Personality (or axis II) disorders are common, disabling and highly co-morbid with important axis I psychiatric disorders such as major depression and anxiety disorders as well as alcohol abuse/dependence. Personality disorders (PDs) aggregate in families, and existing twin studies suggest this familial aggregation is due partly to genetic factors. However these were based on modest-sized clinical samples or self-report questionnaires and have not been confirmed by an interview-based epidemiologic twin study of PDs. The goal of this application is to conduct detailed analysis of a population-based study of young adult twins in Norway assessed using personal interviews for the lifetime history of both major axis I psychiatric and substance use disorders and all axis II disorders. Data collection -- supported from Norwegian sources --is now 94% complete, and will be finished by 9/30/03 resulting in 1,400 complete twin pairs. We will conduct an extensive series of analyses on this rich data set using both standard and recently developed statistical tools.
Aims i nclude: i) examine and correct for attrition effects in the registry; ii) apply both factor and IRT models to generate empirical PD scales; iii) conducting univariate twin analyses to clarify the etiologic role of genetic, shared-environmental and individual specific environment factors for personality disorder traits (PDTs); iv) performing multivariate twin analyses to understand the sources of covariation between both individual PDTs and PD clusters; v) examining a series of theory-driven bivariate twin analyses to determine the degree to which selected pairs of axis I disorders and PDTs reflect the similar or distinct genetic and environmental risk factors such as Major Depression (MD) and Depressive and Borderline PD, Social phobia and Avoidant PD, and Alcohol Abuse/Dependence and Antisocial PD; vi) examine etiologic links between PDs and prospectively collected data on pregnancy and birth complications and vii) attempt to replicate key findings emerging from an on-going study of axis I Disorders in the Virginia Twin Registry. This study has the capacity to address several key and largely unanswered empirical questions about PDs, the answers to which will be critical for proposed revisions in DSM-V.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01MH068643-03
Application #
7017797
Study Section
Behavioral Genetics and Epidemiology Study Section (BGES)
Program Officer
Breiling, James P
Project Start
2004-05-18
Project End
2008-02-29
Budget Start
2006-03-01
Budget End
2007-02-28
Support Year
3
Fiscal Year
2006
Total Cost
$301,220
Indirect Cost
Name
Virginia Commonwealth University
Department
Psychiatry
Type
Schools of Medicine
DUNS #
105300446
City
Richmond
State
VA
Country
United States
Zip Code
23298
Torvik, F A; Ystrom, E; Gustavson, K et al. (2018) Diagnostic and genetic overlap of three common mental disorders in structured interviews and health registries. Acta Psychiatr Scand 137:54-64
Gustavson, Kristin; Knudsen, Ann Kristin; Nesvåg, Ragnar et al. (2018) Prevalence and stability of mental disorders among young adults: findings from a longitudinal study. BMC Psychiatry 18:65
Czajkowski, Nikolai; Aggen, Steven H; Krueger, Robert F et al. (2018) A Twin Study of Normative Personality and DSM-IV Personality Disorder Criterion Counts: Evidence for Separate Genetic Influences. Am J Psychiatry 175:649-656
Torvik, Fartein Ask; Rosenström, Tom Henrik; Ystrom, Eivind et al. (2017) Stability and change in etiological factors for alcohol use disorder and major depression. J Abnorm Psychol 126:812-822
Sheerin, Christina; Berenz, Erin C; Knudsen, Gun Peggy et al. (2016) A population-based study of help seeking and self-medication among trauma-exposed individuals. Psychol Addict Behav 30:771-777
Østby, Kristian Amundsen; Czajkowski, Nikolai; Knudsen, Gun Peggy et al. (2016) Does low alcohol use increase the risk of sickness absence? A discordant twin study. BMC Public Health 16:825
Welander-Vatn, A; Ystrom, E; Tambs, K et al. (2016) The relationship between anxiety disorders and dimensional representations of DSM-IV personality disorders: A co-twin control study. J Affect Disord 190:349-356
Torvik, Fartein Ask; Welander-Vatn, Audun; Ystrom, Eivind et al. (2016) Longitudinal associations between social anxiety disorder and avoidant personality disorder: A twin study. J Abnorm Psychol 125:114-124
Gjerde, L C; Czajkowski, N; Røysamb, E et al. (2015) A longitudinal, population-based twin study of avoidant and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder traits from early to middle adulthood. Psychol Med 45:3539-48
Reichborn-Kjennerud, T; Czajkowski, N; Ystrøm, E et al. (2015) A longitudinal twin study of borderline and antisocial personality disorder traits in early to middle adulthood. Psychol Med 45:3121-31

Showing the most recent 10 out of 59 publications