Cluster C Pds. The DSM-IV clusters were also strongly interrelated. An additional finding was the similarity between self-report and structured interview methodology in obtained personality disorder comorbidity.

In this cross-cultural study of stress and coping, students in India (n = 198) and Canada (n = 344) were compared with respect to stress, coping, and selected psychosocial variables, namely, locus of control, self-esteem, life orientation (optimism-pessimism), and social support. The two main hypotheses postulated that, compared to the Canadian students, Indian students would experience more stress and would prefer emotion-focused coping strategies for dealing with stress. It was also predicted that the Indian students would have an external locus of control, low self-esteem, pessimistic life orientation, and greater social support satisfaction. The results reveal instead that the Indian students report less stress than the Canadian students and prefer emotion-focused coping strategies. The Indian students score higher on chance control, but are similar to the Canadian students on powerful others and internal control. The Indian students are less satisfied with social support than are their Canadian counterparts.

This cross-cultural research study aimed to explore the relationship of stress and coping with psychological illness or symptoms among university students in Canada and India. The predictor variables were stress (hassles and life experience), 8 ways of coping (Folkman & Lazarus, 1988), and selected personal-social variables, namely, locus of control, self-esteem, and social support. The criterion variables were 9 psychological symptoms of the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI;Derogatis & Spencer, 1982). The results revealed that the Indian students reported more psychological symptoms compared to the Canadian students. Stepwise multiple-regression analyses also revealed considerable differences between the 2 samples with respect to the contribution of predictor variables in accounting for variance in the BSI scales.

This research examined the efficacy of the 40-item Defense Style Questionnaire (DSQ-40), measuring mature, neurotic and immature defense styles, to predict DSM-III-R personality disorders. The Coolidge Axis II Inventory, the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II, and the MMPI personality disorder scales were used to measure 11 personality disorders in a nonclinical sample. The results show that most personality disorders are positively associated with the highly maladaptive immature defense style, and negatively associated with the mature defense style. Multiple regression analyses reveal that the combined variance accounted for by the defense styles range from 12% to 42% on the CATI, 3% to 42% on the MCMI-II, and 2% to 32% on the MMPI-PD. However, specific personality disorders cannot be predicted with the defense styles on any measure.