Problem reading user specified pathdef

Hi,

I saved a user specific pathdef.m file via pathtool. This is saved on the startup matlab directory /home/username/Documents/MATLAB I have checked the file and it includes the correct path.

However, whenever I start matlab, it seems to ignore this file and reads the pathdef stored under matlabroot/toolbox/local. I am running matlab version R2013a.

I looked into matlabrc.m and if I run "which pathdef" prior to running matlabpath(pathdef) on line 33 it only finds the pathdef saved under matlabroot/toolbox/local. The user specific pathdef is only found after running line 33. I checked the output of userpath during startup and it points to the correct directory where my user specified file is saved.

Is this the correct behaviour and how can I force matlab to read the user specified file on startup?

Many thanks for your help