PTypes - Personality Types

Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder

Leisurely Personality Type
Values of the Leisurely Type ^New!
Needs of the Leisurely Type ^New!

Perspectives q.v.

Disease
Dimensional
Behavior
Life Story

The Disease Perspective

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM-IV (American Psychiatric Association, 1994, pp. 634-635), for research purposes, describes Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder as a pervasive pattern of negativistic attitudes and passive resistance to demands for adequate performance, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by four (or more) of the following:

passively resists fulfilling routine social and occupational tasks;
complains of being misunderstood and unappreciated by others;
is sullen and argumentative;
unreasonably criticizes and scorns authority;
expresses envy and resentment toward those apparently more fortunate;
voices exaggerated and persistent complaints of personal misfortune;
alternates between hostile defiance and contrition.

The disorder does not occur exclusively during Major Depressive Episodes and is not better accounted for by Dysthymic Disorder.

The Dimensional Perspective

Here is a hypothetical profile, in terms of the five-factor model of personality, for Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder (speculatively constructed from McCrae, 1994, pg. 306):

High Neuroticism: Chronic negative affects, including anxiety, fearfulness, tension, irritability, anger, dejection, hopelessness, guilt, shame; difficulty in inhibiting impulses: for example, to eat, drink, or spend money; irrational beliefs: for example, unrealistic expectations, perfectionistic demands on self, unwarranted pessimism; unfounded somatic concerns; helplessness and dependence on others for emotional support and decision making.
High Extraversion: Excessive talking, leading to inappropriate self-disclosure and social friction; inability to spend time alone; attention seeking and overly dramatic expression of emotions; reckless excitement seeking; inappropriate attempts to dominate and control others.
Low Openness: Difficulty adapting to social or personal change; low tolerance or understanding of different points of view or lifestyles; emotional blandness and inability to understand and verbalize own feelings; alexythymia; constricted range of interests; insensitivity to art and beauty; excessive conformity to authority.
Low Agreeableness: Cynicism and paranoid thinking; inability to trust even friends or family; quarrelsomeness; too ready to pick fights; exploitive and manipulative; lying; rude and inconsiderate manner alienates friends, limits social support; lack of respect for social conventions can lead to troubles with the law; inflated and grandiose sense of self; arrogance.
High Conscientiousness: Overachievement: workaholic absorption in job or cause to the exclusion of family, social, and personal interests; compulsiveness, including excessive cleanliness, tidiness, and attention to detail; rigid self-discipline and an inability to set tasks aside and relax; lack of spontaneity; overscrupulousness in moral behavior.

Character Weaknesses and Vices*

procrastination
argumentativeness
dilatoriness at work
querulousness
obstructionistic behavior
scornful of authority
resentful of suggestions
"forgets" obligations
unaware of being incompetent

passive-aggressiveness, passiveness, contumaciousness, uncooperativeness, resentfulness, hostility, angriness, irritableness, argumentativeness, scornfulness, obstructionism, curmudgeonliness, procrastination, blamefulness, captiousness, nitpicking, contrariness, sulkiness, indecisiveness, stubbornness (Stone, 360-62).

negativism

idleness, inactiveness, indolence, laziness, slothfulness, sluggishness, clumsiness, dilatoriness, dullness, heaviness, inertness, unreadiness, slowness, dawdling, delaying, drowsiness, laggardness, lingering, malingering, slackness, carelessness, negligence, forgetfulness, tardiness, apathy, accidie, immobility, indifference, insensibility, lethargy, submissiveness, unassertiveness, unconcern, unfeelingness, oppositionalism.

Know Your Major Weaknesses

* Derived from Michael Stone's (23) list of the "personality traits" of DSM-III-R Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder.

The Behavior Perspective

Motivations

Behaviors

Associated Disorders

Depression (Styron).

The Life Story Perspective

Childhood

Common Character Disorder

Depressive

stoic explanation

Passive-Aggressive personality disorder is a typological representation of bad character, of a vicious disposition formed by habitual passion. Passions are, or are the results of, erroneous value-judgments. The objects of passion listed below (derived mostly from Beck, Freeman, and associates, 1990, pp. 45-46) are external, indifferent things that the Passive-Aggressive personality incorrectly judges to be good or bad. (Evolutionary Psychology and Behavior Genetics provide adequate scientific explanations of the origins of these impulses.) The cure of Passive-Aggressive personality disorder will require correcting these habitual, erroneous value-judgments by making proper use of impressions.

Niebuhrian / Horneyan explanation

Passive-Aggressive character disorder is a type of "solution" to the problem of anxiety; that is, it is a strategy to alleviate anxiety. The objects of desire and pleasure listed below (derived mostly from Beck, Freeman, and associates, 1990, pp. 45-46) are limited goods pridefully turned to for security when we fail to trust God. They are analogous to Karen Horney's "neurotic needs."
Karen Horney: Intrapsychic Strategies of Defense
The Self-Effacing Solution
"Even when we deeply value ourselves, the anxiety built into finitude will tempt us to find our source of security in some strategy rather than a trust in God" (Cooper, pg. 163).

False Value-Judgments

False Goods

False Bads

freedom to do as one pleases
oppositional style
the goodwill of authorities
recognition from authority figures
support of authority figures
benefits conferred by authorities
autonomy
passivity
submissivenes
self-sufficiency
strong figures
strong organizations
social approval
social support
attachment
social acceptance
the caring of others
doing things one's own way
deviousness
evasion or circumvention of rules
delaying tactics
the line of least resistance
solitary pursuits

compulsory activity
encroachment by others
intrusiveness of others
demandingness of others
interference by others
control by others
dominance by others
rules which restrict freedom of action
expectations of others, especially authority figures
compliance
competition
reprisals
the cutting off of "supplies"

Cognitive Effects

Basic Belief: I could be stepped on. [Strategy]: Resistance (Beck, Freeman & associates, pg. 26).
The "idealized self is made up of beliefs about how we should feel, think, or act" (Tamney, pg. 32).

Compulsive beliefs and attitudes are idols, too.

In Cognitive Therapy of Personality Disorders, Aaron T. Beck, Arthur Freeman, and associates (1990) list typical beliefs associated with each specific personality disorder. According to my view, the beliefs and attitudes rationalize and reinforce the idealized image and the compulsive attachments and aversions. They are analogous to Karen Horney's "shoulds" and "neurotic claims." Here are the typical beliefs that they have listed (pg. 360) for Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder:

I am self-sufficient, but I do need others to help me reach my goals.
The only way I can preserve my self-respect is by asserting myself indirectly�for example, by not carrying out instructions exactly.
I like to be attached to people but I am unwilling to pay the price of being dominated.
Authority figures tend to be intrusive, demanding, interfering, and controlling.
I have to resist the domination of authorities but at the same time maintain their approval and acceptance.
Being controlled or dominated by others is intolerable.
Making deadlines, complying with demands, and conforming are direct blows to my pride and self-sufficiency.
If I follow the rules the way people expect, it will inhibit my freedom of action.
It is best not to express my anger directly but to show my displeasure by not conforming.
I know what's best for me and other people shouldn't tell me what to do.
Rules are arbitrary and stifle me.
Other people are often too demanding.
If I regard people as too bossy, I have a right to disregard their demands.

Beck's Cognitive Therapy for Personality Disorders

American Psychiatric Association (1994). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM-IV. 4th ed. Washington: Author.

American Psychiatric Association (2000). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM-IV. 4th ed., text revision. Washington: Author.

Beck, Aaron T. and Freeman, Arthur M. and Associates (1990). Cognitive Therapy of Personality Disorders. New York : Guilford Press.

Beck, Aaron T. and Freeman, Arthur M. and Associates (2003). Cognitive Therapy of Personality Disorders, 2nd ed. New York : Guilford Press.

Cooper, Terry D. (2003). Sin, Pride, and Self-Acceptance: The Problem of Identity in Theology and Psychology. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

Gunderson, John G. and Philips, Katherine A. (1995). Personality Disorders. Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry/VI, Vol. 2. Eds. Harold I. Kaplan and Benjamin J. Sadock. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins.

McCrae, Robert R. (1994). "A Reformulation of Axis II: Personality and Personality-Related Problems." Costa, Paul T., Jr., Widiger, Thomas A., editors. Personality Disorders and the Five-Factor Model of Personality. Washington, D.C.: The American Psychological Association.

Perry, J. Christopher (1989). Personality Disorders: Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder. Treatments of Psychiatric Disorders, Vol. 3. American Psychiatric Association. Task Force on Treatments of Psychiatric Disorders. Washington, DC : American Psychiatric Association.

Stone, Michael H. (1993). Abnormalities of personality: within and beyond the realm of treatment. New York: W.W. Norton.

Styron, William (1990). Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness. New York: Random House

Tamney, Joseph B. (2002). The Resilience of Conservative Religion. New York: Cambridge UP.

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