Table 3.
Comparisons of personality traits, psychosocial functioning and marital adjustment of couples with a partner with bipolar disorder, with and without a comorbid personality disorder, and healthy control couples
| Couples | Couples with a partner with BD and PD vs healthy control couples | Couples with a partner with BD no PD vs healthy control couples | Couples with a partner with BD and PD vs couples with a partner with BD no PD | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| One partner with BD | Two healthy control partners | |||||||
| PD | No PD | |||||||
| M (SD) | M (SD) | M (SD) | F | η2 | ||||
| Personality (NEO-PI-R)a | n = 21 | n= 37 | n= 47 | |||||
| Neuroticism | 58.52 (7.40) | 53.59 (6.93) | 44.94 (7.35) | 20.37** | .29 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Extraversion | 45.59 (6.18) | 49.17 (6.31) | 52.10 (5.56) | 5.79** | .10 | ✔ | ||
| Openness | 48.79 (9.44) | 50.18 (6.60) | 52.10 (6.46) | .07 | .00 | |||
| Agreeableness | 49.29 (6.58) | 50.58 (6.98) | 52.16 (5.71) | .27 | .01 | |||
| Conscientiousness | 47.90 (7.55) | 46.68 (7.90) | 51.06 (5.45) | 3.45* | .06 | ✔ | ||
| Negative life events (LES)b | n = 18 | n = 30 | n = 33 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dependent | 2.22 (1.34) | 2.75 (1.53) | 1.32 (1.17) | 7.81** | .17 | ✔ | ||
| Independent | .50 (.49) | .33 (.48) | .35 (.41) | 1.60 | .04 |
| Coping skills (CISS)c | n = 21 | n = 36 | n = 47 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Task-oriented | 45.83 (6.31) | 47.57 (8.03) | 51.60 (7.20) | 2.81 | .05 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Emotion-focused | 53.72 (6.54) | 51.88 (7.47) | 46.19 (6.08) | 6.71** | .12 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Avoidance-oriented | 46.72 (4.99) | 54.01 (8.48) | 45.38 (7.60) | 13.93** | .22 | ✔ | ✔ |
| Social support (ASSI)d | n = 21 | n = 37 | n = 47 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size of social network | 9.17 (5.47) | 10.73 (5.86) | 17.20 (9.22) | 6.20** | .11 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Satisfaction with social network | 26.04 (2.90) | 25.59 (2.92) | 28.27 (1.85) | 10.84** | .18 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Amount of social contact | 5.87 (6.44) | 7.64 (5.77) | 12.44 (8.10) | 4.41** | .08 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Satisfaction with social contact | 4.10 (.80) | 4.24 (.74) | 4.70 (.47) | 5.25** | .09 | ✔ | ✔ |
| Marital adjustment (DAS)e | n = 19 | n = 26 | n = 46 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consensus | 48.35 (7.07) | 51.88 (6.16) | 53.52 (5.44) | 5.89** | .12 | ✔ | ✔ | |
| Affectional expression | 7.78 (1.84) | 8.31 (2.78) | 9.23 (1.95) | 3.84* | .08 | ✔ | ||
| Satisfaction | 31.68 (8.08) | 35.81 (7.25) | 39.72 (4.22) | 10.88** | .20 | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Cohesion | 13.14 (4.72) | 14.69 (5.00) | 16.15 (3.32) | 3.50* | .07 | ✔ |
| Verbal aggression (CTS)f | n = 19 | n = 26 | n = 45 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inter-partner | 22.85 (19.60) | 15.24 (19.12) | 9.44 (9.34) | 2.31 | .05 | ✔ |
Due to non-independence of data and to obtain a global estimate of couple functioning, mean scores across all available parents were used for these analyses when there was more than one parent in a family [number of single-parent families = 11 (7 BD)]
T-scores were used for the Personality and Coping Skills subcategories, *p < .05, ** p < .01
BD: bipolar disorder; PD: personality disorder; ✔: significant group difference
aFrom the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised
bFrom the Life Events Scale
cFrom the Coping Inventory of Stressful Situations
dFrom the Arizona Social Support Interview
eFrom the Dyadic Adjustment Scale
fFrom the Conflict Tactic Scale