title: Interpersonal traits change as a function of disease type and severity in degenerative brain diseases.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Different degenerative brain diseases result in distinct personality changes as a result of divergent patterns of brain damage; however, little is known about the natural history of these personality changes throughout the course of each disease.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To investigate how interpersonal traits change as a function of degenerative brain disease type and severity.
  
  
  METHODS
  Using the Interpersonal Adjective Scales, informant ratings of retrospective premorbid and current scores for dominance, extraversion, warmth and ingenuousness were collected annually for 1 to 4&emsp14;years on 188 patients (67 behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), 40 semantic dementia (SemD), 81 Alzheimer's disease (AD)) and 65 older healthy controls. Using random coefficient models, interpersonal behaviour scores at very mild, mild or moderate-to-severe disease stages were compared within and between patient groups.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Group-level changes from premorbid personality occurred as a function of disease type and severity, and were apparent even at a very mild disease stage (Clinical Dementia Rating=0.5) for all three diseases. Decreases in interpersonal traits were associated with emotional affiliation (ie, extraversion, warmth and ingenuousness) and more rigid interpersonal behaviour differentiated bvFTD and SemD patients from AD patients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Specific changes in affiliative interpersonal traits differentiate degenerative brain diseases even at a very mild disease stage, and patterns of personality change differ across bvFTD, SemD and AD with advancing disease. This study describes the typical progression of change of interpersonal traits in each disease, improving the ability of clinicians and caregivers to predict and plan for symptom progression.
authors.affiliation: Memory and Aging Center, University of California, San Francisco, CA 94143-1207, USA.
authors.forename: Marc
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sollberger
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Neuhaus
authors.forename: Robin
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Ketelle
authors.forename: Christine M
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Stanley
authors.forename: Victoria
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Beckman
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Growdon
authors.forename: Jung
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jang
authors.forename: Bruce L
authors.initials: BL
authors.lastname: Miller
authors.forename: Katherine P
authors.initials: KP
authors.lastname: Rankin
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000523:psychology; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D018450:Disease Progression; D005120:Extraversion, Psychological; D005260:Female; D057174:Frontotemporal Lobar Degeneration / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019636:Neurodegenerative Diseases / Q000523:psychology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010551:Personality; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires