The Bear-Fedio personality inventory and temporal lobe epilepsy.

We administered the Bear-Fedio inventory to normal controls and to patients with epilepsy, chronic pain, and psychiatric disorders. The trait scores showed progressive increase with the severity of psychiatric symptoms. There were no statistically significant differences between epileptic patients with diffuse spike wave discharges and those with focal temporal EEG abnormalities. Also, there were no significant differences in patients with left versus right temporal foci. The inventory is markedly influenced by intellectual factors and, to some extent, by gender and anticonvulsant drug levels, especially those of carbamazepine. The test in its current form measures overall psychopathology rather than a specific syndrome.