After some debate, the American Psychiatric Association dropped it from the list of personality disorders in the DSM IV as too narrow to be a full-blown diagnosis and not well enough supported by scientific evidence to meet increasingly rigorous standards of definition.
The removal of the passive-aggressive personality definition from the official diagnostic manual was in large measure because of the frequent misapplication and because of the often contradictory and unclear descriptions clinicians in the field provided.
This includes behaviors such as condescension, belittling, snubbing, subtly insulting insinuations, contrarianism, procrastination, stubbornness, sabotage, the silent treatment, victim playing, sarcasm, resentment, sullenness, or deliberate/repeated failure to accomplish requested tasks for which one is often explicitly responsible.
Paula De Angelis says, "It would actually make perfect sense that those promoted to leadership positions might often be those who on the surface appear to be agreeable, diplomatic and supportive, yet who are actually dishonest, backstabbing saboteurs behind the scenes.
"[8] Passive-aggressive behavior was first defined clinically by Colonel William C. Menninger during World War II in the context of men's reaction to military compliance.