“45% of the 20 Year-Old Male Have Possibilities of Personality Disorder”

This number is 2.5 ~ 4 times more if we compare it with the average of 11 ~ 18% appeared in the advanced countries like America and the European countries.

According to the research team, the personality disorder has characteristics that people with the personality disorder do not know that they have personality problems, they have problems in family and social life and personal relationships, and people around them are suffer from them. And they lay their faults at another`s door, so they show extreme reactions.

It is urgent to find a countermeasure because it could be the root of various crimes and the social trouble; however, the social recognition for this is still low, so adequate diagnosis and treat for this are not presented.

Professor Rhyoo diagnosed the reason why the ratio of the personality disorder was so high like that, “In the circumstances that the social value is muddled, the lack of family education is mass producing morally ‛immature adults.`”

The research team reported that as the result of a survey of the existence of the personality disorder in 12 cases, it was found that as many as 71.2% of people have at least one case of personality disorder.

Among them, `compulsion (49.4%),` which clings to oneself too much and is clumsy in personal relationship, `evasion (34.7%),` which avoids the rational solution of problems or personal relationship, `hysteria (25.6%),` which reacts too sensitively even to the slight stimulation and is capricious, and `paranoia (22.6%),` which doubts others endlessly, were the frequent cases.

Professor Kwon said, “Since the base point that the personality disorder is doubtful might be differ from the social and cultural background of each country, so we raised the base point from 30 to 35 and 40 and analyzed them again, but they were still 32.7% and 22.8%,” and “and even we did that, the possibility of the personality disorder is still very higher than foreign countries.”

Professor Lee, Hoon-Goo of the Psychology Department in the Yonsei University pointed out, “Since the questions of the survey are general, the possibility that the ratio of the personality disorder appears high because of the characteristics of Korean society seems low,” and “we need to take this chance to pay attention to the mental health of our society.”

The result of this research is planned to be published in the local learned journal, the `Mental Pathology,` and an American learned journal the `Mental Medicine and Clinic Neurology.`

Seong-Ju Lee stein33@donga.com