Neurotic Personality

Neuroticism is a trait that reflects a person's level of emotional stability. It is often defined as a negative personality trait involving negative emotions, poor self-regulation (an inability to manage urges), trouble dealing with stress, a strong reaction to perceived threats, and the tendency to complain.

People with neuroticism often become easily aroused when stimulated or have a reduced ability to calm themselves down when upset or worried. This concept has roots in Freudian times but was later expanded upon Hans Eysenck and others.

Neuroticism is one of the "Big Five" personality traits, along with extraversion, openness, conscientiousness, and agreeableness (OCEAN or CANOE are acronyms sometimes used to remember these traits). These are enduring personality traits that serve as common ways of categorizing people.

Prevalence of Neuroticism

Neuroticism is generally measured using self-report questionnaires as part of a personality assessment. It might also involve asking other people, such as friends and family, about the person and their personality characteristics. This process presents some challenges in identifying its true prevalence.

Additionally, because neuroticism is not a diagnosis, prevalence rates of neurotic personality are not reported as they are for diagnosable mental disorders. Instead, each person falls on a continuum that ranges from very low to very high. In other words, we all exist somewhere on the spectrum when it comes to being neurotic in our behavior or having a neurotic personality.

Common Neurotic Traits

How do you know where you fall on the neuroticism spectrum? People who are at the higher end are often described as having a neurotic personality and tend to show the following characteristics:

• An overall tendency toward negative emotions

• Feels of anxiety or irritability

• Poor emotional stability

• Feelings of self-doubt

• Being self-conscious or shy

• Experiencing moodiness, sadness, or depression

• Easily stressed or upset; unable to handle stress well

• Dramatic changes in feelings

• Lack of resilience or difficulty bouncing back after adversity

• Chronic worrying about a variety of things

• Tendency to interpret neutral situations as threatening

• Often view minor problems as overwhelming

• Difficulty controlling urges or emotions in the moment

• Easily becoming jealous or feeling envy about what others have

• Frustration or anger about everyday occurrences

• Feelings of fear or guilt over minor things

Causes of Neuroticism

What might cause one person to score higher in neuroticism than another? Here are a few factors to consider.

• Brain function: A smaller-scale study found that after viewing unpleasant images, people rating higher in neuroticism had lower oxygen levels in their lateral prefrontal cortex than those with lower neuroticism ratings. This area of the brain plays a role in a variety of cognitive processes.

• Childhood trauma: Experiencing some type of trauma later in life doesn't appear to increase neuroticism, but exposure to these types of events when you're younger does seem to have this effect.

• Climate: If you live in a climate that is prone to more extreme weather patterns, it may increase your risk of neurotic personality traits—potentially due to poorer dopamine function as a result of climatic stress.

• Gender: One multicultural personality study found that women scored higher for this trait in all of the 22 countries studied. Although, the gap between genders does appear to be smaller in the online world. It's thought that this is because you can be more anonymous online, which reduces worries over what others might think of you.

• Genetics: Some research suggests that neuroticism is inherited, much the same as we inherit other traits such as our height. Thus, to a certain degree, we may be born with a tendency toward this particular personality trait.

• Survival: It has even been argued that neuroticism may be rooted in evolution as, in some respects, being hypersensitive to danger or threats could offer a survival advantage.

  Britannica. Neuroticism.

There is also some evidence that neuroticism may be correlated with the startle reflex, which is an involuntary response to loud noises. This suggests that people who are high in neuroticism may be genetically wired to react more strongly to outside stimuli.

How Neuroticism Affects Behavior

As mentioned previously, neuroticism may help people survive because they tend to pay more attention to negative outcomes or risks. Research has also connected this trait with higher levels of academic success.

On the other hand, a neurotic personality can have negative effects on behavior, such as if you are unable to manage feelings of worry. In some cases, neuroticism may contribute to the development of mental health issues such as depression or anxiety.

A 2019 study adds that neuroticism was the only "Big Five" personality trait that could significantly predict participants' cognitive decline. This decline was assessed by looking at health behaviors such as whether the participant took action to maintain their wellness or if they engaged in substance misuse.

In general, people who are high on the neuroticism scale react with quick arousal to situations and can take a long time to get back to their baseline level. In other words, they live with emotional instability and may have trouble regulating their behaviors as a result.

How Neuroticism Affects Relationships

Neuroticism can have negative impacts on personal relationships. Here are a few of the ways in which this personality trait can affect how you relate to the people in your life.

Higher Level of Annoyance

People who are high in neuroticism can sometimes be seen as annoying. For example, a person with neurotic behaviors might grate on the nerves of those around them

• Being critical of others

• Being overly dependent on others, or asking for help instead of figuring things out for themselves

• Complaining a lot

• Constantly asking for reassurance

• Taking small issues and making them out to be bigger than they are

Greater Number of Conflicts

Being high in neuroticism can also lead to conflict with others. If you become enraged over someone cutting you off in traffic, for example, you may decide to confront them. If minor problems send you over the edge, you might also yell or become angry at the people you feel have caused you stress.

Some people high in neuroticism accuse others of doing things out of their own worry. This could show up in the form of accusing your spouse of cheating without any evidence, driving them away from you. Or you may blame friends for things in an overly aggressive way, which can hurt your relationships.

Also, if you obsess over minor details and always strive for perfectionism, you might not complete tasks that other people ask you to do. This, too, can lead to tension and conflict.

Using a variety of therapeutic techniques with the integration of hypnotherapy and psychotherapy offers a successful way to identify and understand feelings of neuroticism or engaging in neurotic behavior response patterns and behavioural traits that might be causing and maintaining the client's thought process. Cognitive Hypnotherapy identify negative thinking patterns and providing important management tools and skills. Through hypnotherapy, we can help you manage unhelpful anxiety patterns and stressful situations more calmly. We work with an integrative approach to change automatic responses from triggers, to thinking, feeling and behaving differently so that you remain relaxed in situations that would typically trigger

​neurotic behavior and worries.