ABSTRACT
The concept of personality disorders (PDs) has existed for some time, although PDs have typically been considered as disorders of exclusion—that is, specifically to the exclusion of psychosis or neurosis (Jackson, 1998). However, the importance of PDs in clinical practice was dramatically emphasized with the inclusion of Axis II in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders–Third Edition (DSM–III; American Psychiatric Association [APA], 1980). Since the advent of the DSM–III, PDs have been separated from the great majority of mental disorders and represented as distinct diagnostic categories on a distinct diagnostic axis (Axis II). This innovation has forced clinicians to think of PDs as (a) coexisting with Axis I disorders such as depression or panic disorder, (b) predisposing individuals toward developing specific Axis I disorders, (c) complicating Axis I presentations, and/or (d) complicating treatment response to Axis I disorders (i.e., interfering with or preventing treatment).
