If you've searched for ‘Anankastic Personality Disorder’ and landed on articles about ‘OCPD’, you're not on the wrong page. Anankastic Personality Disorder is the term used in the ICD-11 — the diagnostic manual used across Australia and much of the world — while Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD) is the equivalent term in the DSM-5, the manual more commonly referenced in psychology research. They describe the same underlying pattern: a rigid preoccupation with order, rules, perfectionism, and control that gets in the way of flexibility and connection with others.
A 2021 scoping review looked at how the ICD-11 reshaped this diagnosis, moving away from a simple checklist toward a more dimensional model called ‘anankastia’ — essentially, how strongly someone leans toward rigid standards and controlling behaviour, rather than a yes/no diagnosis. The researchers found that the traits captured under this newer ICD-11 model overlap closely with the older DSM-5 OCPD criteria, and that the dimensional approach may do a better job of capturing how these traits actually show up in real people.
Why does this matter to you? Because most of the published research uses the term ‘OCPD’ — so if you're trying to understand Anankastic PD, OCPD is where the evidence lives. If rigid perfectionism, control, or difficulty delegating are affecting your relationships or wellbeing, it's a genuinely treatable pattern, and a psychologist can help.