The Maudsley Personality Inventory as a Prognostic Instrument

The present investigation confirms once again that E increases and N is reduced when psychiatric subjects are tested before and after treatment. The greatest differences are observed in the endogenous depressions group. In this particular study interest has mainly been directed to considering the possible value of the initial MPI results as a prognostic instrument. In respect of length of treatment in hospital there seems to be no correlation with MPI results. It is also to be anticipated that the period of treatment should be bound up with a number of complex factors which one cannot expect to measure with the MPI. As regards the social functioning of neurotic subjects, the MPI has a certain prognostic value, and especially the L variable. This is in accord with the paper presented earlier by [SEE THE TABLE V IN SOURCE PDF] Wretmark, Astrlom and Olander (7) from investigations into endogenous depressive subjects. The bimodal distribution of L scores in the group of neurotics which had not resumed work has made it possible to construct a sort of risk table which clearly shows that the risk of not resuming work increases quickly from an L value of 10. In respect of the L variable both the endogenous depressions group and the alcoholics show the same strong tendency as the neurosis group, but the material was too small to draw any conclusions. The E variable has, as distinguished from the L variable, no great ability to make individual predictions, even if the small group of patients very low down on the E variable, run a risk of not returning to work four times greater than the others. The N variable seems completely to lack prognostic value regarding the resumption of work. The initial MPI scores showed no prognostic ability for the schizophrenic group. The MPI results on admittance proved to be connected with whether the patient resumed work, but not with how the patient claimed to manage his job six months after discharge. With regard to persistent nervous symptoms the investigation showed that both the neuroticism and the extraversion variables gave some support for prognosis in the case of the neurosis group. This was, however, less marked in the other clinical groups. A low grade of extraversion combined with a high grade of neuroticism (i.e. dysthymia) seem to indicate a slightly less favourable prognosis as regards the nervous symptoms.