Personality dysfunction was assessed with the SIPP-118, a comprehensive
measure developed to assess effects of therapy intervention
on personality dysfunction. This implies that our discussion
of the structure of personality dysfunction is necessarily
confined to this instrument. The factor analytic results indicated
that the 16 facets of the SIPP-118 are best summarized by four
factors of general personality functioning. The Identity Integration
factor had significant and primary loadings of Self-Respect, Purposefulness,
Enjoyment, Stable Self-Image, Feeling Recognized,
and Self-Reflexive Functioning, and therefore captures most of
what the alternative proposal in DSM-5 Section III subsumes under
the Self component of the personality functioning continuum.
Although the proposal further subdivides this Self component into
Identity and Self-Direction, these two aspects were represented
within the same component in our results (e.g., Self-Respect and
Stable Self-Image representing Identity, whereas Self-Direction
was mainly represented by Purposefulness and Self-Reflexive
Functioning). Therefore, it seems diagnostically inefficient to measure
these aspects of personality functioning separately, as they
seem to vary in largely parallel ways.