Sense of Purpose and Maladaptive Personality Traits in Older Adulthood

Abstract

The current study examined the relationships between sense of purpose and 10 forms of maladaptive personality traits among older adults. In addition, we aimed to explore whether a sense of purpose was more strongly associated with these maladaptive personality traits than another well-being indicator, life satisfaction. Participants included 1,011 older adults (M_Age = 71.93, 56.15% female, 74.10% White, 23% Black) enrolled in the St Louis Personality and Aging Network study. Correlational analyses were conducted between sense of purpose, life satisfaction, and maladaptive personality traits. Results suggest that older adults who report high levels of maladaptive personality traits also tend to report a lower sense of purpose. Dependent, antisocial, borderline, narcissistic, avoidant, and histrionic traits were more strongly negatively associated with the sense of purpose than life satisfaction. These findings suggest the importance of considering the sense of purpose in future measurement and therapy to help promote well-being among older adults with maladaptive personality traits.

Keywords

aging life satisfaction maladaptive personality traits sense of purpose well-being

Introduction

Individuals who exhibit maladaptive personality traits experience long-term difficulties with respect to interpersonal and intrapersonal functioning (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). Notably, this definition has caused significant consternation among practitioners and researchers with respect to whether separate assessments of reduced well-being and functioning ought to be “required” for one to qualify for a diagnosis of personality disorder. Accordingly, multiple studies have been conducted to examine associations between psychological well-being indicators and maladaptive personality trait levels (e.g., Stanga et al., 2019; Veenstra et al., 2022; Yu & Clark, 2015). Across clinical and nonclinical studies, individuals who exhibit higher levels of maladaptive personality traits tend to report reduced well-being, although these associations are often modest in magnitude. Moreover, strong conclusions are difficult to make, given that studies often have smaller sample sizes and differ in their well-being assessments, which limits the ability to compare across facets of well-being.

Another knowledge gap in the current literature is that relatively little work has examined the relation between maladaptive personality traits and well-being among older adults, with most past research being conducted in younger adult samples (e.g., Yu & Clark, 2015). However, prior work suggests that maladaptive personality traits are not uncommon in older adulthood. In fact, some research has found that personality pathology affects older adults at a higher rate than anxiety or mood disorders (Reynolds et al., 2015). Further, research suggests that the manifestation of maladaptive personality traits may change across the lifespan (Debast et al., 2014). Thus, understanding the relation between maladaptive personality traits and well-being among older adults is essential for gaining insight into how to better support individuals throughout the aging process.

The current study sought to address these concerns using data from the St Louis Personality and Aging Network (SPAN) study (Oltmanns et al., 2014). In this study, older adult participants completed self-report of maladaptive personality traits and two well-being indicators: sense of purpose and life satisfaction. First, we predicted that higher scores on each maladaptive personality trait would be negatively related to both well-being indicators. Second, we predicted that the magnitudes of the associations would differ across the maladaptive personality traits of interest, in ways that reflect how a sense of purpose is not synonymous with general well-being. We focus our discussion below on the sense of purpose, given it has been understudied with respect to maladaptive personality traits (although see Marco et al., 2017, for work on borderline personality disorder), whereas past work using the current sample has demonstrated initial connections between maladaptive personality traits and life satisfaction (e.g., Cruitt & Oltmanns, 2019; Oltmanns et al., 2018). As such, the current study endeavored to replicate and extend that work by comparing associations between maladaptive personality traits and sense of purpose to correlations between maladaptive personality traits and life satisfaction.

Sense of Purpose: Definition and Well-Being Correlates

A purpose in life is a central life aim that provides one with a sense of direction that facilitates the organization of daily and longer-term activities toward the pursuit of this overarching aim (McKnight & Kashdan, 2009). Critically, the pursuit of a sense of purpose and its daily manifestations are inherently personal, insofar as one's direction in life helps them to recognize which goals are most important. Consistent with this notion, research shows that identity commitment and sense of purpose commitment are strongly intertwined (e.g., Hill & Burrow, 2012; Sumner et al., 2015). Sense of purpose can be defined as the extent to which one feels a sense of direction and is engaged with their life (e.g., Ryff, 1989; Scheier et al., 2006). Sense of purpose has been demonstrated as a consistent predictor of adaptive developmental outcomes, ranging from improved physical and cognitive health and reduced risk for later disease (Boyle et al., 2010; Cohen et al., 2016; Kim et al., 2019; Lewis et al., 2017; Willroth et al., 2023; Windsor et al., 2015) to greater personal net worth over time (Hill, Turiano et al., 2016). Within the clinical realm, recent meta-analytic work has demonstrated robust negative associations between sense of purpose and depressive and anxiety symptoms (Boreham & Schutte, 2023). Moreover, a sense of purpose may help boost well-being among those with social anxiety disorder (Kashdan & McKnight, 2013). Together, a strong sense of purpose is an important component of daily life that is closely linked to critical facets of health.

At least four rationales have been presented for these benefits, which exemplify why it is critical to consider associations between sense of purpose and maladaptive personality traits. First, researchers have shown that more purposeful individuals tend to exhibit reduced impulsivity (Burrow & Spreng, 2016) and are more likely to consider the future consequences of their actions (Hill, Edmonds et al., 2016). Second, sense of purpose has been linked conceptually (e.g., Lewis, 2020; McKnight & Kashdan, 2009) and empirically (Bronk et al., 2009; Burrow et al., 2010) to greater goal regulation and agentic pursuit of goals. Third, more purposeful individuals tend to be less reactive to negative (Hill et al., 2018) and positive (Hill, Klaiber et al., 2022; Hill, Sin et al., 2022) events in their daily lives, and they exhibit reduced reactivity in the face of experimental or real-world potential stressors (Burrow et al., 2014; Burrow & Hill, 2013; Schaefer et al., 2013). Toward this end, researchers have suggested that a sense of purpose provides a homeostatic function, helping individuals to recenter their focus on personally important life aims in the face of disruptions (Burrow et al., 2024). Finally, more purposeful individuals tend to report more positive relations with others (Ryff, 1989; Ryff & Keyes, 1995), greater social support (Weston et al., 2021), and reduced loneliness (Pfund et al., 2022).

Sense of Purpose and Maladaptive Personality Traits

In sum, past work suggests that more purposeful individuals have (1) improved impulse control, (2) increased goal pursuit, (3) less emotional reactivity in daily life, and (4) improved social relationships. Each of these points illuminates why there may exist a close connection between a sense of purpose and maladaptive personality traits among older adults. To start, poor impulse control is a defining characteristic of borderline personality disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). Similarly, emotional lability as well as poorer social functioning and relationships are endemic to most maladaptive personality traits (Morf & Rhodewalt, 2001).

Beyond these points, it is worth noting again that goal pursuit has been described as a critical element of sense of purpose, separating sense of purpose from related constructs including meaning in life and sense of coherence (e.g., Costin & Vignoles, 2020; Martela & Steger, 2016; McKnight & Kashdan, 2009). This point is critical given a theoretical framework (DeYoung & Krueger, 2018), that views psychopathology as characterized by difficulties “to move forward toward one's goals due to failure to generate effective new goals, interpretations, or strategies when existing ones prove unsuccessful” (p. 121). Similar to past models (Morf & Rhodewalt, 2001), this framework focuses on how psychopathology manifests when individuals are unable to regulate their goals and strategies following feedback from others and the environment. Over time, this unresponsiveness can become dispositional in nature, which underlies the manifestation of maladaptive personality traits. Accordingly, a sense of purpose appears particularly relevant to the discussion of well-being among older individuals who exhibit maladaptive personality traits, leading to the possibility that a sense of purpose will be similarly or more strongly associated with these traits than life satisfaction. However, limited research has examined differential correlates between sense of purpose and other well-being indicators (although see Steen et al., 2019, for initial evidence on meaninglessness vs. depression among individuals with personality disorders).

Current Study

The current study tested three research questions using the SPAN study (Oltmanns et al., 2014), wherein participants completed measures for sense of purpose (Scheier et al., 2006), life satisfaction (Diener et al., 1985), and 10 maladaptive personality traits following the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental (DSM-5; antisocial, avoidant, borderline, dependent, histrionic, narcissistic, obsessive-compulsive, paranoid, schizoid, and schizotypal; Oltmanns & Turkheimer, 2006). First, we examined associations between maladaptive personality traits and each well-being indicator. We expected that sense of purpose and life satisfaction would be negatively associated with all maladaptive personality traits. Second, we sought to examine whether a sense of purpose is more strongly associated with certain maladaptive personality traits. Based on past research, we expected that sense of purpose would be more strongly negatively associated with those traits strongly defined by characteristic issues with impulse control, social relations, and emotional lability, including dependent, avoidant, narcissistic, and borderline traits. Third, we explored whether a sense of purpose or life satisfaction was more strongly associated with maladaptive personality traits. Again, given the lack of past literature, we refrained from making stronger predictions, though the discussion above points to a central role for sense of purpose in the discussion of maladaptive personality traits.

Methods

Participants

SPAN is an ongoing longitudinal study started in 2007 that assesses a wide range of personality, health, social, and biological characteristics in a community-based sample of older adults in the St Louis metropolitan area (T.F. Oltmanns et al., 2014). Here, we used data from the most recent wave of assessment for each variable of interest (sense of purpose, life satisfaction, and maladaptive personality traits), which included 1,011 participants (M_age = 71.93, 56.15% female, 74.10% White, 23% Black; Table 1).

Table 1.

Sample Demographics.

Characteristics	n	Percentage
Gender
Female	566	56.15
Male	442	43.85
Race
White	744	74.10
Black	239	23.0
East Asian/Pacific Islander	2	0.20
South Asian	1	0.10
Middle Eastern	3	0.30
Native American	1	0.10
Biracial	8	0.80
Other	7	0.70
Income
Under $20,000	159	16.34
$20,000–$39,999	239	24.56
$40,000–$59,999	236	24.25
$60,000–$79,999	149	15.31
$80,000–$99,999	72	7.40
$100,000–$119,999	39	4.01
$120,000–$139,999	24	2.47
$140,000 or more	55	5.65
Education
Less than high school	9	0.90
High school (or GED)	106	10.55
Some college	161	16.02
Vocational school	47	4.68
2-year college degree (associates)	77	7.66
4-year college degree	279	27.76
Master's degree	233	23.18
Doctoral degree (PhD)	47	4.68
Professional degree (MD, JD)	46	4.58
	Mean	SD
Age (in years)	71.93	2.92

Measures

Maladaptive personality traits were assessed using the Multisource Assessment of Personality Pathology (Oltmanns & Turkheimer, 2006), an 80-item measure based on lay translations of the diagnostic criteria for the 10 personality disorders listed in DSM-IV and carried forward into DSM-5 (antisocial, avoidant, borderline, dependent, histrionic, narcissistic, obsessive-compulsive, paranoid, schizoid, and schizotypal). Participants were asked to rate each item on a 5-point, Likert-type scale ranging from 0 (I am never like this) to 4 (I am always like this). Composite scores for each maladaptive personality trait were computed by averaging item scores for each maladaptive personality traits trait subscale (Antisocial [α = .47], Avoidant [α = .80], Borderline [α = .70], Dependent [α = .66], Histrionic [α = .68], Narcissistic [α = .68], Obsessive-Compulsive [α = .67], Paranoid [α = .71], Schizoid [α = .54], and Schizotypal [α = .67]).

Sense of purpose was assessed using the 6-item Life Engagement Test (Scheier et al., 2006). Participants were asked to respond with their agreement with each statement on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). An example item includes, “To me, the things I do are all worthwhile.” All items were averaged to create a composite score with higher scores indicating a higher sense of purpose (α = .85).

Life satisfaction was assessed using the five-item Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985). Participants were asked to respond with their agreement with each item on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). An example item includes, “In most ways, my life is close to my ideal.” All items were averaged to create a composite score, with higher scores indicating greater life satisfaction (α = .87).

Analytic Plan

Statistical models. Correlational analyses were conducted between each maladaptive personality trait and sense of purpose, as well as each maladaptive personality trait and life satisfaction. Further, to examine whether sense of purpose was more strongly associated with maladaptive personality traits than life satisfaction, correlational comparisons were conducted using the cocor package (Diedenhofen & Musch, 2015) in R. Participants must have responded to at least 75% of the items for a particular measure to receive a composite score for that construct. A standard of p < .05 was used to judge statistical significance throughout the analyses. In addition, to correct for multiple comparisons, false discovery rate (FDR) analyses were completed for (a) correlations across all measures and (b) correlation comparisons.

Transparency and Openness

Analyses were conducted in R utilizing the psych (Revelle & Revelle, 2015), ppcor (Kim, 2015), and cocor (Diedenhofen & Musch, 2015) packages. All participants were presented with education about the study and provided informed consent by selecting a checkbox prior to completing the online survey. This research was considered exempt by the Washington University in St. Louis IRB due to the anonymity of participants and the lack of experimental manipulation. The study design, hypotheses, and analyses were preregistered (https://osf.io/yr9q3/?view_only=4496887989b74fa38df9aa4425037cd8). Materials and analysis code for the current study are available by emailing the corresponding author.

Results

Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

As shown in Table 2, participants reported moderate to high levels of sense of purpose and life satisfaction and low levels of maladaptive personality traits. In addition, participants on average reported the highest levels of maladaptive personality traits for obsessive-compulsive and schizoid, and the lowest levels of maladaptive personality traits for dependent and borderline. Also shown in Table 2, borderline and avoidant traits were most strongly associated with a sense of purpose, while obsessive-compulsive and narcissistic traits displayed the weakest correlations. In addition, most of the maladaptive personality traits were significantly negatively associated with life satisfaction, with paranoid and schizotypal traits most strongly associated with life satisfaction. However, antisocial, histrionic, and narcissistic traits were not significantly associated with life satisfaction. All correlations remained significant after accounting for the FDR.

Table 2.

Correlations Between Key Study Variables and Means (SDs).

	Sense of Purpose	Life Satisfaction	Dependent	Schizoid	Schizotypal	Antisocial	Borderline	Histrionic	Narcissistic	Avoidant	Paranoid	Obsessive-Compulsive
Sense of purpose	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Life satisfaction	.51**	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Dependent	−.25**	−.08**	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Schizoid	−.30**	−.26**	.26**	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Schizotypal	−.28**	−.26**	.48**	.41**	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Antisocial	−.14**	−.04	.41**	.27**	.45**	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
Borderline	−.36**	−.25**	.64**	.37**	.62**	.54**	–	–	–	–	–	–
Histrionic	−.13**	−.05	.52**	.24**	.53**	.55**	.59**	–	–	–	–	–
Narcissistic	−.12**	−.03	.50**	.30**	.51**	.54**	.52**	.66**	–	–	–	–
Avoidant	−.35**	−.21**	.64**	.40**	.53**	.30**	.59**	.41**	.44**	–	–	–
Paranoid	−.23**	−.29**	.45**	.41**	.65**	.36**	.58**	.44**	.51**	.56**	–	–
Obsessive-Compulsive	−.11**	−.12**	.37**	.44**	.52**	.38**	.42**	.47**	.54**	.42**	.57**	–
Age	−.04	.02	.02	.006	.03	.001	−.003	.05	.03	.01	−.05	.003
Gender	.02	−.04	−.09*	−.02	−.11*	−.22**	−.17**	−.14**	−.21**	−.04	−.09*	−.18**
Mean (SD)	4.14	4.91	0.35	1.05	0.52	0.50	0.40	0.75	0.58	0.64	0.74	1.17
	(0.68)	(1.30)	(0.37)	(0.52)	(0.41)	(0.34)	(0.39)	(0.46)	(0.38)	(0.56)	(0.52)	(0.55)

Note. Bold correlations significantly differed across sense of purpose and life satisfaction after FDR correction. FDR = false discovery rate.

*p < .05; **Survived FDR correction.

Correlation Comparison Between Sense of Purpose and Life Satisfaction

The strength of correlations differed between sense of purpose and life satisfaction for multiple maladaptive personality traits (Table 2). Specifically, dependent (z(780) = −4.92, p < .01), antisocial (z(777) = −2.84, p < .01), borderline (z(778) = −3.31, p < .01), narcissistic (z(780) = −2.55, p < .05), avoidant (z(777) = −4.17, p < .01), and histrionic (z(780) = −2.27, p < .05) traits were more strongly associated with sense of purpose than life satisfaction. Counter to our predictions, maladaptive personality traits defined by characteristic issues with impulse control, social relations, and emotional liability (dependent, avoidant, narcissistic, and borderline) were not more strongly negatively correlated with sense of purpose than the other traits (all ps > .05).

General Discussion

This study examined the relation between maladaptive personality traits and well-being indicators among older adults. As predicted, all 10 maladaptive personality traits were negatively associated with the sense of purpose. In addition, most associations were stronger for sense of purpose than for life satisfaction. Contrary to our predictions, only seven maladaptive personality traits were significantly associated with life satisfaction, with no significant association found between life satisfaction and antisocial, histrionic, and narcissistic traits. Additionally, contrary to our hypotheses, maladaptive personality traits defined by impulse control, social relations, and emotional liability were not necessarily more strongly associated with the sense of purpose relative to the other maladaptive personality traits. These findings present multiple implications for future clinical, personality, and social psychology research.

Maladaptive Personality Traits and Sense of Purpose

Our study showed that borderline and avoidant traits were the strongest correlates of sense of purpose among the 10 maladaptive personality traits. This may be due to a tendency for older adults with high levels of borderline or avoidant traits to struggle to maintain social relationships and display high sensitivity to perceived rejection or criticism (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). This may lead to a lack of social support, avoidance of activities that could result in rejection or criticism, or abandonment of goals after experiencing rejection or criticism. Because rejection and criticism are common, often unavoidable, aspects of goal pursuit, individuals who struggle to adaptively cope with these challenges may find it difficult to pursue goals and obtain a sense of purpose.

In contrast, of the 10 maladaptive personality traits, narcissistic and obsessive-compulsive traits were most weakly associated with the sense of purpose. One potential explanation for this unexpected finding is that certain aspects of narcissistic and obsessive-compulsive traits may be sense of purpose-promoting and thus help offset other sense of purpose-hindering aspects of these traits. For instance, narcissistic personality disorder is defined by a grandiose sense of self-importance and exploitation of others to achieve one's own end (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). As such, some aspects of the narcissistic trait may help promote goal pursuit and a sense of purpose. This aligns with prior research findings that narcissism, predominantly characterized by grandiose, involves approach motivation, extraversion, higher self-esteem, and lower psychological distress (Hart et al., 2020; Mota et al., 2020; Weiss & Miller, 2018). Therefore, it is plausible that these aspects of the narcissistic trait may help offset the difficulties with impulse control, social relations, and emotional liability. Additionally, because the narcissistic trait impedes an individual's ability to acknowledge ineffective or unsuccessful behaviors, these individuals may lack awareness of the ways they are not successfully working toward goal pursuit. Future research is needed to formally test these possibilities, as well as potential mediators of these relationships.

Sense of Purpose Versus Life Satisfaction

To examine whether associations with maladaptive personality traits are specific to sense of purpose or well-being indicators more broadly, we compared associations between sense of purpose and another well-being indicator, life satisfaction. While all 10 maladaptive personality traits were significantly associated with sense of purpose, only seven of the traits were significantly associated with life satisfaction. This suggests that maladaptive personality traits are related to a sense of purpose differently than well-being more broadly. Further, differences in the strength of correlations between sense of purpose and life satisfaction for dependent, antisocial, borderline, narcissistic, histrionic, and avoidant traits also provide evidence that sense of purpose is distinct from other well-being constructs. The majority of these maladaptive personality traits were more strongly associated with a sense of purpose than with life satisfaction.

One potential explanation is in alignment with a theoretical framework (DeYoung & Krueger, 2018), which argues that psychopathology is characterized by difficulty with goal pursuit. Because a sense of purpose is characterized by goal pursuit, individuals with maladaptive personality traits may display an especially low sense of purpose. In contrast, because goal pursuit is not required for high life satisfaction, individuals with high levels of maladaptive personality traits may be better able to maintain life satisfaction than a sense of purpose. This further emphasizes the importance of considering the sense of purpose in future research on maladaptive personality traits.

Limitations and Future Directions

The current study is not without its limitations, which should catalyze future research on sense of purpose and maladaptive personality traits. First, because this was a cross-sectional correlational study, causation and effect directionality could not be determined. Second, it is possible that a third variable, such as other co-occurring psychiatric disorders (e.g., anxiety, depression), may have influenced our results. Future research is needed to examine this possibility. Third, this study only assessed traits of maladaptive personality, not clinical diagnoses. Therefore, future work assessing clinical diagnoses of personality disorders is needed to examine whether these results hold. Fourth, our age data was highly restricted, limiting our ability to draw meaningful conclusions based on age-related effects. As such, we caution against making strong claims from these findings. Fifth, some maladaptive personality trait scales demonstrated relatively low internal consistency. Future research using alternative measures of maladaptive personality traits is needed to assess whether this may have influenced our results. Sixth, because participants reported on their own maladaptive personality traits, sense of purpose, and life satisfaction, self-rating biases may have influenced the results. Additionally, because participants self-reported both their sense of purpose and maladaptive personality traits, shared method variance may have inflated the observed correlations. Future research incorporating observer reports is needed to examine whether this impacted our results.

Conclusions

The current study provides valuable steps toward an understanding of the relation between sense of purpose and maladaptive personality traits among older adults. The results suggest that older adults who report high levels of certain maladaptive personality traits also tend to report a lower sense of purpose. Further, many of these associations are specific to a sense of purpose, and not well-being indicators more broadly. These findings suggest the importance of considering the sense of purpose in future measurement and therapy to help promote well-being among older adults with maladaptive personality traits.

Footnotes

ORCID iDs

Patrick J. Cruitt

Patrick L. Hill

Funding

The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (grant numbers R01-AG045231; R01-MH077840; R01-AG061162). PDR was supported by a fellowship from the National Science Foundation (Grant number: 2139839). KJO was supported by NIMH 2T32MH100019-06. PJC was supported in part with the resources and use of facilities at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System, Minneapolis, MN. The contents of this article are solely the responsibility of the authors, and they do not represent the views of the U. S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the United States Goverment, or the National Sicence Foundation.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Payton D. Rule is a PhD Candidate at Washington University in St. Louis. Her research focuses on mental health and wellbeing among the disability community.

Juston K. Osborne is a Postdoctoral Research Scholar at Washington University in St. Louis. His expertise is in the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying the risk, development, and progression of psychotic disorders.

Patrick J. Cruitt is a Staff Psychologist at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System. His expertise is in personality pathology in older adulthood.

Ryan Bogdan is a Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. His research examines the genomic and environmental factors associated with psychopathology risk, as well as their biological correlates.

Thomas F. Oltmanns is a former Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. His research considers personality pathology in older adulthood, and he was the initial primary investigator for the St. Louis Personality and Aging Network (SPAN) study.

Patrick L. Hill is a Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. His research focuses on how individuals develop a purpose and direction in life, and the consequences of this development for healthy aging.

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