[Understanding the personality changes following craniocerebral injuries, with special reference to premorbid...

The personality changes frequently observed in the wake of craniocerebral trauma are a serious impediment to psychosocial rehabilitation of those concerned. Based on empirical research, the present contribution is intended as a pleading for adoption of a multidisciplinary and multidimensional approach to personality change post craniocerebral trauma, taking the dynamic complexities involved into consideration. The current, stereotyped characterizations of the changes of personality caused by organic brain damage have not been confirmed for the patient population investigated by us. Crucial to avoidance of a rigid, static view of the personality changes is direct inclusion of the familial and social environment in the process of diagnosis and rehabilitation of the person with craniocerebral trauma. As exemplified by a case analysis described, it is possible, above all, to trace the systemic-etiological forces active in determining the nature and contents of the personality changes, in stabilizing or reinforcing them.