Understanding broader community perspectives on the scientific accuracy and stigma of personality trait labels

Many labels are used within and across subfields to describe personality disorder (PD) and interpersonally-oriented trait dimensions. For example, "interpersonal disorders" is a suggested alternative label to "personality disorders" in clinical research. Other "dark trait" terms, though not proposed as formal labels for PDs, also are used in different research areas for describing externalizing traits. Terminology changes have been proposed both due to concerns about different descriptors' validity and their usage potentially being stigmatizing. Improving terminology consensus can also unify research and clinical assessment efforts, and we recruited participants from a range of sources who provided their views on terminology used in PD research toward this goal. This included data from 362 undergraduates, 408 adults recruited online, and 161 adults recruited from the community, and we used targeted recruitment strategies to ensure that individuals with a range of mental health histories were represented in our study. All participants completed questionnaires assessing their personalities and symptoms, and a subset of participants also completed structured clinical interviews. Results indicated that traditional "personality disorders" terminology were viewed favorably compared to other terms both in regard to scientific accuracy and stigma. Additionally, "interpersonal disorders" terminology was also viewed more favorably overall than many other terms, whereas "dark trait" terminology was viewed negatively. Participants' characteristics (e.g., personality, age) were mostly unrelated to their terminology views. These results provide insight into how various descriptors are viewed by the broader community and provide a foundation for future research investigating how different terms are perceived across contexts. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).