Schnitker and Emmons (2007) found evidence for an inverse relationship between patience and negative affect and between patience and depression, but a positive relationship between patience and self-reports of certain negative health outcomes, including headaches, acne, and ulcers.
They found that trait stability increased from a correlation .31 in childhood to .54 during the college years, to .64 at age 30, and then it reached a plateau around .74 between the from age 50 until the age of 70. What we can infer from these results is that personality seems to stabilize with increasing age.
50% of mental health conditions begin by age 14 and 75% of mental health conditions develop by age 24. The normal personality and behavior changes of adolescence may mimic or mask symptoms of a mental health condition. Early engagement and support are crucial to improving outcomes and increasing the promise of recovery.