The Swedish Depressive Personality Disorder Inventory: Psychometrics and clinical correlates from a DSM-IV and proposed DSM-5 perspective

Abstract

Background: Depressive personality is commonly seen in clinical practice, and today only one exclusive self-report instrument—the Depressive Personality Disorder Inventory (DPDI)—is available for its assessment based on the DSM-IV description of the construct. Aims: The purpose of this research was to evaluate a Swedish version of this measure (DPDI-Swe) in terms of its reliability, internal structure, and convergent validity using related variables from the DSM-IV criteria for depressive personality disorder (DPD) and the proposed DPD trait set for DSM-5. Methods: A non-clinical sample of 255 adults in southern Sweden completed a self-report package, which, in addition to DPD, included the assessment of self-esteem, optimism, hope, rumination, worry, depression, and anxiety. Quality of life was also measured. Results: Results indicated that the DPDI-Swe was internally consistent (α = 0.96). Exploratory factor analysis with oblique rotation yielded three components, together accounting for 48.21% of the variance in DPDI-Swe scores. There were strong positive associations between the DPDI-Swe and measures of depression, anxiety, rumination, and worry, and strong negative associations between the DPDI-Swe and measures of self-esteem, optimism, hope, and quality of life. These significant relationships remained, albeit slightly diminished, after statistically controlling for current depressed mood. Conclusions and clinical implications: The DPDI-Swe appears to be a reliable and valid measure of DPD, and it is available for clinical and research use.

• Depressive personality disorder
• Depressive personality traits
• DSM
• DPD
• Psychometric

Disclosure of interest: The authors report no financial or other conflicts of interest regarding this research. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to recognize Jan Bergendorf and Robert Goldsmith for their linguistic expertise during the translation process, and Elizabeth Marcheschi for her efforts during the data collection period. This research was financially supported by Ograduerade Forskares Fond, Department of Psychology, Lund University.

Declaration of interest: The author reports no conflicts of interest. The author alone is responsible for the content and writing of the paper.