Personality traits and psychiatric and somatic morbidity among kleptomaniacs

Although the behaviour of kleptomania has been identified for decades, very little is known about the reasons, prevalence, course and treatment of this disorder. Current knowledge about kleptomania is generally derived from case reports or from material collected from highly selected groups. There are no published systematic studies of personality traits among kleptomaniacs, and knowledge of somatic and psychiatric co-morbidity is limited. The purpose of the present study was to describe personality characteristics, psychiatric disorders and somatic illness among kleptomaniacs. A total of 37 patients (two-thirds of whom were female) who fulfilled the DSM-IV criteria for kleptomania were recruited by advertising in a daily newspaper. Monotony avoidance was a prominent personality trait, as was a low degree of socialization. Depression and anxiety were also very common, as was a history of attempted suicide. Somatic illness was commonly reported, and a high proportion of the kleptomaniacs were regularly receiving pharmacological treatment for either psychiatric or somatic illness. The representativeness of this group of kleptomaniacs is as yet unknown. However, the present study is based on the largest sample of patients fulfilling DSM-III-R/DSM-IV criteria for kleptomania to date who were not primarily recruited through the medical or legislative systems.