The Personality Traits of People with IBS (and How to Rewire Them for Healing)

If you have IBS, you might have wondered: Is it just my gut? Or is there more going on here? Maybe you’ve noticed you’re highly sensitive, anxious, driven, or emotional. Maybe you’ve tried all the diets and supplements, and yet your symptoms still flare. What if, beneath it all, your personality traits (the ones you didn’t exactly choose) are part of what’s keeping your body in survival mode?

You’re not imagining it. There’s growing research showing links between certain personality traits and IBS. These traits are not flaws. They’re often brilliant adaptations to early stress, trauma, and environments where our nervous system learned to stay on high alert. The good news? They can shift. And that’s where healing becomes possible.

Let’s break down what the research actually says (based on this comprehensive review and this one), and how you can work with these traits through nervous system regulation.

The Most Common Personality Traits in People with IBS

1. High Neuroticism

Neuroticism is the strongest and most consistent trait associated with IBS. It means a tendency toward negative emotions like anxiety, fear, guilt, and self-doubt. Neuroticism can amplify your awareness of gut sensations, make you more reactive to stress, and increase symptom reporting. I can say that my degree of neuroticism was quite high for years!

• Neuroticism is more common in IBS-D and IBS-C than the control population.

• It's linked to past trauma, including emotional and sexual abuse.

• It correlates with mood disorders like anxiety and depression, which often co-occur with IBS.

Regulation tip: If you relate to being emotionally intense or overwhelmed, start building daily safety signals for your nervous system. Breathwork, orienting, and co-regulation are great tools to start with.

2. Low Extraversion

People with IBS tend to be more introverted. This might mean you feel safer alone, struggle to seek support, or find social situations draining. But since our nervous systems co-regulate, isolation can make healing harder.

Regulation tip: Practice safe connection — even a short phone call, sharing a vulnerable thought, or joining a gentle group class can help your body feel less alone. For me, intentionally nurturing close friendships and bringing more safety and warmth into my romantic relationship made a huge difference. Building new connections isn’t always easy — it takes effort, time, and a good dose of courage — but the sense of support and belonging is so worth it.

3. Conscientiousness (Mixed Findings)

One study found IBS-C patients scored higher in conscientiousness (structured, perfectionist tendencies), while others found low conscientiousness was linked to more severe symptoms. This might reflect two coping styles:

• The hyper-vigilant, over-controlling perfectionist (common in IBS-C).

• The burned-out, overwhelmed avoider (common in IBS-D).

Regulation tip: Whether you lean toward over-controlling or under-functioning, compassionate structure helps. Choose micro-habits you can stick to. Practice letting go when needed.

4. Low Agreeableness

Some studies found IBS patients to be less agreeable than healthy controls. This doesn’t mean you’re unkind — it might mean you’re more guarded, skeptical, or sensitive to conflict. Especially if your nervous system learned early on that others weren’t safe.

Regulation tip: Rebuild trust slowly. Practice voicing boundaries and needs. Allow yourself to be seen in safe spaces.

5. Alexithymia (Difficulty Identifying and Expressing Emotions)

This trait shows up a lot in IBS research. Up to 66% of IBS patients experience alexithymia — trouble feeling, naming, or expressing emotions. This can cause emotions to get "stuck" in the body and show up as physical symptoms.

• Linked to increased pain perception.

• Reduces treatment responsiveness.

• Strongly correlated with GI-specific anxiety.

I struggled with this a lot. I couldn't figure out what I was feeling and it was a big blocker to my healing. I had to relearn how feelings felt and practice tuning into the sensations of my body. After some time, it became easier and easier to identify emotions as they popped up and move through them through somatic practices.

Regulation tip: Start with body awareness. Notice sensations. Ask, "If this tension had a feeling, what would it be?" Somatic practices and parts work can help unfreeze emotional blocks.

6. Type D Personality (Distressed Personality)

This is characterized by high negative affect (gloominess, worry) and social inhibition (holding back in relationships). About 45% of IBS patients meet this profile. It’s linked to poor sleep, lower quality of life, and worse outcomes overall.

For years, I felt like I was stuck in a “negative Nancy” loop. I wanted to be lighthearted, bubbly, and joyful — I even envied people who could just laugh things off — but it felt like my system simply couldn’t allow it. Looking back, I realize this wasn’t a personality flaw. It was my nervous system in chronic fight-or-flight, where my amygdala (the brain’s fear center) was running the show. In that state, scanning for danger feels safer than seeking joy.

As I started my healing journey and worked on regulating my nervous system, I noticed something subtle but life-changing: I began letting go more easily. I started enjoying the small, ordinary moments. I could see the bright side even in neutral or challenging situations. It wasn’t forced positivity — it was a natural byproduct of my body feeling safer.

If you relate to this, know that you don’t have to fake joy or “think positive” to change your outlook. Focus on building cues of safety for your body first — the mindset shift often follows naturally.

Regulation tip: If you often feel like you have to handle everything alone, remind yourself that interdependence is not weakness — it’s biology. You deserve to be supported.

The Role of Negative Emotions in IBS

Research consistently shows that anger, anxiety, and depression are strongly linked to key IBS symptoms — particularly visceral and pain hypersensitivity. In simpler terms, when you're stuck in emotional overwhelm, your body becomes more sensitive to gut sensations — and those sensations are more likely to be labeled as painful by the brain.

• IBS patients show attentional bias to gut-related threats, scan their bodies for symptoms more often, and report higher abdominal pain burden.

• In children and teens, anxiety and emotional instability are also common and linked with school impairment and depression risk.

• Emotional instability (like impulsiveness and impatience) has even been correlated with heightened gut sensitivity in children.

Emotional arousal (especially unprocessed anger) can also directly influence gut motility. In IBS patients, anger-provocation increases colon motility, while anger suppression slows gastric emptying and gut transit.

There’s even evidence linking negative emotions with low-grade inflammation in IBS. IBS patients with anxiety and depression had elevated inflammatory markers like IL-1β and TNF-α, and reduced anti-inflammatory cytokines like IL-10.

So we’re not just talking about “mind over matter” — this is body-based, measurable stuff.

Regulation tip: Instead of focusing on one emotion, consider your emotional patterns. What states do you live in most? What triggers your system? By working with the full emotional landscape (not just anxiety or sadness), you support your whole-body healing.

Personality Is Plastic (Just Like the Brain)

Here’s the most important part: personality traits in people with IBS are not fixed. They’re patterns — often formed in response to chronic nervous system dysregulation and relational trauma. And because they’re patterns, they can be softened, rewired, and rebalanced.

You don’t need to “become a different person.” But you can:

• Soften the inner critic.

• Befriend your emotional world.

• Reclaim rest.

• Trust your gut again (literally).

The way forward isn’t through fixing yourself, but through meeting yourself — with compassion, curiosity, and safety.

My Favorite Tools for Shifting These Traits Gently

Here’s what I’ve used (and what I teach) to work with these patterns in the body, not just the mind:

• Daily somatic regulation (start with 10 minutes)

• Parts work / IFS to understand the protective roles of perfectionism, fear, and avoidance

• Co-regulation (even just breathing beside someone or being seen, or cuddling a pet)

• Emotional tracking and expression (gentle movement, shaking, art, voice)

• Body-based boundary practice (noticing your yes and no)

You Are Not Your Personality. You Are Your Possibility.

If you saw yourself in any of these traits, I want you to know:

• You are not dramatic.

• You are not too sensitive.

• You are not broken.

You are a human with a brilliant, adaptive nervous system — one that learned to keep you safe. And now, you get to teach it a new way.

IBS isn’t just a gut issue. It’s a whole-person experience. And healing it means coming home to yourself, one layer at a time.

If you want support untangling those layers, I offer 1:1 nervous system coaching here. You don’t have to do it alone.

With love,

Cam