Validity of the DSM–5 Levels of Personality Functioning Scale–Self Report

Abstract

In this study we examined the structure, reliability, and validity of the Levels of Personality Functioning Scale-Self Report (LPFS-SR) in 3 large community samples. The LPFS-SR is a questionnaire with content that corresponds directly to the DSM-5 alternative model of personality disorders, Criterion A. We found that the LPFS-SR was highly reliable across a brief retest interval. LPFS-SR scores correlated substantially with a wide range of maladaptive personality traits, personality disorder constructs, and interpersonal problems. The LPFS-SR did not correlate as strongly with aspects of personality with less clear relations to distress and dysfunction. Data further support that identity, self-direction, intimacy, and empathy components of the LPFS-SR can be characterized by a single factor and have similar correlations with criterion variables, consistent with the hypothesis that DSM-5 Criterion A is a relatively homogeneous construct. Overall, these results support the validity of the LPFS-SR, highlight important issues in assessing personality pathology, and point toward novel avenues for research on personality disorder classification.

Levels of Personality Functioning Predicting Daily Affect Stress and Self-Efficacy

“…However, we did not find significant direct effects of personality dysfunction on self-efficacy after controlling for individual differences in affect, suggesting that affective tendencies are stronger predictors of self-efficacy than overall personality dysfunction. However, considering that higher negative affect and affective instability are associated with personality dysfunction at the between-person level (Hopwood et al, 2018;Morey, 2017), a more likely explanation is that affective tendencies are embedded into personality dysfunction, and the elements that are not Our moderation results extend past findings to confirm that people with higher personality dysfunction do report lower willpower and higher distress intolerance in daily life, specifically when experiencing fewer positive emotions. This finding that self-efficacy and positive affect were more strongly related for people with personality dysfunction likely reflects the idea of emotion-related impulsivity (Carver & Johnson, 2018), or a reduced sense of agency in responding to emotions.…”

“…In the present research, only total scores were calculated because total scores are thought to be as or more useful than the scores for each of the dimensions, as those the subscales tend to be strongly correlated (e.g. Morey, 2017;Hopwood, Good, & Morey, 2018). Note that there is no alpha given for reliability because items central to the core of personality dysfunction are weighted more heavily in the score.…”

Personality Constructs and Paradigms in the AlternativeDSM-5Model of Personality Disorder

“…Given the range of personality constructs and paradigms represented within AMPD, our results provide implications for assessment of Criterion A and B. The AMPD may be assessed by a variety of methods, such as self-report (e.g., PID-5, LPFS-Self Report; Morey, 2017;Hopwood, Good, & Morey, 2018), as well as clinician ratings from the DSM-5, Section III (APA, 2013). Yet, the assessment strategy of multi-method assessment may be particularly germane.…”

“…We also note that the LPFS was not originally designed to be used as a 60item scale. However, others have examined it in this fashion (Zimmermann et al 2015), and a multi-item self-report version shows strong psychometric properties (Hopwood et al, 2018;Morey, 2017).…”

A Brief but Comprehensive Review of Research on the Alternative DSM-5 Model for Personality Disorders

“…Internal consistency of the LPFS total score has been shown to be acceptable when computed based on ratings of the four domains [40,42] and very high when computed based on ratings of subdomains [34,46,48,135] or individual items [29, 51, 136••]. Moreover, the four domains [27,29,43,46,51,136••] and the 12 subdomains [47••] also showed rather high internal consistency. Most subdomains appear to be unidimensional, albeit this may not be true for all of them (e.g., desire and capacity for closeness is probably more heterogeneous) [47••].…”