Paranoid Personality Disorder Diagnostic Criteria

The formal diagnosis of paranoid personality disorder rests on these symptoms, which can be evaluated by psychiatrists and other mental health professionals.

Paranoid Personality Disorder According to the ICD-10

The following information is reproduced verbatim from the ICD-10 Classification of Mental and Behavioural Disorders, World Health Organization, Geneva, 1992. (Since the WHO updates the overall ICD on a regular basis, individual classifications within it may or may not change from year to year; therefore, you should always check directly with the WHO to be sure of obtaining the latest revision for any particular individual classification.)

F60.0 Paranoid Personality Disorder

Personality disorder characterized by at least 3 of the following:

1. excessive sensitiveness to setbacks and rebuffs;
2. tendency to bear grudges persistently, i.e. refusal to forgive insults and injuries or slights;
3. suspiciousness and a pervasive tendency to distort experience by misconstruing the neutral or friendly actions of others as hostile or contemptuous;
4. a combative and tenacious sense of personal rights out of keeping with the actual situation;
5. recurrent suspicions, without justification, regarding sexual fidelity of spouse or sexual partner;
6. tendency to experience excessive self-importance, manifest in a persistent self-referential attitude;
7. preoccupation with unsubstantiated “conspiratorial” explanations of events both immediate to the patient and in the world at large.

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Includes:

• expansive paranoid, fanatic, querulant and sensitive paranoid personality (disorder)

Excludes:

• delusional disorder
• schizophrenia

Diagnostic Guidelines

Please see the separate set of notes which apply to all personality disorders in the ICD-10 system of classification: ICD Notes Common to the Diagnostic Criteria for Each Personality Disorder.