Schizoid personality disorder is an uncommon condition in which people avoid social activities and consistently shy away from interaction with others. They also have a limited range of emotional expression.

If you have schizoid personality disorder, you may be seen as a loner or dismissive of others, and you may lack the desire or skill to form close personal relationships. Because you don't tend to show emotion, you may appear as though you don't care about others or what's going on around you.

The cause of schizoid personality disorder is unknown. Talk therapy, and in some cases medications, can help.

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If you have schizoid personality disorder, it's likely that you:

• Prefer being alone and choose to do activities alone
• Don't want or enjoy close relationships
• Feel little if any desire for sexual relationships
• Feel like you can't experience pleasure
• Have difficulty expressing emotions and reacting appropriately to situations
• May seem humourless, indifferent or emotionally cold to others
• May appear to lack motivation and goals
• Don't react to praise or critical remarks from others

Schizoid personality disorder usually begins by early adulthood, though some features may be noticeable during childhood. These features may cause you to have trouble functioning well in school, a job, socially or in other areas of life. However, you may do reasonably well in your job if you mostly work alone.

Schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia

Although a different disorder, schizoid personality disorder can have some similar symptoms to schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia, such as a severely limited ability to make social connections and a lack of emotional expression. People with these disorders may be viewed as odd or eccentric.

Even though the names may sound similar, unlike schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia, people with schizoid personality disorder:

• Are in touch with reality, so they're unlikely to experience paranoia or hallucinations
• Make sense when they speak (although the tone may not be lively), so they don't have conversational patterns that are strange and hard to follow

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