Personality disorder profeiles in drug abuse and abuse

Abstract

There is empirical evidence showing the relationship between personality disorders, violence crime and substance abuse problem. This study aims to examine the prevalence of personality disorders in prison populations (drug abusers and abusers), using as a control group a population imprisoned without these types of crimes. The participants were 45 men within the prison in Albolote (Granada) (15 drug abusers, 15 abusers and 15 control) and were selected following the Severity Addiction Scale (EUROPASI; Bobes et al., 1996) and the Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2; Strauss et al., 1996). The Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory was used to assess personality disorders. We found that drug abusers had higher scores than abusers and controls in histrionic, antisocial, borderline and aggressive-sadistic, and abusers had higher scores than drug abusers and controls in dependent personality disorder. Our results highlight the need to take into account the existence of personality disorders in clinical population in order to design prevention and intervention strategies for drug abuse and domestic violence.