Immature personality disorder (IPD) was a type of personality disorder diagnosis. It is characterized by lack of emotional development, low tolerance of stress and anxiety, inability to accept personal responsibility, and reliance on age-inappropriate defense mechanisms.
While emotional immaturity isn't always a sign of a mental health disorder, it has been associated with narcissistic personality disorder and emotionally abusive tendencies. That being said, it is not always the case that an emotionally immature person is either a narcissist or abusive.
They may have frequent and volatile mood swings, which often include trying to control the people around them. They may seem to believe the world revolves around them. A person with BPD may appear to be emotionally immature because they often expect others to put their needs first.
Some causes of emotional immaturity may include unresolved trauma or personal issues, life experiences, a lack of understanding of healthy relationship dynamics, or difficulty with self-regulation.
Delay in brain development
One reason immaturity might be confused with ADHD is that ADHD itself has been linked to a delay in brain maturation. An older child with ADHD might present behaviors that are typical in a younger child — and the opposite could be true if your frame of reference is older children.
It was concluded from this study that ADHD children were less emotional mature as well as had less adjustment than the normal children. These finding should be considered while enrolling the ADHD in special psychological training programs to help them achieve better emotional maturity and higher adjustment abilities.
Bipolar disorder can arrest a person's emotional maturity and produce behavior that appears very childish and reckless. Please remember, however, that while someone who has bipolar may act like a child, there is an adult underneath.
Emotional immaturity can be the result of insecure attachments during early life experiences, trauma, untreated addiction or mental health problems, and/or lack of deeper introspection or work on oneself. It can manifest as self-centeredness, narcissism, and poor management of conflict.
Individuals who are emotionally immature can be bratty, juvenile, impetuous and unthinking and lack the ability to handle their emotions and tend to react impulsively, without considering the consequences of their actions. They often make the environment toxic.
But gaining prominence is a diagnosis for those who behave in a predominantly childish way. It's called immature personality disorder, and it affects men and women.
Most personality disorders begin in the teen years when your personality further develops and matures. As a result, almost all people diagnosed with borderline personality disorder are above the age of 18. Although anyone can develop BPD, it's more common if you have a family history of BPD.
BPD makes people more likely to engage in impulsive or risky behaviors, such as: Speeding or other unsafe driving. Unprotected sex or sex with strangers. Binge eating.
People sometimes revert to childlike behavior to cope with trauma, stress, severe illness, or mental health disorders. Age regression can be unconscious (involuntary) or conscious (voluntary) behavior.
Trauma-related immaturity refers to the ways in which trauma can impact a person's emotional and social development. As we mentioned before, trauma can often result in behavioral problems or emotional difficulties that make a person appear immature or developmentally delayed.
Traumatic events can overwhelm your body and mind, leaving a lasting mark on your mood, relationship, and sense of self long after the trauma has ended. When trauma impairs your ability to develop full emotional maturity, this is known as arrested psychological development.
Emotional immaturity is an effect of developmental trauma. If you experienced neglect or emotional abuse as a child and identified with the above, healing your trauma wounds can help you approach life and relationships with balance and maturity.
Impulsive behavior.
They say things without thinking about how they'll affect other people. Over time, people learn not to do those things. Emotionally immature adults haven't learned to curb their impulses. They act in unpredictable or antisocial ways.
Grandiosity and overconfidence. Easy tearfulness, frequent sadness. Needing little sleep to feel rested. Uncharacteristic impulsive behavior.
A “bipolar meltdown” is, much like “bipolar anger,” a very stigmatizing phrase, and not something that really exists. The phrase “bipolar meltdown” could refer to a bipolar person having a manic episode or being in a depressed state.
The relationship between high IQ and bipolar disorder isn't causative. “But the genes that cause bipolar disorder and the genes that cause high intelligence may in some cases go together,” says Tohen. Bipolar disorder is linked to a specific kind of intelligence.
Similar to the hyperactive symptoms, impulsive symptoms are typically seen by the time a child is four years old and increase during the next three to four years to peak in severity when the child is seven to eight years of age.
Hyperactivity or restlessness in adult ADHD
Hyperactivity in adults with ADHD may appear the same as it does in kids. You may be highly energetic and perpetually “on the go” as if driven by a motor. For many people with ADHD, however, the symptoms of hyperactivity become more subtle and internal as they grow older.