Personality and vulnerability to psychological distress

Personality and psychopathology have long been associated, however the mechanism that create this association are not well studied. Stress generation was examined as a potential mechanism to explain the association between personality traits, especially negative emotionality, and depressive symptoms. In addition, the moderating influence of cognitive vulnerabilities to potentiate the relation between stressors and depressive symptoms was investigated. This Chapter will presents as both dysfunctional attitudes and negative cognitive style interacted with additional stressors to predict prospective fluctuations of daily distress symptoms.