Personality Psychology

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 Personality Psychology
Foundations and Findings

Marianne Miserandino
Arcadia University

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Miserandino, Marianne.
Personality psychology : foundations and findings / by Marianne Miserandino.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-205-73887-8 (alk. paper)
1. Personality. I. Title.
BF698.M556 2011
155.2—dc23
2011030719

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 QUV 15 14 13 12 11

ISBN-10: 0-205-73887-7
www.pearsonhighered.com ISBN-13: 978-0-205-73887-8
 Dedication
To Dimitri, with all my love, except for the chapter on
resilience—that is dedicated to my mother, who
taught me all I know on the subject and who passed
away when that chapter was being written.
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 BRIEF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks

of Personality 1

CHAPTER 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 21

CHAPTER 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 47
CHAPTER 4 Personality Assessment 77
CHAPTER 5 Self and Identity 105
CHAPTER 6 Genetics 139
CHAPTER 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 167
CHAPTER 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 203
CHAPTER 9 Regulation and Motivation:
Self-Determination Theory 241
CHAPTER 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 271
CHAPTER 11 Gender and Personality 311
CHAPTER 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative
Mini-Chapter 349
CHAPTER 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 373

vii
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 CONTENTS

Preface xv

CHAPTER 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks

of Personality 1
What Is Personality Psychology? 3
The Building Blocks of Personality 3
Putting It All Together: Integration 5
Organization of This Book 6
How Do Psychologists Study Personality? 7
The Scientific Method 7
Observational Studies, and Personality Questionnaires 8
Correlational and Experimental Designs 9
Research Methods Illustrated: A True Experiment 10
Types of Data and Personality Assessment 12
Then and Now: The Ethics of Research With People 13
Science or Science Fiction? A Brief Introduction to Current Research
Findings in Personality Psychology 17
Chapter Summary 17
Review Questions 18
Key Terms 19

CHAPTER 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 21

What Is a Personality Trait? 24
Two Approaches to the Study of Personality Traits 25
What Do We Know About Personality From the Idiographic
Approach? 27
Studying Individual Personalities: The Idiographic Approach 27
The Idiographic Approach Applied: The Case of Jenny 28
What Do We Know About Personality From the Nomothetic
Approach? 29
Finding Universals: The Nomothetic Approach 29
Research Methods Illustrated: Factor Analysis 30
The Great Nomothetic Search for Universal Principles of Personality 32
Three Superfactors: Eysenck 33
Five Factors: The Big Five and the Five-Factor Model 35

ix
x Contents

A One-Factor Solution 40
Six- and Seven-Factor Solutions . . . and Beyond! 41
Then and Now: The Four Temperaments and the Five Factors 42
The Personality of Everyday Life: What can you tell about someone
from his or her living space? 44
Chapter Summary 44
Review Questions 45
Key Terms 45

CHAPTER 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 47

What’s Missing From the Five Factors 49
Is Intelligence a Personality Trait? 49
Is Religiosity a Personality Trait? 50
Is Sexuality a Personality Trait? 51
Indigenous Personality: Unique Personality Traits? 52
The Five Factors in Other Cultures 53
Personality Traits Cross-Culturally: Personality Traits
in China 54
Research Methods Illustrated: Triangulation and Types of Data 55
Expression of Traits in Everyday Life 57
Personality Traits of Presidents 57
Music Preferences and Personality Traits 59
Web Pages and Personality Traits 61
Careers and Personality Traits 63
The Personality of Everyday Life: What does your online presence say
about your personality? 63
Personality Development Over the Life Span: Continuity, Change,
and Coherence 65
How Consistent Are People Over Time? 67
How Much Do People Change in General? 68
How and Why Do Individuals Develop in Their Own Particular
Ways? 71
Where Does Adult Personality Come From? 72
Then and Now: The Grant Study of Harvard Graduates 73
Personality Traits: Theoretical and Practical Conclusions 75
Chapter Summary 75
Review Questions 76
Key Terms 76

CHAPTER 4 Personality Assessment 77

What Makes a Good Personality Test? 79
Test Reliability: Generalizability Across Time, Items,
and Raters 80
Test Validity 81
Test Generalizability 84
Research Methods Illustrated: Is the NEO-PI-R a Good Personality
Test? 84
Does the NEO-PI-R Have Reliability? 85
Does the NEO-PI-R Have Validity? 85
Does the NEO-PI-R Have Test Generalizability? 87
Personality Tests 87
Types and Formats of Personality Tests 87
Response Sets 91
 Contents xi

Personality Tests and Selection 93

Integrity Testing 95
Success Stories 96
Legal Issues 97
The Personality of Everyday Life: What can they ask you on a job
interview? 98
Then and Now: Personality Assessment and Matchmaking 99
Chapter Summary 101
Review Questions 102
Key Terms 103

CHAPTER 5 Self and Identity 105

Self-Concept 106
How Does the Self-Concept Develop? 106
Impact of Culture on Self-Concepts 113
Possible Selves 118
Then and Now: The Self 121
Self-Esteem 123
Self-Esteem Level 123
Self-Esteem Stability 124
Self-Concept Clarity 124
The Personality of Everyday Life: Shooting yourself in the foot
to protect your self-esteem 125
Life Outcomes of High and Low Self-Esteem:
Myths and Realities 126
Research Methods Illustrated: Qualitative Data and Content
Analysis 130
Social Identity 133
Self-Presentation 133
Self-Monitoring 135
Chapter Summary 137
Review Questions 138
Key Terms 138

CHAPTER 6 Genetics 139

Nature and Nurture as Allies 142
Genes and Environment as Co-actors 143
Heritability 143
Environmentality 144
Shared and Nonshared Environments 145
Estimating Heritability 146
Research Methods Illustrated: Correlational Designs I:
The Logic of Adoption and Twin Studies 148
Heritability of Common Personality Characteristics 151
Then and Now: The Science of Genetics 153
Genes and Environment: A Dialectical Synthesis 156
Genotype–Environment Interactions 156
Genotype–Environment Correlations 158
The Personality of Everyday Life: What can genetics research
do for us? 163
Chapter Summary 164
Review Questions 165
Key Terms 165
xii Contents

CHAPTER 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 167

What Is Neuroscience and How Do We Study It? 169
Bodily Responses 169
Brain Structure 170
Brain Activity 171
Biochemical Activity 173
Research Methods Illustrated: Correlational Designs II: Scatterplots,
Correlations, and the Alleged “Voodoo Science” of fMRI Studies 174
Neurological Theories of Personality 176
Eysenck’s PEN Model 178
Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST) 181
The Personality of Everyday Life: Personality
and the guessing penalty 187
Then and Now: Phrenology, the New Phrenology, and the Future
of Neuroimaging for Personality and Beyond 188
Neurological Correlates of Personality 191
Extraversion and Neuroticism 192
Impulsivity and Sensation Seeking 196
Conclusion: What Have We Learned From the Neuroscience
of Personality? 200
Chapter Summary 200
Review Questions 201
Key Terms 202

CHAPTER 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 203

Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalysis 204
Background 205
Then and Now: The Word Association Test
and the Implicit Attitudes Test 209
Freud’s View of Personality: The Structural
and Topographic Models 211
Anxiety and the Defense Mechanisms 213
Psychosexual Stages 220
Research Methods Illustrated: Case Study and Psychobiography 226
Psychodynamic Theory Since Freud 228
Attachment Theory 229
Brief History 229
The Personality of Everyday Life: Taking the trauma out
of a hospital stay 230
Attachment Patterns for Life? 232
Attachment Styles in Adulthood 233
Attachment and Adult Personality Functioning 234
Chapter Summary 237
Review Questions 238
Key Terms 239

CHAPTER 9 Regulation and Motivation:

Self-Determination Theory 241
Three Fundamental Psychological Needs 243
How Do We Satisfy These Needs? 245
Fostering Autonomy: Autonomy Support 246
Fostering Competence: Structure and Optimal Challenge 248
Fostering Relatedness: Involvement 250
 Contents xiii

The Personality of Everyday Life: Relatedness

in college students 251
Then and Now: Undermining Intrinsic Interest 252
Connections Between Self-Determination Theory and Other Theories
in Personality 254
Autonomy and Locus of Causality 254
Competence and Self-Efficacy Theory 254
Relatedness and Attachment Theory 256
Research Methods Illustrated: Path Analysis 256
What It Means to Be Self-Regulated 257
Types of Motivation 258
Causality Orientations 260
Self-Determination Theory Applied 261
Health Behaviors 262
Sports Behaviors 263
Work Behaviors 266
The Pursuit of Happiness 268
The Tae Bo Study Revisited 268
Chapter Summary 269
Review Questions 270
Key Terms 270

CHAPTER 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 271

Locus of Control 274
Measures of Locus of Control 274
Locus of Control and Achievement 275
Locus of Control and Work Behavior 276
Locus of Control and Physical and Psychological Health 276
Locus of Control and Social Behavior 277
Cultural Differences in Locus of Control 278
Then and Now: Locus of Control 279
Learned Helplessness 280
Explanatory Style 283
Measures of Explanatory Style 285
Explanatory Style and Achievement 287
Explanatory Style and Work Behavior 290
Explanatory Style and Physical and Psychological Health 291
Explanatory Style and Social Behavior 294
Cultural Differences in Explanatory Style 295
Research Methods Illustrated: Field Studies
and Natural Manipulations 296
Dispositional Optimism 298
Measures of Dispositional Optimism 300
Dispositional Optimism and Coping 301
The Personality of Everyday Life: Making people
more optimistic 306
Chapter Summary 307
Review Questions 308
Key Terms 308

CHAPTER 11 Gender and Personality 311

Beliefs About Personality Similarities and Differences Between Men
and Women 313
Research Methods Illustrated: Effect Size and Meta-Analysis 315
xiv Contents

Personality Differences Between Men and Women:

Fact or Fiction? 317
Gender Similarities and Differences in the Five-Factor Model 322
Gender Differences in Other Aspects of Personality
and Social Behavior 323
Gender Differences? It Depends 325
What Causes Gender Differences? 330
Evolution 332
Social Context 334
Social Role Theory 335
Social Construction 337
Biopsychosocial Model 338
The Personality of Everyday Life: Gendered beliefs about personality:
What difference does it make? 342
Then and Now: Definition and Assessment of Gender 343
Chapter Summary 347
Review Questions 347
Key Terms 348

CHAPTER 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative

Mini-Chapter 349
Myths and Misperceptions About Sexual Orientation 351
The Personality of Everyday Life: The heteronormativity
of American life 352
What Is Sexual Orientation? 353
How Many People Are Gay, Lesbian, Straight, or Bisexual? 356
What Determines Sexual Orientation? 357
Biological Explanations of Sexual Orientation 358
Environmental Theories 366
Interactionist Theories 366
Chapter Summary 371
Review Questions 372
Key Terms 372

CHAPTER 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 373

What Is Resilience? 375
Characteristics of Resilient People 376
Hardiness: Control, Commitment, and Challenge 377
Trait Resilience 379
Positive Emotions 383
The Seven Habits of Highly Resilient People 388
The Personality of Everyday Life: Who is happy? 391
Chapter Summary 391
Review Questions 392
Key Terms 392

Glossary 393

References 409

Photo Credits 467

Index 469
 PREFACE

What makes this book different from many of the current textbooks on personality psychology?
This book is evidence-based: It focuses on what psychologists have discovered about the human
personality.
This mission is directly reflected in the title of the book: Personality Psychology: Foundations
and Findings. Foundations refers to the basic questions and accumulated knowledge in each of
the areas of traits, genetics, neuroscience, self and identity, intrapsychic aspects, regulation and
motivation, and cognition as it applies to the human personality. Findings refers to the cutting-
edge research in each of these areas in which personality psychologists are actively engaged
every day. By studying both of these parts of the research process, you will have a context for
understanding new developments in the field.
In the process of learning about research, I hope you will learn about yourself, the people
around you, and how personality psychology applies to your everyday life. But more than
that, I hope that this grounding in basic research will help you understand and interpret new
discoveries in psychology and related fields as they occur in the future. Although theories may
be refined and facts updated, the scientific method of evaluating findings and putting them
together to build an understanding of the human personality will outlast every edition of this
book.

For Instructors: Approach of This Book

This book reflects personality research as contained in the latest Handbook of Personality
Psychology (John, Robins, & Pervin, 2008) rather than an overview of the theories or schools
of personality psychology. For many years, there has been this unusual split between what
personality psychologists do (research), and what students learn in a personality course
(theories). I believe that there is a place for both kinds of courses in most schools. I happen
to teach in a psychology department that is committed to research, so much so that our
majors take four labs in addition to Research Methods and Statistics, and every one of them
writes a senior thesis, sometimes involving original research! I’ve been teaching both social
psychology and personality psychology with labs for over 20 years.
Because this book represents the state-of-the-art of the field of personality, you won’t see
many topics that you would normally see in an undergraduate personality textbook. Notably
missing are entire chapters or sections devoted to the major schools of thought including the
humanistic and behavioristic schools. The book does cover Sigmund Freud in great depth, but
barely mentions Carl Jung, Karen Horney, and Albert Bandura and makes no mention of B. F.
Skinner! If you wish, these luminaries can easily be covered in your lectures at the appropriate
juncture in the text.
As an instructor, I would encourage you to take a look at this research-based view of
personality. From my experience as a teacher, I have a pretty good sense of the kinds of studies

xv
xvi Preface

that pique students’ interests and that they can make sense out of even if they haven’t had an
entire course in research methods. Of course, you may want to emphasize certain methods
and techniques more—or less—than others depending on the needs of your students, just
as you may wish to skip entire chapters or sections of chapters. In skipping chapters, I urge
you to cover at least one of the chapters in the final section examining the whole person—
gender, sexual orientation, or resilience—as these topics build on material covered in the
earlier chapters.

Supplements
To help you in this approach, there are a number of supplements to help students master the
foundations and findings of personality psychology, and to appreciate research findings in
personality psychology today. Pearson Education is pleased to offer the following supplements
to qualified adopters:

Instructor’s Resource Manual (0-205-85365-X): Designed to make your lectures more effec-
tive and save you preparation time, this resource gathers together the most effective activities
and strategies for teaching your course. Materials are broken up by chapter and include chapter
outlines, key terms, lecture suggestions and discussion topics, and classroom activities. Available
for download on the Instructor’s Resource Center at www.pearsonhighered.com

Test Bank (0-205-09678-6): Each chapter contains multiple choice, true-false, short answer,
and essay questions. Available for download on the Instructor’s Resource Center at www
.pearsonhighered.com.

MyTest Test Bank (0-205-09678-6): A powerful assessment-generation program that helps

instructors easily create and print quizzes and exams. Questions and tests can be authored
online, allowing instructors ultimate flexibility and the ability to efficiently manage assess-
ments anytime, anywhere! Instructors can easily access existing questions, edit, create, and store
using simple drag-and-drop techniques and Word-like controls. Data on each question provides
information on difficulty level and page number of corresponding text discussion. In addition,
each question maps to the text’s major section and learning objective. For more information,
go to www.PearsonMyTest.com.

Standard PowerPoint Presentation (0-205-09674-3): The PowerPoint Presentation is an

exciting interactive tool for use in the classroom. Each chapter pairs key concepts with images
from the textbook to reinforce student learning. Available for download on the Instructor’s
Resource Center at www.pearsonhighered.com.

CourseSmart eTextbook (0-205-09677-8): CourseSmart Textbooks Online is an exciting choice

for students looking to save money. As an alternative to purchasing the print textbook, students
can subscribe to the same content online and save up to 60% off the suggested list price of the
print text. With a CourseSmart eTextbook, students can search the text, make notes online,
print our reading assignments that incorporate lecture notes, and bookmark important pas-
sages for later review. For more information, or to subscribe to the CourseSmart eTextbook,
visit www.coursesmart.com.

MySearchLab (0-205-23992-7): MySearchLab is an engaging online experience that person-

alizes learning for students. Features include the ability to highlight and add notes to the
eText online or download changes straight to the iPad. Chapter quizzes and flashcards offer
immediate feedback and report directly to the grade book. A wide range of writing, grammar,
and research tools and access to a variety of academic journals, census data, Associated Press
newsfeeds, and discipline-specific readings help students hone their writing and research skills.
www.pearsonhighered.com.
 Preface xvii

For Students: Key Features

There are a number of unique features to this book to help you get excited about research—
likened to getting children to eat vegetables by one early reviewer of this book. First, each
chapter begins with an eye-opening study to make you curious about the topic of the “Traditional scientific
chapter. method has always been
Second, rather than have an entire chapter devoted to research methods, I have integrated at the very best, 20–20
research methods into Chapters 1 through 11 in a special Research Methods Illustrated sec- hindsight. It’s good for seeing
tion. In my experience, most method chapters are rather dry because beginners don’t have the where you’ve been. It’s good
background yet to understand why a particular method is important. Also, method chapters
for testing the truth of what
often seem to be placed at the beginning of a textbook so that just as readers are getting excited
about the subject matter and are ready to jump in, they have to wait a bit longer to first learn you think you know, but
about methods before they get to the good stuff. By integrating the methods, readers will be it can’t tell you where you
able to see right away how a particular method is used rather than having to remember it for ought to go.”
later or flip back for a refresher. Robert M. Pirsig
For example, in the first chapter you will immediately learn about what makes a true experi-
ment. In Chapter 6—where true experiments are often ethically and practically impossible—you
will learn about correlational designs. In Chapter11, when you might wonder if there is a dif-
ference between men and women on personality characteristics, you will learn about a statistic
that quantifies how big of a difference it is, on average. In this way, each research method is
taught in context and reinforced by the material in a given chapter. Sure, it might take you an
entire semester to learn about all of the major kinds of research methods used by personality
psychologists, but you will learn it in a more meaningful and lasting way. Research Methods
Illustrated sections include:

■ A True Experiment (Chapter 1)

■ Factor Analysis (Chapter 2)
■ Triangulation and Types of Data (Chapter 3)
■ How to Evaluate a Personality. Is the NEO-PI-R a Good Personality Test? (Chapter 4)
■ Qualitative Data and Content Analysis (Chapter 5)
■ Correlational Designs I: The Logic of Adoption and Twin Studies (Chapter 6)
■ Correlational Designs II: Scatterplots, Correlations, and the Alleged “Voodoo Science”
of fMRI Studies (Chapter 7)
■ Case Study and Psychobiography (Chapter 8)
■ Path Analysis (Chapter 9)
■ Field Studies and Natural Manipulations (Chapter 10)
■ Effect Size and Meta-Analysis (Chapter 11)

Third, Chapters 1 through 11 include a feature called Then and Now. These features pres-
ent an in-depth view of a research method or paradigm over time. Scientists often devote years
of their life to studying a certain area or even to a specific research question. One of the things
you will quickly learn about research is that results of experiments give us—not answers, as
you might expect—but more questions! Research often progresses by asking more sophisticated
questions and using more sophisticated methods to answer the same questions. Sir Isaac New-
ton reportedly said, “If I have seen further, it is only by standing on the shoulders of giants.”
These Then and Now features will give you a sense of what a research program looks like and
an appreciation for the continuity of research across time. This way you can start to see for
yourself how findings fit together and build on each other instead of seeming as if they occur
in a vacuum (or happen perfectly the first time).
Fourth, each chapter contains a self-assessment, to help you explore some of the topics
on a more personal level. These are nearly all legitimate personality tests that are currently
used by personality psychologists in their research. I find that there is no better way to
understand a topic than to experience it firsthand, and these personality tests will help
xviii Preface

you learn more about yourself in the process. For example, as you learn about Sigmund
Freud and the psychoanalytic approach to personality, you can learn about your own adult
attachment style that developed out of your early relationships. In Chapter 7 you can see
how sensation seeking you are. You even can see how resilient or masculine and feminine
you are and how much you know about sexual orientation in the chapters on these topics.
Self-assessments include:

■ Science or Science Fiction? (Chapter 1)

■ The Ten-Item Personality Inventory (Chapter 2)
■ The Spiritual Transcendence Scale (Chapter 3)
■ The Need for Cognition Scale (Chapter 4)
■ The Twenty Statements Test (Chapter 5)
■ The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Chapter 5)
■ Genetic and environmental contributions to personality (Chapter 6)
■ The Brief Sensation Seeking Scale (Chapter 7)
■ Adult Attachment Style (Chapter 8)
■ The Need for Relatedness at College Questionnaire (Chapter 9)
■ The Life Orientation Test (Chapter 10)
■ The Personal Attributes Questionnaire (Chapter 11)
■ Myths and misperceptions of sexual orientation (Chapter 12)
■ The Ego Resiliency Scale (Chapter 13)

Fifth, all chapters feature a special The Personality of Everyday Life box, and include margin
exercises titled SEE FOR YOURSELF to help you experience, apply, and ultimately make sense out
of the findings discussed in the text.
Sixth, the margin critical thinking questions titled THINK ABOUT IT and Review Questions
at the end of every chapter help you think critically about the theories and research discussed in
the text. Actively getting involved in, questioning, processing, and recalling material, as opposed
to passively reading the text, will help you recall the material better.
Seventh, there are numerous references in the book (nearly 2,000 of them!). By having
each topic thoroughly documented, you will be able to investigate a given topic more deeply
on your own. Perhaps you will have the opportunity to write a paper or to design a research
project in personality psychology. With each topic fully supported with an extensive number
of references, this book will serve as a good resource to get you started on such projects, even
after your personality course is over. In particular, I’ve included many references to personality
tests used by researchers with the hope that you can incorporate some of these measures into
your own studies.
Finally, the book features three integrative chapters on gender, sexual orientation, and resil-
ience (Chapters 11, 12, and 13, respectively). Each of these chapters builds on material from the
previous chapters. For example, psychologists still don’t have a good sense of what determines
our gender or our sexual orientation. Part of it is physiological and part of it is psychological.
Also, part of what makes us resilient has to do with our physiological makeup, our emotional
responses, and also our cognitive interpretation of events. By reading one or all of these chapters
you will see how the building blocks of personality—outlined in Chapters 2 through 10—can
be put together to reach an understanding of the human personality.
There are a few things you will not see in this book. First, I have chosen to focus on healthy
personality rather than psychopathology or personality disorders. Like other psychologists,
I view mental health as occurring on a continuum (Krueger & Tackett, 2003; Widiger & Smith,
1999), so that the difference between so-called normal personality and abnormal personality
is one of degree rather than of kind. After all, at what point does a defense mechanism turn
into a delusion? And who’s to make that judgment? By giving you a grounding in the building
blocks of personality, I help you take it a step further on your own or in your next psychology
class and study what happens when something goes awry in the process.
 Preface xix

In addition, I have aimed to make this book about the personality of all persons, regard-
less of cultural background. I believe that the building blocks of personality are universal,
though they play out against a cultural background. Rather than include a separate chapter
on culture, or special highlighted boxes within the text, I have chosen to integrate findings
on culture throughout the book. Sometimes the building blocks of personality do not vary
by culture, but where they do, I make a point of discussing these departures within the
relevant chapter.
By the end of reading this book, I hope that you will be as excited about the state of
personality psychology as I am. And that crack about research being like vegetables? I like to
think of the following quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson:

Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment.
The more experiments you make the better. What if they are a little coarse, and
you may get your coat soiled or torn? What if you do fail, and get fairly rolled in
the dirt once or twice. Up again, you shall never be so afraid of a tumble.

Let us start this experiment together.

Acknowledgments
As trite as it may sound, this book took a whole village to bring to fruition. I wholeheartedly
thank each and every one of you (whether I mention you by name or not), from my former
students who challenged me with the words “You can write a better textbook,” to my col-
leagues who read and commented on early drafts both at Arcadia University (Josh Blustein,
Steve Robbins, Ned Wolff, Angela Gillem, Maddy Brenner, Dawn Michelle Boothby, Peggy
Hickman, Sheryl Smith, and Wes Rose) and elsewhere (Dana Dunn, Moravian Univer-
sity; Ed Deci, University of Rochester), to colleagues who cheered me on and shared their
experience and expertise on textbook writing (Barbara Nodine, Les Sdorow). I especially
wish to thank my team of editors at Pearson who helped me do the impossible, including
Susan Hartman, LeeAnn Doherty, Jeff Marshall, and additional reviewers including: Victor
Bissonnette, Berry College; Ronen Cuperman, University of Texas at Arlington; Daneen
Deptula, Fitchburg State University; Thomas Holtgraves, Ball State University; Ben Gor-
vine, Northwestern University; John Kurtz, Villanova; Heather LaCost, Waubonsee Com-
munity College; Phil O. McClung, West Virginia University at Parkersburg; Daniel Molden,
Northwestern University; Kathryn C. Oleson, Reed College; Richard Osbaldiston, Eastern
Kentucky University; Christina L. Scott, Saint Mary’s College of California; Matthew Scul-
lin, University of Texas at El Paso; and Chuck Tate, California State University Bakersfield.
Thanks also to the students of PY332 during the Spring of 2011 for their comments and
critiques of an early draft of this book; Dottie Ettinger and the student workers in the Psy-
chology Department; Interlibrary Loan Magician Jay Slott, Michelle Realle, and the student
workers in the Arcadia University Landman Library; and Provost Michael Berger and Dean
John Hoffman, who supported my yearlong study leave from teaching to write a good first
draft of the entire book.
On a personal note, I wish to thank my friends and husband who endured my factoids and
frustrations over many a meal and online chat session: Suzanne DuPlantis, Reiko Finamore,
Troy Finamore, Rick Arras (the master of analogies and metaphors), Adam Levy, Eileen Kim;
my family, whose anecdotes, words, and photos occasionally grace these pages; Phil Jones
for proofreading; Monique Legaré and my fellow dancers for having patience with missed
rehearsals; my personal support team of Jayne Antonowsky, Parviz Hanjani, and Susan Nolte;
Dimitrios Diamantaras for reading every last word of this text and his typesetting expertise;
and my “crazy nephew” Dominick who made sure I didn’t take the whole process too seri-
ously by taking me to Disneyland with his wife Margherita and mother-in-law Rosaria so he
could see my and my great-niece Caterina’s faces light up while visiting the Magic Kingdom
for our very first time.
xx Preface

About the Author

Marianne Miserandino is the 2010 winner of the Robert S. Daniel
Teaching Excellence Award, Four-Year Colleges and Universities,
from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (Division 2 of the
American Psychological Association). She was also the 2009 Arca-
dia University Professor of the Year and the 2000 recipient of the
Lindback Award for Teaching Excellence. She currently maintains
the Personality Pedagogy website for teachers of personality psy-
chology (http://personalitypedagogy.arcadia.edu), for which she
received a grant from the Association for Psychological Science
(APS) Fund for Teaching and Public Understanding of Psychologi-
cal Science.
Her commitment to teaching is evidenced by her work as news editor, reviewer, and frequent
contributor to the APA journal Teaching of Psychology. She designed and conducted a 4-week
study abroad program in Vienna, Austria, for the Arcadia University College of Global Studies
on the psychology of Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, and Viktor Frankl.
Dr. Miserandino received her BA in psychology from the University of Rochester and
a PhD in social-personality psychology from Cornell University. Dr. Miserandino came to
Arcadia University after a postdoctoral fellowship in human motivation at the University of
Rochester and full-time teaching.
She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, and a member of the Association
for Psychological Science, the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, the Society for the
Teaching of Psychology, Sigma XI—The Scientific Research Society, and the Honor Society of Phi
Kappa Phi, and has served on the American Psychological Association Division Two Task Force for
Minority Issues.
CHAPTER
1 WHO AM I?
UNDERSTANDING THE
BUILDING BLOCKS
OF PERSONALITY
WHAT IS PERSONALITY PSYCHOLOGY?
The Building Blocks of Personality
Traits
Genetics
Neuroscience
Self and Identity
Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality
Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory
Cognitive Foundations
Putting It All Together: Integration
Organization of This Book
HOW DO PSYCHOLOGISTS STUDY PERSONALITY?
The Scientific Method
Observational Studies and Personality Questionnaires
Read the Chapter on Correlational and Experimental Designs
mysearchlab.com RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: A TRUE EXPERIMENT
Types of Data and Personality Assessment
THEN AND NOW: THE ETHICS OF RESEARCH WITH PEOPLE
SCIENCE OR SCIENCE FICTION? A BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO CURRENT RESEARCH FINDINGS IN
PERSONALITY PSYCHOLOGY
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

1
2 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

T
he summer after my first year in high school, my mom and I spent a few weeks explor-
ing the east end of Long Island. I had always loved the ocean growing up and I looked
“Individual results may forward to the chance of spending every day at the beach. Until that summer, I thought
vary.” I knew all about the ocean, having lived on Long Island my entire life—all 14 years of it—to
Advertising disclaimer that point. But that summer I learned that there was so much more to the ocean than I realized.
I was completely amazed at how different the ocean was each day. Some days the ocean
would be very calm and we could walk out a long, long way before the water was over our heads.
Other days, the ocean was too rough for small children to go into, with water over our heads and
waves breaking just a few feet from shore. Some days the water would be very warm but then an
overnight storm would churn up deep water delivering ice-cold water to the shore the next day.
Even the color of the ocean varied from the light green of the sea foam to the dark forest green
almost black of the deep water. I spent a lot of time thinking and daydreaming that summer
while looking out to sea and it struck me that the ocean almost seemed to have a personality.
The ocean is a pretty good metaphor for personality. Think about it: The ocean is made
up of water, but it is much more than that. There are tides, waves, inversions, salt, seaweed, and
marine life; it is vast and deep; and it changes regularly. Could we understand the ocean only
by studying water molecules? By exploring only its depths and ignoring the shore? Obviously,
there are many different aspects of the ocean and scientists devote their lives to studying just
a small part of what makes up the ocean. The ocean is all of these parts and yet it is also more
than these parts. So it is with personality.
To understand personality, we need to understand what a person is like. Is she extroverted
or introverted? Is he easygoing? Is she open to new ideas? Is he responsible? Would he make a
good mate? Would she make a good lab partner? We also need to understand our genetics and
physiology, which gives us our physical being and building blocks of neurons, hormones, and
brain structures that take in and process information and direct our responses to the world. And
we need to consider that there may be parts of the person hidden under the surface, much like
how the ocean has tides and a myriad of creatures hidden in its depths. We also need to know
how a person copes with the storms of life.
Even then, a person is more than these things, more than the sum of his or her parts. How
does a person function in the world? How does a person think of himself or herself and interact
with others? How do gender, sexual orientation, and other social identities and personal self-
concepts affect a person? How does a person fit into the large social world, much like how the
ocean is part of the larger ecosystem of the earth, including fish, birds, sky, and land? And finally,
how does a person, like the ocean, change over time and yet remain fundamentally the same?
Two early personality psychologists mused that there are aspects of personality that are
universal to all people, that are shared by similar people, and that are completely unique to a
single individual (Kluckhohn & Murray, 1948).
Consider that all humans, regardless of culture, have a genetic makeup, a brain, a nervous
system, and are born into a social group. To the extent that these forces affect human personality,
there will be universals in human personality.
Of course, people do vary, but there is often a rhyme and a reason to their variance. At a
basic level, there are people who are more likely to venture forth in the world to meet other
people. We call such people extroverts. Other people, introverts, prefer to keep to themselves. We
would expect people who behave similarly to share similar personality characteristics, whether
it be extraversion or introversion, neuroticism or emotional stability, openness or concreteness,
agreeableness or grumpiness, conscientiousness or impulsiveness, for example.
Finally, we could say that another human universal is the desire for actualization (i.e., to
be who we are meant to be; to develop and express our individual identity). Though we may
share the same mechanisms (genetics, physiology, neurology), some of the same characteristics
(introversion-extraversion), and have some of the same experiences in the world (attachment to
caregivers, sexual adjustment, trauma, happiness), the way these building blocks of personality
come together forms a unique individual: you!
Knowing that people do vary, personality psychologists attempt to study both the ways
people are similar and the ways people are different from each other.
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 3

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts: Just as the small pictures, like the ones on the left, combine to form the picture of the
whole person on the right, personality is made up of building blocks.

In this book, I will share with you some of the building blocks of human personality at
all levels, from the micro-level of genes on up to the macro- or meta-level of the social world.
I hope to help you put these individual elements together and think across and beyond these
individual levels to understand personality functioning.

What Is Personality Psychology?

Personality psychology is the scientific study of what makes us who we are. Using the scientific “Whenever two people meet
method of investigation, it is the study of individual differences: for identifying ways in which there are six present. There
people are both similar and different, and for explaining how they became that way. is the man as he sees himself,
Part of personality is identifying and studying the building blocks or raw materials that
each as the other person sees
make us think and act as we do. Consider the illustrations in the photos on the top of this page.
Though the figure on the left is made up of smaller images, the figure as a whole is more than him, and each man as he
the mere sum of individual images. The same is true for personality. Although we can study really is.”
the individual elements that make up the human personality, the elements come together to William James, the father
create a whole person in a way that is not reducible to its parts. And an individual’s personality of American psychology
is more than the sum of his or her parts. Not only can the individual parts vary among people,
but the way they fit together may vary as well.

The Building Blocks of Personality

What are these individual parts that come together to create a whole person? Most psycholo-
gists would agree that to understand human personality we need to understand traits, genetics,
neuroscience, self and identity, intrapsychic aspects, regulation and motivation, and cognition.
Missing from this list are social and environmental forces that impact human personality at
all of these levels. For example, environmental forces—including culture, society, and social-
ization by parents and peers—have a huge impact on our personalities. The impact of the
social environment is felt at multiple levels, from our sense of self and identity to the level of
our genetics. Rather than viewing social influences as a separate building block, the impact of
societal forces runs as a theme throughout all of the foundations. Let’s take a closer look at the
building blocks of personality.
4 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

SEE FOR YOURSELF Traits. How do we go about describing human personality and identifying important person-
ality characteristics? The answer is traits: a person’s typical way of thinking, feeling, and acting,
How would you describe in various situations, at different times. We may be born with a certain physiology that makes
yourself? The words that us more likely to develop certain characteristics, but there are many other characteristics that
come most readily to mind
we can develop from our socialization (from parents, peers, teachers, society), and from our
are often trait terms.
personal experiences. These traits will be consistent across our lives and will be expressed in all
sorts of ways, as you will see in later chapters, from how we shake hands, to the kind of music
we prefer, to even how we decorate our living spaces and the careers we choose.

Genetics. Personality starts with our genetic makeup that we have inherited from each of
THINK ABOUT IT our birth parents. Over millennia, evolutionary forces have selected behaviors that improve the
survival of the species or survival of an individual and an individual’s close genetic relatives
What does it mean to say
we inherit “potentialities”? (Confer et al., 2010). Genetics is the study of how genes and environment affect personality
and behavior. We know that even though many personality variables have a genetic component,
every one of them has an environmental component as well. As we shall see in Chapter 6, nature
and nurture work together to make us who we are. Whereas we may inherit specific personality
characteristics, we also inherit potentialities that may be expressed in our personalities depend-
ing on the environment.

Neuroscience. Our genes encode our physical bodies, including our brain and nervous sys-
tem. Neuroscience is the study of how our brain and nervous system affect personality and
behavior through the study of bodily responses, brain structure, brain activity, and biochemi-
cal activity. Some of this research suggests that extroversion, neuroticism, and impulsivity are
related to physiological and neurological differences which may be present at birth, or develop
soon thereafter. Though the environment and our personal experiences can still impact how
these characteristics develop, the current evidence suggests that part of who we are—at least in
terms of these three characteristics—is built into us by our neurology.

Self and Identity. Self and Identity encompasses our own sense of who we are including our
THINK ABOUT IT self-concept, self-esteem, and social identity. One of the hallmarks of being human is the ability
Are you born with a self or to reflect on ourselves. We have a sense of who we are: our self-concept. And we have an opinion
does a self develop? about that: our self-esteem. We may even try to present ourselves in a certain way to others, or
we may embrace what others think about us, taking on a social identity. Where scientists once
thought that self-reflection was unique to humans, we now know that a few other species share
this capacity including dolphins and chimpanzees. Part of what makes up our personality, in
addition to our traits, is our sense of self and social identity.

Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality. With this sense of self, we can look within our-
selves (intra) to our own conscious and unconscious thoughts and feelings (psychic) that also
make up our personality (intrapsychic). No doubt you’ve heard of Sigmund Freud, who estab-
lished an entire theory about our unconscious motivations and the defenses we use to protect
ourselves from threatening thoughts and desires.
“If a man has been his One of Freud’s biggest contributions to psychology was the realization that physical dis-
mother’s undisputed darling orders could have psychological causes, which were often unconscious. He also claimed that
he retains throughout life our early experiences left an indelible, but unconscious, imprint on our adult personalities. At
the same time, Freud was one of the first to suggest that personality could be changed, and he
the triumphant feeling, the
originated a method of psychotherapy to do so. Since Freud’s day, science has discounted some
confidence in success, which
aspects of his theory, even as it has supported others (Westen, 1998a). Today, a complete under-
not seldom brings actual standing of personality must also take into account our unconscious motivations, including our
success along with it.” defense mechanisms and important attachments, starting with our caregivers and continuing
Sigmund Freud with our intimate relationships.

Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory. Although Freud believed

that people were controlled by unconscious forces, a modern theory of motivation suggests
that people can—and do!—regulate themselves consciously and unconsciously. According to
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 5

self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 1985; Ryan & Deci, 2008), when people feel free to
choose, are competent at what they do, and are connected to people around them, they will
be motivated and self-directed for the task at hand. People differ in the extent to which they
feel self-determined and regulate their own motivation. The building block of regulation and
motivation is concerned with how people adjust their responses to the environment, both
consciously and unconsciously.

Cognitive Foundations. Finally, people differ in how they process information, espe-
cially about the causes and impacts of events in their lives, and expectations for what
may happen in the future. Specifically, there are individual differences in locus of control,
learned helplessness, learned hopelessness, and optimism-pessimism. The Cognitive foun-
dation describes how people perceive and think about information about themselves and
the world.

Putting It All Together: Integration

Finally, in Integration we combine the building blocks of personality into a whole person.
When it comes to personality, the whole is greater than the mere sum of the parts. Consider
your own personality. You are equipped with a specific package of genes that have provided a
certain type of physiological reactivity and brain function, which, along with life experiences
have led you to develop a package of character traits. You are able to reflect on who you are, and
who the world wants you to be. You may also be vaguely aware of hidden motives and desires,
such as whom you feel emotional attachments to. You may also be enthusiastically engaged in
certain activities and bored or disengaged from others. You may face the world with optimism
(or pessimism), believing that you have an impact on what befalls you (or not!). Is knowing all
of this about you enough to say that we really know you?
For the most part, all of these topics stand alone. That is, we can understand any one of
them without thinking a whole lot about the others (indeed, your instructor might take these
THINK ABOUT IT
chapters in a different order or omit some of them altogether). However, some of the most
interesting aspects of the human experience can be understood only by seeing how these blocks Do men and women have
build on each other and interact. different personalities? Are
Take gender, for example. How much of our gender is genetic or physiological and how these differences inborn or
learned?
much of it is learned or socialized? Is gender identity grounded in our thoughts, beliefs,
and cognitions? What impact do our society’s beliefs about gender have on us? Do men and
women have different personalities? To answer these questions, we need an understanding
of genetics, physiology, self, and cognitions. The picture is even more complicated—and
fascinating—when it comes to understanding whom we are attracted to. Genetics and
neurology interact with cognitions, attachments, and motivations, to determine our sexual
orientation.
Or, consider how people cope with stress. Are there differences in physiology that make
some people hardier and more resilient to stress? Or is handling stress more an issue of
mind over matter? Are some types of people better able to cope with stress and tragedy? To
answer these questions, we need to build on our understanding of neurology, cognitions,
and personality traits.

Who am I? Am I more than

the sum of my genetics,
neurology, traits, self and
identity, intrapsychic
motivations, attachments, and
cognitions?
6 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

Organization of This Book

This book organizes these seven building blocks of personality into five parts, each revolving
around a question, and includes a special section on putting it all together:
■ Part I: The Dispositional Foundations of Personality—Who Do You Say That I Am? In
this section, we consider the theories behind personality traits, the practical way traits
are expressed in many aspects of our lives, and how best to measure personality. We
also take a look at how people reflect on themselves. After reading this section, you
will understand how psychologists describe human personality and also how people
describe themselves as reflected in their own self-concepts, self-esteem, and social iden-
tities. This section includes four chapters: Chapter 2, Personality Traits: A Good Theory;
Chapter 3, Personality Traits: Practical Matters; Chapter 4, Personality Assessment; and
Chapter 5, Self and Identity.
■ Part II: The Biological Foundations of Personality—What Makes You You? Here, we focus
on how your unique genetic blueprint impacts your personality. In addition, we look at
how your unique brain and physiology impact your personality. Together, these chapters
describe the biological foundations of personality. The section includes Chapter 6, Genetics,
and Chapter 7, The Neuroscience of Personality.
■ Part III: The Intrapsychic, Regulation, and Motivational Foundations of Personality—Who
Do You Feel You Are? Personality psychologists study aspects of our personality at a deep-
down, almost gut level that we may not even be aware of. Sigmund Freud was the first,
but by no means the last, to theorize that unconscious processes have a big impact on
who we are. This section looks at Freudian theory as well as more modern theories of
how unconscious processes such as our motivations, desires, and emotional attachments
makes us who we are. This section includes two chapters: Chapter 8, Intrapsychic Foun-
dations of Personality, and Chapter 9, Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination
Theory.
■ Part IV: The Cognitive Foundations of Personality—Who Do You Think You Are? The phi-
losopher René Descartes famously remarked, “I think therefore I am” and psychologists
working in this area couldn’t agree more. The specific thoughts we have—like the belief
that we control what happens to us or whether we are helpless—make us who we are.
Knowing what people think they are, like optimists or pessimists for example, tells us
a lot, not just about their personalities, but also about their health and well-being and
other important life outcomes. This section includes Chapter 10, Cognitive Foundations
of Personality.
■ Part V: Integration Across the Building Blocks of Personality—Is the Whole Person Greater
Than the Sum of His or Her Parts? Finally, having a sense of what makes up the human
personality, we need to consider how the individual foundations fit together to make a
whole person. In the case of personality, the whole is definitely greater than the sum of its
parts. That is, to understand the impact of gender and sexual orientation on personality,
we need to consider multiple building blocks at the same time. In fact, if you want to know
how an individual person functions in the world, adapting to both good times and bad,
and in sickness and health, it would take a consideration of all of the building blocks to
understand the resilience of the human spirit. This section includes Chapter 11, Gender
and Personality; Chapter 12, Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter; and Chap-
ter 13, Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter.
As we work our way through the building blocks of personality, you will see how personal-
ity psychology has attempted to answer these eternal questions using research. I should warn
you right now: In the attempt to answer these questions researchers have discovered—more
questions! Instead of definitive answers, think of this book as presenting more of the state-of-
the-science on these questions.
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 7

How Do Psychologists Study Personality?

You might wonder what the difference is between personality psychologists and you sitting around
with friends making guesses about the personality of people you see at a party. In a word: research.
Research allows us to formulate and test questions about human behavior, to design accurate SEE FOR YOURSELF
methods to answer these questions, and to test competing explanations against one another
(Dunn, 1999). By conducting research using sound methods, scientists are able to generalize What do you think causes
people to act the way they
beyond their own findings and add to the collective knowledge about a given phenomenon and,
do? Where do you believe
in many cases, apply their results to make the world a better place for individuals and whole personality comes from?
societies (Dunn, 1999).

The Scientific Method

Research rests on the philosophy of empiricism: using direct experience to draw conclusions
about the world. Psychological research relies on the scientific method which describes how
to make and test observations about the world in order to draw conclusions while minimizing
error or bias (Dunn, 1999). The scientific method starts with the identification of basic facts
about the world. Then, using this collection of facts, scientists build theories. For example,
while people watching at a party we might recognize that there are similarities and differences
in how people behave, such as how some people laugh more than others. Then, using these facts
as a basis, we can reason what other ideas are likely to be true. We might start to notice that
people who laugh a lot like to hang out with other people. Is this true? We could do some more
controlled observations of people to test our theory. Theories help scientists ask new questions THINK ABOUT IT
and suggest where to look for answers and what kinds of answers they might find.
Then scientists make predictions and test predictions based on their theories using con- How do common sense,
anecdotal evidence, per-
trolled methods. For example, you might devise an experiment for these laughing partygoers sonal experience, the opin-
to see if people who laugh respond differently to the experiment than the nonlaughers, or you ion of experts, and research
might administer a series of personality questionnaires to them and see if the laughers all share differ?
a common personality trait which is different from the nonlaughers.
Finally, scientists make their results public by publishing them in journals, on the Internet,
or by presenting their results at conferences. They do this to seek out independent verification
from other researchers. For example, after the party you might do some investigation using a
psychological database such as PsycArticles and read about a study that was conducted by other
researchers that also found that people behave differently at a party and identified two kinds of
people: extroverts and introverts.
Personality hasn’t always
Alternative
embraced the experimen- Theory
tal method as much as other
branches of psychology have Falsification
(Cronbach, 1957; Eysenck, 1997),
but over the last decade or so
there has been a tremendous Verification
explosion in experimental per-
sonality psychology (John et al., Observation
2008). Science progresses along a Induction
continuum from casual observa- Hunch Hypothesis Theory Law
tions, which may inspire a hunch
Figure 1.1 Science progresses along a continuum, with
or guess about human behavior, methods that become more sophisticated as hunches
to controlled experimentation, turn into theory and laws. Source: Eysenck (1997, Figure 1,
in which researchers attempt to p. 1225). Eysenck, H. J. (1997). Personality and experimental
prove a theory false (Eysenck, psychology. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
1997; see Figure 1.1). As long as 73(6), 1224–1237.
8 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

research evidence supports a theory, that theory will prevail and with more research will reach
the status of a law until it is overthrown by an alternative theory that explains the evidence even
better. For the most part, personality psychology has many theories, but unfortunately, very few
(if any!) actual laws of human behavior.

Observational Studies and Personality Questionnaires

Personality psychologists, like other researchers in psychology, draw on many kinds of methods
SEE FOR YOURSELF
to explore the human personality (Robins, Fraley, & Krueger, 2007; see Table 1.1). The methods
Think about how extroverts researchers use depend on the kind of questions they are asking. For example, researchers might
may differ from introverts. use an observational study, where they observe what people do, to understand a certain phenom-
How would you test your enon such as: Do some people talk more than others at a party? Then, based on these observations
ideas to see if your hypoth-
researchers might make an educated guess or generate a hypothesis to explain their findings.
eses are correct?
Continuing our example, one researcher might hypothesize that extroverted people talk more
than introverted people. He might give partygoers a self-report personality questionnaire to see
if, indeed, extroverts are doing more of the talking at a party than the introverts are. Personality
questionnaires are tests in which people answer questions about themselves that identify certain
aspects of their personality, like how talkative, outgoing, and sociable they are, all typical traits of
an extrovert. Another researcher might hypothesize that extroverts circulate more than introverts.
She might give out a personality questionnaire and link people’s answers to her observations of
how many people each guest talks to and how long each interaction lasts.
Another researcher might present each person with an ambiguous picture and ask him
or her to tell a story, administering a projective personality test. Yet another researcher

Table 1.1 Methods and Measures Used in Personality Research

Mean
Type of Measure Frequency % Ever Used
Self-report scales and questionnaires 6.17 100%
Judgments of self and others 5.07 99
Informant reports 3.68 86
Behavioral observation 3.58 89
Structured interviews 3.15 76
Behavioral responses 3.11 81
Other judgments tasks (e.g., of stimuli) 3.10 79
Narrative/open-ended questionnaires 3.03 74
Reaction time 2.93 61
Experience sampling 2.89 65
Implicit measures 2.76 64
Memory tasks 2.52 62
Autonomic arousal 2.22 57
Judgments of groups/nations/cultures 2.19 43
Hormone levels 1.94 36
Neuroimaging (fMRI, etc.) 1.75 32
Molecular genetics/DNA testing 1.60 26
Note: Prominent personality psychologists (N = 72) were asked to rate how often they used each of 17 assessment methods
using a scale ranging from 1 (Not at all) to 7 (Very much), with 4 (Somewhat) at the middle. The third column lists the percentage
of researchers who have ever used the method in their work.
Source: Robins, Tracy, and Sherman (2007, Table 37.1, p. 676). From R. W. Robins, R. C. Fraley, & R. F. Krueger, eds., Handbook of
Research Methods in Personality Psychology. Copyright © 2007 by Guilford Press. Reprinted with permission.
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 9

could ask guests about their past behavior or the behavior of their parents or siblings. Still
another researcher might go so far as to compare the heart rate, hormone levels, or the
brain activity of extroverts and introverts to see if differences in their behavior are due to
underlying physiological or neurological differences between them. Another researcher
might wonder if women are more talkative than men, and if so, how large, on average, is
this difference?

Correlational and Experimental Designs

If researchers want to know more about why extroverts talk more, this will require different
kinds of research. For example, one researcher may want to interview each person at the
party or interview their friends, either using set structured questions for each person or by
having each person merely tell his or her own story. Analyzing this kind of qualitative data
requires different methods than rating scales or questionnaires (see Chapter 5 for more about
these methods). Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, built much of his theory on
case studies of his patients (we discuss how to conduct a case study when we discuss Freud
in Chapter 8).
Still another researcher might investigate whether extroversion and introversion runs in
families using a family study. She might even study twins who were separated at birth and
adopted by different families to gauge the relative contribution of genetics and environment
on extroversion-introversion. She might hypothesize that if extraversion runs in families, then
people ought to resemble their birth parents more than their adoptive parents or their twins
more than their nontwin siblings.
How do we gauge similarity between children and their parents or between twins? Enter
the correlation coefficient, indicated by the symbol r. A correlation coefficient does just
that: It measures the relationship, or co-relation, between two variables. Correlations can
be positive or negative, depending on the type of relationship the two variables in ques-
tion have. If two variables increase or decrease at the same time, then they are positively
correlated. For example, softball skill and hits at bat are positively correlated: Better batters
hit the ball more than weaker batters. However, if one variable increases as the other one
decreases—or vice versa, decreasing as the other one increases—then the two variables are
negatively correlated. Golf skill and golf scores are negatively correlated: Better players have
lower scores.
By convention, correlations are considered high, medium, or low depending on how
big they are (see Table 1.2). These numbers should be taken only as a rough guideline, as
the size of a correlation doesn’t tell us if the relationship is statistically significant, and
not merely a fluke. For that, we need to know the sample size and some other information
about the sample, so researchers generally report the significance level of any correlations
they calculate.
When two variables are related, there are always at least three possible explanations for the
findings. First, it’s possible that the first variable causes the second. Second, it’s possible that
the second variable causes the first one. Finally, it’s also possible that some third variable causes
both of the variables. Because we can’t be sure what is causing the relationship we see between
two variables we must keep in mind that correlation is not the same as causation. Knowing that
two variables are similar doesn’t tell us about why they are similar.

Table 1.2 Interpreting Correlations

Negative Correlations Size Positive Correlations
.0 to -.3 Small .0 to .3
-.3 to -.5 Medium .3 to .5
-.5 to -.9 Large .5 to .9
Source: From Cohen (1988).
10 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

Although a family study would yield some possible answers as to why extroverts talk more
(e.g., “It’s in their genes” or “They come from a very sociable family”), it wouldn’t isolate a spe-
cific cause of the talkative behavior that we have observed. To test the theory that one variable
causes another variable, scientists need to conduct a true experiment (described in the next
section). When this is not possible either due to practical or ethical reasons, researchers use
correlational studies. In correlational studies researchers generally don’t manipulate variables,
but instead measure two variables to see how they are related.
In personality psychology, in particular, when we want to study how a person with a
certain personality behaves, we use a correlational study to measure both personality and
behavior. For example, we might give people a personality questionnaire that measures their
level of extroversion. Extroverts would score high on this questionnaire whereas introverts
would score low. Later, we can see how introverts and extroverts interact with strangers, or
differ in physiological arousal, or any other measure that we think would show a difference
based on personality. Similarly, we could measure a person’s typical level of anxiety and see
how he or she reacts to a pop quiz. We would expect people high in anxiety to perform worse
than people low in anxiety.
Many studies on the genetics or neuroscience of personality use correlational designs,
such as twin or adoption studies. Indeed, when researchers can’t manipulate the variable they
want to study, they conduct their studies in the “real world” using field studies and natural
manipulations, such as studying people coping with job loss, ill health, or natural tragedies, or
war (see Chapter 10 for more on these methods). When correlational studies are well designed,
replicated, and combined with other kinds of evidence, they are nearly as good as a true experi-
ment in identifying the causes of outcomes (Aronson et al., 1990).

Research Methods Illustrated: A True Experiment

T
here are many different methods that psychologists use to study human personality and
behavior (Revelle, 2007). Researchers could merely observe behavior or they might measure
a personality characteristic or they might place people in a controlled situation and see how
they react. This latter method, of placing people in a carefully controlled situation and measuring
their responses, is called an experiment.
In a typical experiment, researchers decide what variable they wish to study. Researchers
then design at least two conditions which differ in this variable. In one condition, called the
experimental condition, participants experience one treatment. In the other, control condition,
participants experience a different treatment or no treatment at all. Researchers will go to great
lengths to ensure that the entire experimental procedure is exactly alike for all participants except
for this one difference in the variable being studied.
Then, researchers must use random assignment to assign participants to one condition or
the other. Random assignment means that every participant in the experiment has an equal chance
of experiencing each of the conditions. In the case of two groups, the researcher might flip a coin to
decide which treatment a participant will receive.
By having experimental control, where all aspects of the experiment are the same except
for the variable being studied, and random assignment, where participants have an equal chance
of being in any condition, researchers are able to conclude that a difference in reactions of
participants must have been due to the variable that was manipulated. This is the logic of a true
experiment which allows researchers to conclude that what they manipulated caused a difference
in the outcome they measured (Aronson et al., 1990).
By manipulating one variable, researchers look to see if there was a difference in some
response of the participants, which they measure. The variable that researchers manipulate is called
the independent variable because it is independent of participants’ responses. The variable that
the researchers measure, the responses of the participants, is called the dependent variable
because it depends on participants’ responses. In fact, many experiments are aptly titled “The
effect of _____ on _____” to help readers identify the independent variable (the first blank) and the
dependent variable (the second blank) right away.
For example, suppose researchers wanted to see if some cognitive strategies for coping
with failure were more effective than others. They might randomly assign participants to one of
two treatment conditions: Effective Strategies or Ineffective Strategies. Then, after they learned
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 11

and practiced these strategies, the researchers could measure how angry, anxious, disappointed,
unhappy, and sad they felt afterward. In this experiment, the independent variable, what the
researchers manipulated, is type of strategy. The dependent variable, what the researchers
measured, is emotion.
If there is a difference in participants’ emotions after the experimental treatment, and if the
researchers successfully controlled all other differences between the groups, then we can conclude
that the difference in emotions at the end of the experiment must be due to the treatment during SEE FOR YOURSELF
the experiment.
Take a recent negative
When it comes to research in personality, there are a lot of variables that we cannot manipulate
occurrence and see if you
because it is impossible, impractical, or unethical to do so. For example, there is no way to randomly
can think about it in a dif-
assign people to a certain personality type, like being an extrovert or an introvert. Similarly, it would ferent way using ideas from
be wrong to manipulate self-esteem in an experiment by making people in one condition feel bad the Effective Strategies con-
about themselves. In these cases, researchers either use correlational designs or else researchers see dition. Does changing your
if their manipulation has a different effect on people depending on their personality (Brewer, 2000; thinking help you feel any
Revelle, 2007; Smith, 2000). better about the event?
This experiment on cognitive strategies for coping with failure was actually part of a more
detailed experiment studying the effect of cognitive strategies and personality on emotions
after failure (Ng & Diener, 2009). Participants imagined that they failed to get into any of the
eight graduate programs to which they had supposedly applied. The researchers manipulated
coping strategy, just as described, by randomly assigning all participants to an Effective Strategies
condition or an Ineffective Strategies condition.
In the Effective Strategies condition, participants were instructed to reinterpret their failure
to see it in a more positive light, to see if they could find something positive in the experience, and
to reflect on how they might be able to grow as a person as a result of the event. They were also
instructed to think about how they might do something to change or to improve the situation.
Participants in the Ineffective Strategies condition were instructed to focus on how upset they
were, to admit that they could not deal with what happened, and to think that they should just
give up and stop trying to reach their goal of entering graduate school.
The researchers also took into account the personality of the participants by identifying them
as being high or low in Neuroticism, a personality trait that describes how anxious and vulnerable “There are two possible
to negative emotions a person is. Notice that the researchers are unable to randomly assign people outcomes: If the result
to be high or low in Neuroticism, because it is a personality trait. Instead, they merely measured this
confirms the hypothesis,
variable and then assigned people high or low on Neuroticism to conditions, ensuring an equal
number of people of both types in each condition. then you’ve made a
Finally, they measured how angry, anxious, disappointed, unhappy, and sad they felt afterward, measurement. If the result is
combining these responses into one composite variable of negative emotion. The design of this contrary to the hypothesis,
experiment is a 2 (Coping Strategy) by 2 (Neuroticism) design. There are two levels, or groups,
then you’ve made a
within each independent variable: Effective and Ineffective Coping Strategies and High and
Low Neuroticism. Note that only one of these variables, Coping Strategy, was actually under discovery.”
experimental control, that is, actually manipulated by the experimenters. Enrico Fermi

The true experiment, where

participants are randomly
assigned to treatment
conditions, is one of many
methods personality
psychologists use to study
individuals.
12 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

7
6.8 High Neuroticism
6.6 Low Neuroticism
6.4

Intensity of Negative Emotions

6.2
6
5.8
5.6
5.4
5.2
5
4.8
4.6
4.4
4.2
4
Effective Ineffective
Cognitive Strategy

Figure 1.2 Negative emotions experienced by people high and low in

Neuroticism who were instructed to use effective or ineffective cognitive
strategies to cope with a hypothetical negative event. Source: Ng & Diener
(2009, Figure 3, p. 459). Reprinted with permission from, “ Feeling bad? The
“power” of positive thinking may not apply to everyone,” by Ng, W., & Diener,
E. (2009), Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 455–463. Permission conveyed
through the Copyright Clearance Center.

What did they discover? First, there was a main effect for condition, meaning that the condition
that participants were in affected how much negative emotion they reported at the end of the
experiment. Participants in the Ineffective Strategies condition reported more negative emotion
than participants in the Effective Strategies condition. Second, there was also a main effect for
personality, meaning that participants’ levels of Neuroticism affected how much negative emotion
they reported at the end of the experiment. People high in Neuroticism reported more negative
emotion than people low in Neuroticism.
Finally, there was a significant interaction between condition and Neuroticism. Whenever we
find a significant interaction, it means that one of the main effects is different depending on the
level of the other variable. Interaction effects are easiest to see in a graph. Lines that are not parallel
to each other suggest an interaction between variables (see Figure 1.2).
Here, the significant interaction between Coping Strategy and Neuroticism suggests that
Effective Strategies were effective only for people low in Neuroticism. People low in Neuroticism
who used Effective Strategies felt less negative emotions than people low in Neuroticism who
used Ineffective Strategies. Essentially, using ineffective strategies made people low in Neuroticism
feel like people high in Neuroticism. The conclusion from these results is that the effect of strategy
depends on personality, or, as the researchers caution, the power of positive thinking may not work
for everyone—it depends on your personality (Ng & Diener, 2009).
Why might be this be the case? Although this is a very good question, it was not the question
the researchers sought to answer in this experiment. This question will have to wait for another
experiment—or material we shall cover in the chapters ahead!

Types of Data and Personality Assessment

As you can see, there are many ways of answering the seemingly simple question of “Why do
some people talk more at a party?” The most accurate answers come from using principles
of good research design. As a general rule, we can put more faith in results that come from
more than just one study or more than just one method. Even when studying just a single
person—that cute, outgoing partygoer telling a joke to a small crowd of admirers—there
are many kinds of data we can gather (John & Soto, 2007). We can collect self-report data
(e.g., questionnaires, interviews), observation data from friends or trained observers, test
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 13

data (e.g., see how they behave in a controlled situation like the laboratory), or even life data
(e.g., count how many times a person’s photo appeared in his or her yearbook or how many
campus organizations he or she belongs to). We explore these various kinds of data in more
depth in Chapter 3.
Of course, a study is only as good as the instruments that a researcher uses. Even a seem-
ingly straightforward personality test is backed by previous experimentation to assure that the
questions are understandable and clear, that responders are giving sincere answers (as opposed
to answering in bogus or unreliable ways), and that the results of such assessments are valid,
reliable, and useful (Smith & Archer, 2008). How can a researcher be sure he or she is using
“If the only tool you have is
the very best measurements in studies? This topic is so important to personality psychology
that we spend an entire chapter discussing the common types of personality tests, the uses of a hammer, you tend to see
personality tests, and what makes a good personality test, including reliability, validity, gener- every problem as a nail.”
alizability, and response sets. Abraham Maslow
Scientists have a number of tools or methods at their disposal. And like a good carpenter,
who chooses the right tool depending on the job at hand, personality psychologists use what-
ever tool is most appropriate for answering the question they wish to explore. As you learn
about each of the building blocks of personality, you will also learn about one of the various
methods personality psychologists have used to explore the human personality. Sometimes
it is easier to understand a particular method when you can see how it is used by personality
psychologists to answer a specific question or to test a specific theory.
The logic of the true experiment requires researchers to control all aspects of the laboratory
environment even determining what participants in an experiment will be facing! As you can
see, this is an awesome responsibility and one not to be taken lightly. Researchers must adhere
to stringent ethical principles and guidelines set out by the American Psychological Associa-
tion (American Psychological Association, 2002, 2010). These guidelines were put in place to
ensure the safety, trust, and welfare of research participants. Let us now turn to a discussion
of research ethics.

Then and Now: The Ethics

of Research With People
One day in 2004, Paula’s world suddenly
changed forever. Though she knew she
was adopted, the stranger on the other
end of the phone gave her the news: You
have an identical twin. Identical strangers
is how Paula and Elyse came to refer to
themselves (Schein & Bernstein, 2008).
The women discovered that they were
both interested in film, had lived in Paris,
and were vulnerable to bouts of depres-
sion. But what truly disturbed them, is Identical twins Paula
that they and their families, along with Bernstein and Elyse Schein
five other pairs of identical twins and one didn’t find out until they
set of identical triplets, were unwitting were adults that they had
participants in a strange study. The head an identical twin and were
psychiatrist at the adoption agency pur- unwitting participants in
posely separated identical twins. But not an unethical study in which
all identical twins were separated, only identical twins who were
those who were born of mothers with a put up for adoption were
purposely separated at birth
history of disorders like schizophrenia
and adopted by separate
and bipolar disorder. He used the identi-
families.
cal twins to conduct his own study of the
impact of genetics and environment on
14 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

the development of mental illnesses, and did so without the knowledge and consent of the
birth mothers and the adoptive families. Families thought that the kindly doctor who made
regular visits was merely making sure that the children were adjusting well to their adoptive
families.
Many adoptive parents said that they would have gladly adopted their child and their
child’s twin had they known. Many twins were understandably upset to discover—often
well into their adult lives—that certain illnesses ran in their biological families, important
information that was purposely kept from them and their adoptive families. Finally, although
taken from their birth mothers right away, the twins were raised in foster care and not sepa-
rated from each other until they were 6 to 9 months of age. Many twins reported growing up
with a permanent sense of loss or the fantasy that they had a secret twin (Schein & Bernstein,
2008).
Elyse and Paula, like the other participants in this study, were outraged. Because of the pain
the study caused and would continue to cause as participants discovered the true circumstances
of their birth and adoption, a court order has sealed the documents describing the study and
its results until 2066 (Schein & Bernstein, 2008). With horror, the more the facts of their birth
came to light, the more their situation reminded Elyse and Paula of the experiments by the Nazi
doctor Josef Mengele who conducted inhumane experiments on prisoners in the concentration
camps (Lifton, 1986).
Sadly, this study is not the only incident in the history of unethical research that includes
the Tuskegee Syphilis study (Reverby, 2009), in which impoverished African American share-
croppers were purposely given syphilis and prevented from obtaining treatment; the Nazi doc-
THINK ABOUT IT tors (Lifton, 1986); and studies done on people in prisons, mental hospitals, and orphanages
without their consent and often with coercion. Could this twin study be conducted today? The
Does your school have a scientific community, including the American Psychological Association (American Psycho-
requirement that students
logical Association, 2002, 2010), along with many governments, including the United States
in introductory psychology
classes participate in research (Department of Health and Human Services, 1979), have all agreed to standards of ethical
studies? Is this ethical? conduct for research with human subjects that protect human participants and prevent studies
like these from ever being conducted.
According to the Belmont Report (Department of Health and Human Services, 1979),
research with humans must adhere to three principles: respect for persons, beneficence, and
justice. The principle of respect for persons includes allowing people to choose for themselves
whether they wish to participate or not, by giving their consent after they have been informed

Participants from the

Tuskegee Study: From 1932
to public outcry in 1972, the
U.S. government carried out
an unethical study observing
the natural progression of
syphilis in humans. The study
continued even after penicillin
was discovered to be a cure
for syphilis in the 1940s.
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 15

about the procedures and possible risks of the study. This is called informed consent. It also
states that the researcher must give extra protection to people who have limited autonomy, or
limited physical or mental capacity to give their informed consent.
For example, people who are in jail have limited autonomy and cannot be used for research
without extra efforts to ensure that they understand that their participation will not impact
their release in any way. Similarly, employees must be assured that their participation will not
affect their employment status or their work evaluation. Also, students must be assured that
their grades will not be affected by their willingness to participate in a research project or not.
Children and people with certain disorders may lack the maturity or the cognitive capacity to
evaluate the risks and benefits of participation for themselves, and so parents or legal guardians
must give consent for them.
The principle of beneficence states that first, and foremost, researchers should do no
harm to their participants. This includes using the best research methods and materials, hav-
ing trained personnel interact with research participants, and minimizing possible harm and
maximizing possible benefits of research participation.
Finally, the principle of justice suggests that the benefits and the burdens of research
participants must be shared equitably among potential research populations. At a basic level,
this means that researchers must treat all participants fairly and equally, avoiding samples
of convenience, exploitation of vulnerable populations, and by not involving persons from
groups unlikely to benefit from the research. For example, researchers should be sure to
represent both genders and various ethnic groups in research that would potentially affect
them. The principle of justice also states that if research supported by public funds leads to a
therapeutic treatment, for example, that treatment must be available to all, not just to those
who can afford it.
Justice also suggests that participants should receive some benefit or value for being in the
study, either something direct and concrete (e.g., learning experience, monetary reward, treat-
ment for an ailment under study) or more general for society (e.g., understanding personality
or finding a cure for cancer).
The Belmont report also led to the Common Rule which was adopted by all federal
agencies including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Institute of
Mental Health (NIMH), and which is also the rule at all universities, schools, hospitals,
and other places where research is conducted. The Common Rule mandates that institu-
tions that conduct research must establish and maintain an institutional review board
(IRB) to review all research to ensure that it upholds these standards. These boards must
include researchers, an ethicist, and members of the community who discuss all research SEE FOR YOURSELF
proposals, often making suggestions to ensure that participants’ rights are protected. The
Common Rule establishes procedures for obtaining informed consent from potential Does your school have an
IRB to review research con-
research participants and for explaining all experimental procedures (see Mills, 1976, for
ducted at your school?
an example).
If you have the opportunity to conduct research, you will need to submit a proposal to
your school’s IRB. Though the questions asked by the IRB on their forms may seem unrelated
to research, you can readily see that the questions are all meant to ensure that the principles
of respect for persons, beneficence, and justice have all been considered and protected (see
Figure 1.3).
Researchers who violate ethical principles face censure from their institution’s IRB, as
well as from their professional societies, like the American Psychological Association, and
from the federal government. Due to these principles and guidelines, it is unlikely that
experiments like the twin study could be conducted today. Good researchers must always
consider the rights and welfare of their participants in the design and planning of their
research studies.
Figure 1.3 A copy of the form used by the Arcadia University IRB. Note that questions 3 and 7 ensure the principle of autonomy whereas
questions 5 and 6 ensure the principle of beneficence. Researchers must address the principle of justice in their narrative describing the
procedure of their study which they submit for review to the IRB along with this form. Source: Reprinted courtesy of Arcadia University.

16
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 17

Table 1.3 Science or Science Fiction?

1. Most experiments take place in a dark, dank laboratory with scary-looking equipment.
2. The English language contains 17,937 words to describe human personality.
3. Psychologists can judge what people are like based on their residence hall rooms, offices,
web pages, and handshakes.
4. Employers can use personality tests to see if potential employees have what it takes to suc-
ceed on the job.
5. Dolphins, elephants, and chimpanzees know who they are.
6. Social experiences can change how our genes function.
7. Gamers can control their character in some video games simply by thinking about how
they want the character to move.
8. Plastic baby carriers may make it more difficult for parents and children to bond.
9. People who feel competent and who are intrinsically motivated have less dental plaque.
10. College students today feel less in control of their lives than college students of earlier
generations.
11. Men are just naturally better than women at certain mathematical tasks such as mental
rotation, for example, and no amount of practice or experience can change this fundamen-
tal difference.
12. Women with a fluid sexual orientation are capable of experiencing a wider range of erotic
experiences and feelings than captured by the labels of lesbian, bisexual, or heterosexual.
13. Experiencing positive emotions such as love, joy, playfulness, wonder, and love make peo-
ple think more creatively than negative emotions such as sadness, disgust, or anxiety.
Note: All but two of these statements are based on science; the rest are science fiction. To find out which two, keep
reading!

Science or Science Fiction? A Brief

Introduction to Current Research Findings
in Personality Psychology
Now that you know a bit about the methods psychologists use to study personality, it’s time
to explore their findings. But first, here’s a chance for you to see for yourself just how exciting
the field of personality psychology is. The field has changed so rapidly over the past decade or
so that we might wonder if we are studying science or science fiction. Take a look at Table 1.3.
Each of these statements draws on research you will learn about in the coming chapters. Can
you tell which is science and which is science fiction?

Chapter Summary
This chapter introduced the topic of personality psychology—the scientific study of what makes
Study and Review
us who we are. People vary and personality psychology studies both similarities and differences
among people and how they became that way. on mysearchlab.com
Though personality is made up of the building blocks of traits, genetics, neuroscience, self Go online for more
and identity, intrapsychic aspects, regulation and motivation, and cognitions, we are more than resources to help you
the mere sum of these parts. Especially when it comes to understanding gender, sexual orienta- review.
tion, and resilience, for example, these parts work together to make us who we are.
Personality psychologists use many methods to study personality. Using the scientific
method, researchers make observations, build theories, and devise and test hypotheses. They
may design true experiments, observational studies, correlational studies or administer per-
sonality questionnaires (both self-report and projective) to test their hypotheses and theories
18 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality

“Personality is essential. about human personality. They may also collect self-report data, observation data, test data, or
It is in every work of art. life data on people. Like a carpenter with a toolbox full of specialized tools, researchers choose
When someone walks on the best methods to answer their questions about human personality.
One method personality psychologists use to study people is the true experiment, where
stage for a performance and
researchers have experimental control over the independent variable and randomly assign
has charisma, everyone
participants to conditions. If researchers succeeded in controlling all aspects of the experi-
is convinced that he has ment except for the one variable under study, then any difference in the dependent variable,
personality. I find that or responses of the participants, must have been caused by the independent variable, what the
charisma is merely a form of experimenter manipulated. A true experiment is the only research design that allows researchers
showmanship. Movie stars to draw conclusions about causality. However, there are times when it is impossible, impracti-
cal, or unethical to manipulate a variable—such as personality—so that researchers must use
usually have it. A politician
alternative methods like correlational designs.
has to have it.”
The Belmont Report establishes guidelines researchers must follow for research with
Lukas Foss
human participants. Researchers must apply the principles of respect for persons (including
obtaining informed consent and protecting vulnerable populations), beneficence (minimize
harm and maximize benefits), and justice (benefits and burdens of research must be shared
equitably) while designing their experimental procedures. Researchers must then present
their proposed study to an ethical review board, called an institutional review board (IRB),
for approval. The IRB will review the proposal specifically making sure that the research
upholds these standards. Institutions of the federal government all adhere to these principles,
as outlined in the Common Rule, which includes the establishment and oversight of all IRBs
throughout the United States.

Review Questions
1. What are some ways in which a single individual is like all others, like some others, and
like no others?
2. What is personality psychology? What are the building blocks of personality?
3. How do psychologists study personality? What are some methods and measures used by
personality psychologists?
4. What are the four different kinds of data a researcher can collect?
5. When researchers find a difference on some measure between two groups, is there a way
to judge how large that difference is?
6. What is a correlation? When are correlational designs used? What is the difference between
a correlational design and a true experiment?
7. What is so special about a true experiment? What two characteristics are present in a true
experiment? What is an independent variable? What is a dependent variable?
8. According to the research by Ng and Diener (2009), are some coping strategies better than
others? Why or why not? Where does personality fit in?
9. What are the three principles that researchers must adhere to in conducting research with
human participants? What is an institutional review board?
 Chapter 1 Who Am I? Understanding the Building Blocks of Personality 19

Key Terms
Personality psychology Personality questionnaires Self-report data
Traits Correlation coefficient Observation data
Genetics Correlational studies Test data
Neuroscience Experimental condition Life data
Self and identity Control condition Respect for persons
Intrapsychic foundations Random assignment Informed consent
Regulation and motivation Experimental control Beneficence
Cognitive foundations True experiment Justice
Integration Independent variable Common Rule
Scientific method Dependent variable Institutional review board
Observational study Neuroticism (IRB)
Hypothesis Levels
This page intentionally left blank
CHAPTER
2 PERSONALITY TRAITS:
A GOOD THEORY
WHAT IS A PERSONALITY TRAIT?
Two Approaches to the Study of Personality Traits
WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT PERSONALITY FROM THE IDIOGRAPHIC APPROACH?
Studying Individual Personalities: The Idiographic Approach
The Idiographic Approach Applied: The Case of Jenny
WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT PERSONALITY FROM THE NOMOTHETIC APPROACH?
Finding Universals: The Nomothetic Approach
The Theoretical Approach
The Lexical Approach
The Measurement Approach
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: FACTOR ANALYSIS
THE GREAT NOMOTHETIC SEARCH FOR UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLES OF PERSONALITY
Three Superfactors: Eysenck
Five Factors: The Big Five and the Five-Factor Model
A Rose by Any Other Name? Two Models of the Five Factors
Is Five Really the Ultimate Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything?
A One-Factor Solution
Six- and Seven-Factor Solutions . . . and Beyond!
THEN AND NOW: THE FOUR TEMPERAMENTS AND THE FIVE FACTORS
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: WHAT CAN YOU TELL ABOUT SOMEONE FROM HIS OR HER
LIVING SPACE?

CHAPTER SUMMARY
Read the Chapter on REVIEW QUESTIONS
mysearchlab.com KEY TERMS

21
22 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

H
ave you ever tried to judge someone’s personality from his or her living space? When I
was a brand-new college student, my roommate Kathy was a cheerleader, daughter of
the head football coach and little sister of their star quarterback. She was tall, blonde,
charming, sociable, flirty, attractive, outgoing, conservative, and slightly daring. We quickly
unpacked and set up our room. Then we had the idea of walking down the hallway and intro-
“There is nothing so practical ducing ourselves to our new hall-mates. This would both satisfy our curiosity—who were these
as a good theory.” people we would be living with?—and give us decorating ideas. After all, there’s not much one
Kurt Lewin can do with a stark, square, concrete-block room of a dull-pastel color.
We were amazed at the ingenuity with which our peers had transformed these “cell blocks”
into cozy and often inviting living spaces: cutesy posters and classic rock album covers on the
walls, seashells, massive stereo systems, a snowboard, an open violin case, dressers with elabo-
rate makeup holders and perfume bottles, golden posters for far-away places (Vienna! Venice!),
color-coded filing systems, and photos of cool boyfriends. We were amazed at what we could
tell about these strangers from their rooms!
As the astute psychology majors that we were, we wondered how much we really learned
about our hall-mates. Certainly people decorate their rooms to impress others or to create
certain images—and there was a lot of that going around our first year—but at the heart of it
all, to what extent does an individual’s personality manifest itself in the design and content of
a dorm room?
Gosling, Ko, Mannarelli, and Morris (2002) asked this very question in a systematic way.
They reasoned that when people live in an environment they leave behavioral residue behind.
Such physical traces left behind by everyday actions are hints or cues to the personality of the
occupant (Gosling et al., 2002). For example, specific items may be left behind either carelessly,
like a snowboard that wasn’t put away properly, or on purpose to convey a certain image (e.g.,
“Hey, I’m cool, I’m edgy, I’m a snowboarder!”). Similarly, people may keep mementos from
a summer vacation, like seashells, in a prominent place because such items have personal
meaning to them or reinforce their own self-views (e.g., “I’m a nature lover”). People may
have tidy rooms and organized bookshelves so they can find what they need quickly. All of
these are ways we express personalities and leave, perhaps inadvertently, cues for observers
(Gosling, 2008).
In this study, anywhere from 1 to 6 observers, ordinary folk with no particular training,
visited actual rooms of 83 college student volunteers. These volunteers lived in private houses,
apartments, residence halls, co-ops, and Greek-system housing either on or just off campus.
The researchers covered names and any photos in the rooms so that observers would not know

What can you tell about the

personality of the occupant
of this room?
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 23

for sure the race or gender of the occupant. The observers then glanced around the rooms and
made ratings on a 7-point scale of the extent to which they thought each of 44 descriptions
applied to the occupant of the room. Some of the descriptions included:
Anxious, easily upset
Extraverted, enthusiastic
Conventional, uncreative
Critical, quarrelsome
Disorganized, careless
Amazingly enough, there was a great amount of consensus. That is, observers readily
agreed on what they thought an occupant was like. Even more amazing, observers were often
very accurate in guessing the personality of the occupants. What cues were they using? Some-
times the neatness of a room indicated how conscientious the occupant was. Other times the
distinctive look of a space, the presence of unique items, or the variety of books and maga-
zines indicated a creative, open personality. And still other times the researchers couldn’t
be sure what cues observers used to accurately judge an occupant’s extraversion, emotional
stability, and agreeableness (see Table 2.1). You can see where you fall on these five factors
by taking a short personality test similar to the one used in the study shown in Table 2.2.
Gosling and his colleagues repeated the study looking at people’s office spaces and got
pretty much the same results. In which space do you think people’s personalities shone through
the most? If you thought that it would be easier for people to truly express themselves in their
bedrooms you’d be right (Gosling et al., 2002). Workplaces tend to constrain how much decora-
tion and personal expression workers can show.
So, my roommate Kathy and I were indeed able to get to know our hall-mates a bit and THINK ABOUT IT
to identify interesting people on our hallway that we wanted to get to know better. However,
Besides living spaces, where
we also discovered that our tastes in friends and room decorations were quite different . . . as else might we see people
befitting two very different personalities! express their personalities?
As the opening research study illustrates, there are many ways of describing human per-
sonality: charming, sociable, flirty, outgoing, conservative, daring, conventional, uncreative,
disorganized, careless, extraverted, enthusiastic, critical, quarrelsome, anxious, easily upset, and
some 17,937 others (Allport & Odbert, 1936)! Such descriptors of personality are called traits.
In this first chapter on traits, as Kurt Lewin suggested, we start with understanding the theories
behind personality traits—including two approaches to studying traits—and the kinds and
numbers of traits, and discuss whether there are universal traits that can describe any person-
ality. In the next chapter we will study some of the practical applications of trait psychology
and, in particular, how traits are expressed in many aspects of our lives, from our handshakes

Table 2.1 Cues Observers Use to Determine Personality of Room Occupants

Trait Consensus Accuracy Valid Cues
Neuroticism .08 .36** (none)
Extraversion .31* .22* (none)
Openness .58** .65** Distinctiveness of the space,
level of decoration, variety
of magazines and books
Agreeableness .20 .20* (none)
Conscientiousness .47** .33** Organized, neat, uncluttered
Note: Numbers in the table are correlations among observers’ ratings. Recall that correlations can be positive or negative. Higher
numbers mean that there is a stronger relationship between the variables. Significant effects are noted by asterisks.
* = p 6 .05, ** = p 6 .01.
Source: From Gosling et al. (2002, Tables 4 and 5) Gosling, S. D., Ko, S. J., Mannarelli, T., & Morris, M. E. (2002). A room with a cue:
Personality judgments based on offices and bedrooms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82(3), 379–398. Copyright
American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.
24 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

Table 2.2 Test Your Own Personality: The Ten-Item Personality Inventory (TIPI)
Here are a number of personality traits that may or may not apply to you. Please write a number next to each statement to indicate the extent to
which you agree or disagree with that statement. You should rate the extent to which the pair of traits applies to you, even if one characteristic applies
more strongly than the other.
Disagree Disagree Disagree a Neither Agree Agree a Agree Agree
Strongly Moderately Little Nor Disagree Little Moderately Strongly
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
1. _____ Extraverted, enthusiastic
2. _____ Critical, quarrelsome
3. _____ Dependable, self-disciplined
4. _____ Anxious, easily upset
5. _____ Open to new experiences, complex
6. _____ Reserved, quiet
7. _____ Sympathetic, warm
8. _____ Disorganized, careless
9. _____ Calm, emotionally stable
10. _____ Conventional, uncreative

Note: To score, take the average of your score on the two items listed for each factor. Items marked with an R are reversed scored. Extraversion: 1, 6R; Agreeableness: 2R, 7;
Conscientiousness: 3, 8R; Emotional Stability: 4R, 9; Openness to experience: 5, 10R. To reverse score, 1 = 7, 2 = 6, 3 = 5, 4 = 4, 5 = 3, 6 = 2, 7 = 1.
Source: Gosling, Rentfrow, and Swann (2003, Appendix A, p. 525). From Gosling, S. D., Rentfrow, P. J., & Swann, W. B. (2003), "A very brief measure of the big-five personality
domains," Journal of Research in Personality, 37, 504–528. Copyright © 2003 by Academic Press. Reprinted with permission.

to the kind of music we like, to the kind of careers we choose, including how our personality
stays consistent, changes, or shows coherence over time.

What Is a Personality Trait?

Traits describe a person’s typical style of thinking, feeling, and acting in different kinds of
situations and at different times (McCrae & Costa, 1997b). Although we might act differently
in specific situations (e.g., a job interview compared to hanging out with a close friend), or at
“Nobody seems to know
different times (e.g., think of what you were like in high school compared to now), if someone
what a trait is, so it were to follow you around for a while to witness your behavior in many situations and at dif-
appears to us better to use ferent times in your life he or she would see some commonalities and consistencies in your
‘characteristic.’ ” reactions (Allport, 1927). These generally persistent ways of acting and reacting are captured
Healy, Bronner, and Bowers (1931, by the concept of traits. In contrast, temporary states (such as emotions), attitudes (liberal,
p. 311) conservative), and physical attributes (short, muscular) are not considered personality traits.
Traits are measured over a continuum—that is, in a continuous stretch, from low to high.
This means that people who score high on a particular trait, say talkativeness, are more likely
SEE FOR YOURSELF to strike up a conversation with a stranger than a person who is low on talkativeness (or high
on the trait of “quiet,” its opposite). If we were to ask several people from different walks of
What kind of person are
life “How talkative are you?” we would probably find a normal distribution of responses: Some
you? List the traits that best
describe yourself. people would be extremely high or low whereas others would fall somewhere in the middle (see
Figure 2.1) on this continuum of talkativeness.
Because traits cannot be directly measured in the same way that, say, height and weight can,
psychologists think of traits as hypothetical concepts. That is, psychologists assume traits exist
even though we can’t see them. For this reason, some psychologists view traits as purely descrip-
tive summaries of behavior without thinking about where they came from or why a person acts
that way (“Mario is very sociable; just look at how well he’s getting along with everybody”).
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 25

Other psychologists see traits as

internal, causal properties (“Well,
of course Mario is getting along
with everybody; he’s a sociable per-
son”) and view a trait as a capacity
that is present even when the trait
is not being directly expressed.
Just because you sit quietly in your
personality class doesn’t mean that Figure 2.1 Normal Distribution of the Trait of Talkativeness.
you are a quiet person. Just wait
until the professor’s back is turned
and see how many people start to express their talkative natures!
Psychologists have long debated the exact number and kinds of traits. In fact, psycholo-
gists have even debated how best to study traits. The next section examines two main ways
that psychologists have approached the study of traits: through the detailed study of a single
individual and through the combined study of numerous people. These approaches have
been called idiographic and nomothetic, respectively (Allport, 1937; Allport, 1937/1961).
However, because science, by definition, searches for generalized truths, there is an inher-
ent tension between these two approaches to personality that even Allport struggled with
(Allport, 1937).

Two Approaches to the Study of Personality Traits

In the idiographic approach, the goal is to understand the personality of a single individual “A description of one
with all of his or her quirks or idiosyncrasies and characteristics that make them unique. The individual without reference
psychologist starts with what a single individual thinks is important to know about him or
to others may be a piece of
her and seeks to answer the question, “What unique combination of traits best describes this
person?” Think about the insights into humankind that we glean from a study of history, the literature, a biography or a
contemplation of a great painting, the power of a moving dramatic performance or a compel- novel. But science? No.”
ling biography. These are examples of idiographic ways of understanding. Meyer (1926, p. 217)
By using techniques of good science such as striving
for objectivity and minimizing biases, psychologists are
able to use case studies and other idiographic methods to
study individual personalities (for example, see the Swann,
Pelham, & Krull, 1989, and Pelham, 1993, experiments on “Although the endless
self-concept). variety and colorfulness
In the nomothetic approach, the goal is to discover
of human personality
universals—concepts that can apply to everyone—by
intrigue the artist . . . many
identifying traits that can describe all people or that can
be applied to any person. Think about this: According to psychometrists have
current estimates the number of people inhabiting planet nevertheless fled from this
Earth is over 6.7 billion. Does this mean that we need more richness of human nature
than 6.7 billion traits to be able to describe each person? Of as from some fearsome
course not, but what exactly is the “right” number of traits,
[demon]. They have left
and how best should we organize them? This philosophical
reality to the novelist.”
question started what I like to call The Great Nomothetic
Search for Human Universals. The right number of trait Cattell (1946, p. 1)
terms is a source of some debate, as we will soon see.
Although Allport is often blamed for starting the battle
between the idiographic and nomothetic approaches, he is
seldom given credit for his brilliant resolution of the conflict. The idiographic approach
Just as the practice of medicine is essentially idiographic— uses many variables to
describe the personality
doctors must diagnose and treat their individual patients—
of a single individual in great
their methods of diagnosis and standards for treatment
detail.
are based on solid nomothetic sciences of biochemistry,
26 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

The nomothetic approach

identifies the few key
variables that can describe the
personality of many people.

bacteriology, and so on. That is, the idiographic and nomothetic overlap and both contribute
to a complete understanding of human personality (Allport, 1937).
Allport cautioned that “individuality cannot be studied by science” (Allport, 1937/1961,
p. 8), yet he recognized a place for the study of the individual within psychology:
Why should we not start with individual behavior as a source of hunches (as
we have in the past), and then seek our generalizations (also as we have in the
past), but finally come back to the individual—not for the mechanical applica-
tion of laws (as we do now), but for a fuller, supplementary, and more accurate
assessment than we are now able to give? I suspect that the reason our present
assessments are now so often feeble and sometimes even ridiculous, is because
we do not take this final step. We stop with our wobbly laws of personality and
seldom confront them with the concrete person. (Allport, 1962, p. 407)
SEE FOR YOURSELF Hans Eysenck took up Allport’s challenge and found a way of reconciling these two seem-
ingly different approaches to the study of human personality. He realized that one could study
Can you see which habits
both the general (nomothetic) and the specific (idiographic) within a single person and develop
and responses make up
each of your traits? a theory of personality from there (Eysenck, 1998). He hypothesized that the human personality
is organized into a hierarchy, which we can think of as a pyramid (see Figure 2.2). This pyramid

Type
EXTRAVERSION
Level

Trait
SOCIABILITY IMPULSIVENESS ACTIVITY LIVELINESS EXCITABILITY
Level

Habitual
H.R.n⫺1
H.R.1

H.R.2

H.R.3

H.R.4

H.R.n

Response
Level

Specific
Response
S.R.1
S.R.2
S.R.3
S.R.4

S.R.n⫺1
S.R.n

Level

Figure 2.2 The Personality Pyramid: The Hierarchical Organization of Human Personality.
Source: Reprinted with permission from Eysenck, H. J. (1967), The Biological Basis of Personality, (Springfield, IL: Charles C.
Thomas). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 27

categorizes human personality from the most general level at the top to the most specific level
at the bottom. General means a trait is universal or applicable to other people, whereas specific
means a trait is more unique to a single individual.
At the very bottom level of the pyramid are specific behaviors including responses, acts,
cognitions, or reactions to everyday life (Eysenck, 1990). Because these reactions are observed
only once, they may or may not be related to one’s personality. However, if the same reaction
occurs many times then we might say that the response has become a habit or a typical way
of responding. Further, if certain habits occur over time and across situations, then we might
say the person is exhibiting a personality trait. Further, if we notice that certain traits tend to
occur together in people then we can say that we’ve identified a personality type, a syndrome
(Cattell, 1946), a superfactor, or an “observed constellation of traits” to use Eysenck’s words
(Eysenck, 1998, p. 36).
According to Eysenck, the lower we go on the pyramid the more idiosyncratic our reactions
are. Similarly, the higher we go on the pyramid, the more similar we become to people who may
be of a similar personality type. To illustrate how this works, let’s imagine a junior engineering
major we’ll call Lakeisha. Suppose Lakeisha spent Thursday night with her hall-mates watching
TV in the lounge. Does this make Lakeisha an extrovert? From one specific response we can’t
draw any conclusions about Lakeisha’s personality. After all, there could have been a special
show on TV. Now suppose that Lakeisha regularly says “Hi!” to people she passes on campus and
often meets up with friends for lunch. We might judge that she has the habit of being friendly
toward others or seeking the company of others. If she exhibited these habits over time (e.g.,
during her sophomore year or junior year) and across different situations (e.g., at home, school,
a summer internship), then we might say that Lakeisha shows the trait of sociability. If she also
demonstrated the traits of impulsiveness, activity, liveliness, and excitability, then we might say
that she is an extroverted type and is similar to other extroverted people. Although this example
started by studying a single individual—Lakeisha—and ended by drawing conclusions about
groups of people, Eysenck cautions that our conclusions must be based experimentally to build
a valid scientific theory.

What Do We Know About Personality

From the Idiographic Approach?
Studying Individual Personalities: The Idiographic Approach
Imagine a person who describes herself as stubborn, critical, curious, intelligent, funny, “The personality of each
and sarcastic. Now compare her to a person who describes herself as caring, quiet, creative, man is a unique integration,
loyal, funny, and loving. Both of these are actual students who responded to the question
and as such is a datum
“What kind of person are you? List the traits that best describe yourself.” Such a description,
where the psychologist focuses on understanding a specific person and where that person for psychology, and for
chooses which traits are important to him or her, is an example of the idiographic approach psychology only.”
to personality. Gordon Allport
Using this approach, Allport identified three different kinds of traits: central traits, sec-
ondary traits, and cardinal traits (Allport, 1937). Central traits are traits that are of major
importance in understanding the person. They are the 5 or 10 traits that people who know you THINK ABOUT IT
might mention in your letter of recommendation or to someone who doesn’t know you when
Why is it that cardinal traits
describing you. Secondary traits are traits of lesser importance, less consistently displayed or
seem to occur more often
seldom displayed or only slightly revealed so that only a very close friend might notice them among fictional characters?
(e.g., “shy with new people,” “leader like at times”).
Finally, an unusual person may have one and only one trait that describes him or her. Such
single traits that completely dominate a personality are called cardinal traits. These traits are
so pervasive and extremely influential that practically every aspect of a person’s life is touched
by this “ruling passion” or “master sentiment” (Allport, 1937, p. 338). Do you know somebody
like this? Even though it is highly unusual in real life to find a one-trait personality, it may not
28 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

be so rare in the world of fictional characters. Just think of Don Juan, Don Quixote, Oscar the
Grouch, or any of Snow White’s seven little friends! Allport himself noted that the occurrence
of a cardinal trait is so unusual in the population that when it does occur we name individual
traits after the “celebrity.” Notice how the names of actual people like Beau Brummell (the
fashionista of early 1800s England), Machiavelli (the manipulative Florentine diplomat), and
the Marquis de Sade (don’t ask) have entered the English language as trait terms (Allport,
1937, p. 338).

The Idiographic Approach Applied: The Case of Jenny

“[I]nstead of studying a Around 1946 Allport had the unique opportunity to apply the idiographic approach to a real
thousand rats for one hour person: “Jenny” (Allport, 1965; Anonymous, 1946). Jenny Gove Masterson was a pseudonym for
each or a hundred rats for ten a woman who wrote a detailed correspondence to two friends over a period of 10 years. Allport
edited and published these letters with psychological commentary (Allport, 1965).
hours each the investigator
Jenny was born in Ireland in 1868 and as a young woman moved to the United States with
is more likely to study one
her husband. Soon, they had a baby and, tragically, her husband passed away leaving Jenny a
rat for a thousand hours. The single mother to fend for herself and baby Ross far away from her native country. To say that
procedure is . . . appropriate Ross became the center of his mother’s life was an understatement, and this led to tension
to an enterprise which between mother and son when Ross was an adult. Jenny wrote to Ross’s college roommate,
recognizes individuality.” Glenn, and his wife, Isabel, some 10 years after Ross’s college years, about the time when their
B. F. Skinner
relationship was the most strained. Consider this excerpt from the second letter she wrote to
Glenn and Isabel in 1926:

All during those years and years that I have lived as a hermit socially in order
to pay the bills of that contemptible dog, I have never formed any social connec-
tion. I never had proper clothes—never had money to spare to entertain, even
in a small way. And I would not be a sponge. My whole life has been wasted.
(Allport, 1965, p. 11)

The following month, when Jenny was planning on visiting Glenn and Isabel, she sent the
following letter:

My dear Glenn: I enclose a check for fifty ($50) dollars, payable to you. If any-
thing happens to me on my trip East please cash the cheque, and use it for my
cremation. If I arrive OK you can let me have the money then. In case of acci-
dent, or death, insist on getting my heavy coat—I shall wear it on the trip East.
Sewed in the lining of the coat at the bottom hem, left side, is fifty dollars. Five
tens. Keep it. I shall have 8 or 10 in my purse, and a $10 bill in a pocket sewed
on my corset. (Allport, 1965, p. 17)

As you can see, Jenny was an interesting and articulate woman who wrote with great sin-
cerity and candor. No wonder Allport found these letters a treasure-trove for understanding
personality traits. Jenny’s personality came out naturally in the letters she wrote. By analyz-
ing her letters, might we be able to identify the traits that made Jenny a unique person? All-
port thought so. After editing, Allport enlisted the aid of 36 people who read the letters and
THINK ABOUT IT described Jenny’s traits. They used 198 trait terms, which Allport then arranged in clusters of
related words: quarrelsome-suspicious, self-centered, independent-autonomous, dramatic-
Would you enjoy having
Jenny as a friend? intense, aesthetic-artistic, aggressive, cynical-morbid, sentimental, and some 13 that remained
unclassified.
Allport and others have gone on to analyze Jenny by applying various personality theories,
including those of Sigmund Freud and Carl Rogers (Allport, 1965; Baldwin, 1942). Indeed, there
are many such cases that illustrate personality functioning through the idiographic method (cf.
Barenbaum, 1997; Barry, 2007; Nasby & Read, 1997; Rosenberg, 1989; Simonton, 1999; Swede
& Tetlock, 1986; Winter & Carlson, 1988). In fact, others have analyzed Allport’s personality
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 29

in his treatment of Jenny: As it turns out,

Jenny was writing the letters to him and his
wife Ada (Winter, 1997)!

What Do We
Know About
Personality From
the Nomothetic
Approach?
Finding Universals:
The Nomothetic Approach
Do you remember the two students from
my personality class? Between the two of Using the idiographic method,
them they used 11 different trait terms Gordon Allport analyzed
to describe themselves. In fact, my whole the letters of “Jenny” and
identified sentimental,
class of 46 people used 116 different terms
suspicious, and quarrelsome,
to describe themselves. I noted earlier that
among her central traits.
psychologists who follow the nomothetic
approach seek to identify the basic traits
that make up the human personality.
Deciding on the right number of traits, or factors, to account for human personality is like “The idiographic pattern
figuring out how many playlists and what labels you need to keep your MP3 collection organized. is best illuminated by the
Some people might organize their individual tracks into playlists by artist, album, genre (e.g., rock, nomothetic trend.”
blues, classical), purpose (e.g., working out, driving, studying, relaxing, partying), mood (e.g.,
Saucier and Goldberg (1996, p. 35)
angry, melancholy, happy), or even a combination of these. The best way to keep your collection
organized depends on your purpose. The same logic applies to traits.
There are at least three different ways to identify the most meaningful and applicable words
to describe personality. Researchers typically use a combination of the theoretical approach, the
lexical approach, and the measurement approach (sometimes called the questionnaire or assess-
ment tradition; John, Naumann, & Soto, 2008). Once the basic traits have been identified by
one of these methods, psychologists use statistical techniques, such as factor analysis, to verify
and validate that they have indeed found important traits. These traits can then be applied, or
generalized, to other people or populations.

The Theoretical Approach. Sometimes personality psychologists start with a theory or

even common wisdom about human personality (Barenbaum & Winter, 2008), referred to as
a theoretical approach (Barenbaum & Winter, 2008). For example, do you remember Niccolò
Machiavelli? Two researchers were so taken by his book of advice to the prince of Florence, The
Prince (Machiavelli, 1532/1940), that they devised a personality scale to measure Machiavel-
lianism, or manipulativeness (Christie & Geis, 1970; an excerpt from the scale is presented in
the chapter on personality assessment). This is how common wisdom can inspire the study
of personality traits.
Other times, psychologists start with a theory. Carl Jung hypothesized that people differ
in how they evaluate information: either rationally, what he called the thinking function, or
through emotions. Jung (1921) spoke of at least two types of personality, feeling types and think-
ing types. Sigmund Freud (1915/2000) had a theory that if a child had problems with weaning
or toilet training this would affect later adult personality. Perhaps you’ve heard of an oral per-
sonality who is overly dependent or anal personality who is incredibly organized and uptight.
These are examples of how psychologists use theory to identify meaningful traits.
30 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

The Lexical Approach. The lexical approach to personality traits explores a particular lan-
guage and identifies the number of synonyms that describe personality. The reasoning is that
if a concept is important to speakers of a language, then that concept will be encoded in their
language in multiple ways. People invent terms for salient or useful ideas and these new terms
spread and become commonplace in the language. At the same time, useless words drop out.
Presumably describing what your loved ones and neighbors are like is very relevant and useful,
so crucial individual differences have become encoded in language (Allport, 1937). Now if the
same personality trait is found across many different languages, such a trait may qualify as a
human universal. In this way an analysis of language, specifically looking for many synonyms
and commonalities across languages, may help personality psychologists identify key terms for
describing human personality (Goldberg, 1981), whether they be adjectives (Allport & Odbert,
1936) or nouns (Saucier, 2003).

The Measurement Approach. For the last 60 years or so personality psychologists have
been working separately on discovering important aspects of personality and trying to measure
personality (Hogan, 1996), called the measurement approach. Some psychologists worked
within a theoretical tradition, some operationalized their own observations, whereas still oth-
ers focused on developing the best questionnaires and measurement techniques apart from a
theoretical context. For a while it seemed that each researcher devised an original question-
naire to measure what he or she deemed were the most important personality traits (John
et al., 2008). The field almost seemed to care more about how accurate their measurements were
than about what they were actually measuring (Hogan, 1996)! It needed a taxonomy, or some
systematic method of identifying and classifying trait terms that unified them into a coherent
body. After all, “the astronomer classifies stars, the chemist elements, the zoologist animals, the
botanist plants” (Eysenck, 1991, p. 774).
One way of doing this is to use mathematical and statistical techniques such as factor
analysis to see if the various trait terms cluster together in some way. For example, Raymond
Cattell started with the 4,504 trait terms identified by Allport and Odbert (1936). He reduced
these terms to 160 by eliminating similarities in the list. Then he added all traits that had been
identified by other psychologists in previous research. Finally, he used an early and crude form
of factor analysis—as this was done way before the day of computers—and discovered 16 fac-
tors (Cattell, 1946) that formed the basis of his questionnaire: The 16 Personality Factors (16PF;
Cattell, Eber, & Tatsuoka, 1970). Ironically, due to some misguided statistical practices of the
time, Cattell didn’t realize that the 5 factors that are so widely accepted today were staring him
right in the face in his own data (Digman, 1996). The Research Methods Illustrated feature
explains more about this technique.
Since that time and with the advent of powerful and accessible computers, researchers have
been using a combination of these three approaches—theoretical, lexical, and measurement—to
identify and organize personality traits. How successful have they been? Read on to find out.

Research Methods Illustrated: Factor Analysis

I
magine that we give a group of participants a questionnaire that lists many different types of
music, from soul and funk to heavy metal to country. Participants rate how much they liked each
of these genres on a 7-point scale from 1 (Not at all) to 7 (A great deal).
If people have consistent feelings about any of these types of music then we would expect
them to answer the pertinent questions in roughly the same way. For example, say one group of
people really enjoy blues and jazz and that their answers to these particular questions are more
similar than to questions on how much they like country and religious music. Are there dimensions
or aspects of music that are common to blues and jazz but that distinguish this kind of music from
country and religious music? From hip-hop? More generally, is there some underlying structure to
the answers of our participants? If there is, then do we really need all the separate questions or will
fewer questions work just as well?
These are the questions that psychologists try to answer by using factor analysis (Lee
& Ashton, 2007). Factor analysis is a statistical technique that mathematically identifies a
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 31

meaningful underlying structure among a set of variables. Suppose some questions are related
to each other—but not to other questions; then we can say that we have identified a unique
factor in participants’ responses to these questions. Depending on what we’re studying—
say personality or intelligence—it’s possible to identify a number of factors that underlie
participants’ responses.
How do we know that some questions go together? We look at the correlations among all
of the questions in our data. Recall that correlations (symbolized by r) represent the strength of
a relationship between two variables, with larger numbers indicating that the two variables are
highly related. The sign of the r tells us that the two variables are either directly related (positive)
or inversely related (negative). The pattern of correlations will tell us which variables go together
or correlate with each other and which variables don’t seem to fit. Then the computer uses
complex matrix algebra to try to re-create this pattern of correlations from a combination of one
or more mathematical equations. The result of all this combining and weighting of participants’
responses is the formation of factors. A small number of these factors are usually able to re-create
the variation among responses in our data set almost as well as all of the original answers
themselves.
Each factor can explain a certain amount of variation, called variance, in answers between
participants. This is called the eigenvalue of the factor. From the eigenvalues, we calculate
factor loadings, which is an estimate of how strongly each question fits into a given factor. We
can interpret factor loadings much like correlations, with higher numbers indicating a stronger
correlation between the item and the factor and the positive or negative sign indicating the
direction of the relationship. Each factor is defined by the questions with the highest factor
loadings. Researchers look at the questions and try to identify what underlying concept the
questions are all getting at.
When we do a factor analysis, the first factor that emerges generally accounts for the
greatest amount of variation in the data. But because this is mathematically derived rather than
inspired by our actual questions, there is no guarantee that the factor makes any sense. At this
stage a researcher might move around the factors to find which questions go together the
best. This is called rotating the factors and allows us to understand the factors better (kind of
like rotating a map to match the direction you are facing to better see where you’re going). This
doesn’t change the number of factors, nor does it change the relationship among the factors,
but it does change which questions cluster together. By rotating the factors—and there are a
number of mathematical ways of doing this—the combining and weighting of questions that
make up that factor shift slightly so that the researcher is better able to see what the underlying
factor is.
How do we know how many factors best explain the data? This is where factor analysis is
more “art” than “science.” Much debate exists on the pros and cons of the various ways of deciding
on the right number of factors. Researchers may stop when a new factor doesn’t add much, often
determined mathematically (e.g., by accepting all eigenvalues greater than 1) or graphically. Often,
researchers take a pragmatic approach and keep only the few factors that are actually interpretable.
Later factors may capture only measurement error or response bias instead of a meaningful
underlying concept.
Once the right numbers have been identified, the researcher must then name the factors. The
way to do this is to look at the items that fall together on each factor and see what concept they
all appear to be getting at. Take our music taste example from the beginning of this section which
was based on an actual experiment. Rentfrow and Gosling (2003) designed the Short Test of Musical
Preferences, called the STOMP, in which participants rated how much they liked each of 14 musical
genres. The researchers then used factor analysis to see if there was some underlying construct that
could explain similarities and differences in participants’ musical tastes. The results are shown in
Table 2.3. Can you think of an adequate name for each of the factors?
This is how factor analysis is a useful tool for exploring the number and kind of traits contained
in the human personality. But note that it does not give the definitive answer to this question
(Darlington, 2009). Keep in mind that factor analysis is a useful, but limited statistical method and is
only as good as the researcher behind it. At nearly every step of the way, researchers make choices
and their choices impact the results. From choosing which questions to ask (and submit to factor
analysis), to determining the right number of factors, to interpreting the factors, factor analysis has
its shortcomings (Fabrigar, Wegener, MacCallum, & Strahan, 1999). Whereas factor analysis gives an
answer, it is up to the researchers to make a solid case for their conclusions and to replicate their
findings before we can believe it is the answer.
32 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

Table 2.3 Factor Loadings of the 14 Music Genres on Four Factors

Genre Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3 Factor 4
Blues .85 .01 - .09 .12
Jazz .83 .04 .07 .15
Classical .66 .14 .02 -.13
Folk .64 .09 .15 -.16
Rock .17 .85 -.04 -.07
Alternative .02 .80 .13 .04
Heavy metal .07 .75 - .11 .04
Country - .06 .05 .72 -.03
Soundtracks .01 .04 .70 .17
Religious .23 - .21 .64 -.01
Pop -.20 .06 .59 .45
Rap/hip-hop - .19 - .12 .17 .79
Soul/funk .39 - .11 .11 .69
Electronica/dance -.02 .15 -.01 .60
Note: N = 1,704. The highest factor loadings for each dimension are listed in boldface type. The research-
ers named the factors Reflective and Complex; Intense and Rebellious; Upbeat and Conventional; and Energetic
and Rhythmic.
Source: Rentfrow and Gosling, 2003, Table 1, p. 1242 Rentfrow, P. J., & Gosling, S. D. (2003). The do re mi’s of everyday
life: The structure and personality correlates of music preferences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(6),
1236–1256. Copyright American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.

The Great Nomothetic Search for Universal

Principles of Personality
How did these three traditions—theoretical, lexical, and measurement—lead to this “most
celebrated empirical accomplishment” (McCrae & Costa, 1996, p. 53)? First, recall that Allport
and Odbert conducted a lexical analysis and uncovered 4,504 trait terms. From this list of trait
terms, Cattell, using factor analysis, identified 16 factors—not realizing the import of only 5
of his factors (Cattell, 1946; Cattell et al., 1970). Others, building on Cattell’s statistical work,
identified a solution of 5 remarkably similar factors (e.g., Fiske, 1949; Norman, 1963) known
as the Big Five (Loehlin, 1992). This moniker was not to extol their greatness so much as to
emphasize that they are broad factors (John et al., 2008). Each of the Big Five factors describes
personality at a high level of abstraction (remember Eysenck’s pyramid?) summarizing a large
number of more distinct lower level traits.
At the same time, working in the questionnaire approach, researchers found that popu-
lar personality tests at the time including the Personality Research Form (Jackson, 1984), the
California Q-set (Block, 1961), and even the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (Myers & McCauley,
SEE FOR YOURSELF 1985) all contained 5 factors (Digman, 1996), as do numerous other questionnaires from widely
different theoretical traditions (McCrae, 1989).
How many factors did Finally, others have theorized that for personality traits to be universal they must be rooted
you use to describe your
personality?
in biology (Eysenck, 1990; McCrae & Costa, 1996) or solve evolutionary problems, which these
5 factors appear to do (Buss, 1996).
The remarkable convergence of theory, research, and measurement makes this a particu-
larly exciting time for personality psychologists as the evidence for a five-factor model of
personality mounts. But there are still plenty of researchers who are not convinced that five is
the right number of trait factors and who have proposed their own dimensions or who have
identified important traits left out from the five-factor model. However, to fully appreciate the
significance of the current five-factor taxonomy—not to mention these alternative models and
critiques—we will need to understand earlier models of personality traits.
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 33

Three Superfactors: Eysenck

Psychologist Hans Eysenck spent his lifetime conducting experiments to identify and describe
key differences between people. So convinced was he that there were fundamental constitutional
differences between people that he first described these personality types in terms of physiologi-
cal or biological differences between people (Eysenck, 1998). More recent research has proved
that Eysenck had the general principle right: His early twin studies support his claim for genetic
differences in the three factors, even as the exact physiological mechanisms were unknown to
scientists at the time (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). He identified three broad dimensions of per-
sonality: Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism. Eysenck also identified more specific,
what he called narrow traits, associated with each of these factors (see Table 2.4). Together,
these three superfactors form the basis of Eysenck’s PEN model of personality (Eysenck, 1952).
The first factor, Psychoticism, describes how tough-minded or antisocial people are. We can
also think about this as impulsivity or disinhibition versus constraint or as undercontrolled versus
overcontrolled (Clark & Watson, 2008). People who are high in Psychoticism tend to be selfish and
antisocial (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). The narrow traits associated with Psychoti-
cism are aggressive, cold, egocentric, impersonal, impulsive, antisocial, lacking empathy, creative,
and tough-minded (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). One writer describes Psychoticism
as low agreeableness and low conscientiousness (from the five factors) “with a few other very bad
things thrown in” (McAdams, 2009, p. 199). According to Eysenck, a person high in Psychoticism
may be cruel and inhumane, lacking in feeling and empathy, and altogether
insensitive. . . . He has a liking for odd and unusual things, and a disregard
for danger. He likes to make fools of other people and to upset them. (Eysenck
& Eysenck, 1975, pp. 5–6)

Table 2.4 Eysenck’s PEN Model: Factors and Narrow Traits

Factors Narrow Traits
Psychoticism Aggressive
Cold
Egocentric
Impersonal
Impulsive
Antisocial
Unempathetic
Creative
Tough-minded
Extraversion Sociable
Lively
Active
Assertive
Sensation-seeking
Carefree
Dominant
Surgent
Venturesome
Neuroticism Anxious
Depressed
Guilt feelings
Low self-esteem
Tense
Irrational
Shy
Moody
Emotional

Source: From Eysenck (1990, p. 246).

34 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

The second factor is Extraversion (Eysenck, 1990). Extraversion describes how outgoing
people are, both to the social and the physical environments. The narrow traits associated
with extraversion are sociable, lively, active, assertive, sensation-seeking, carefree, dominant,
surgent, and venturesome (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). In contrast to intro-
verts, extraverts tend to be outgoing and experience many positive feelings such as happiness
and joy.
According to Hans Eysenck and Sybil Eysenck in their Manual of the Eysenck Personality
Inventory:
The typical extravert is sociable, likes parties, has many friends, needs to have
people to talk to, and does not like reading or studying by himself. He craves
excitement, takes chances, often sticks his neck out, acts on the spur of the
moment, and is generally an impulsive individual. . . . [H]e is carefree, easy-
going, optimistic, and likes to “laugh and be merry”. . . . [A]ltogether his feelings
are not kept under tight control, and he is not always a reliable person. (Eysenck
& Eysenck, 1975, p. 5)
In contrast, the typical introvert is
a quiet, retiring sort of person, introspective, fond of books rather than peo-
ple. . . . [H]e does not like excitement, takes matters of every day life with proper
seriousness. . . . He tends to plan ahead, “looks before he leaps” and distrusts the
impulse of the moment. . . . He keeps his feelings under close control . . . [H]e is
reliable [and] somewhat pessimistic. (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1975, p. 5)
The third factor, Neuroticism, refers to negative emotionality and emotional reactivity. The
SEE FOR YOURSELF narrow traits associated with Neuroticism are anxious, depressed, guilt feelings, low self-esteem,
tense, irrational, shy, moody, and emotional (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). People
Where do your personal- high in Neuroticism tend to be easily upset and vulnerable to negative emotions. In contrast,
ity traits fall on these three
factors?
those low in this trait are even-tempered, calm, relaxed, carefree, unworried, somewhat unemo-
tional, and recover quickly after an upsetting experience.
You can see sample questions from the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (Eysenck &
Eysenck, 1976) used to measure Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism in Table 2.5.
Eysenck and his colleagues conducted extensive research to demonstrate differences among
people high and low in these fundamental factors. Much of his research focused on the physi-
ological differences and genetic evidence for his theory, which we will briefly cover in those
chapters.

Table 2.5 Sample Items From an Early Version of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire
Psychoticism Questions
1. Do you enjoy practical jokes that can sometimes really hurt people?
2. Are there several people who keep trying to avoid you?
3. Do you think people spend too much time safeguarding their future with savings and
insurances?
Extraversion Questions
1. Do you have many different hobbies?
2. Do you often take on more activities than you have time for?
3. Would you call yourself happy-go-lucky?
Neuroticism Questions
1. Does your mood often go up and down?
2. Do you ever feel “just miserable” for no reason?
3. Do you worry too long after an embarrassing experience?

Note: Respondents answered Yes or No to each question.

Source: From Eysenck and Eysenck (1976, pp. 65–68).
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 35

For many years Eysenck’s theory held an important place in trait theory and inspired
numerous experiments. Alas, the prominence of his theory has been eclipsed by the explosion
of research on the five-factor model (John et al., 2008). One problem with Eysenck’s theory
is that many personality psychologists feel that important traits are missing. Eysenck totally
disagreed, and claimed that they were looking at different levels in the hierarchy.
Specifically, he believed that other conceptualizations of traits are invalid because they
include traits from multiple levels of the hierarchy. For example, Eysenck claimed that Cattell’s
16 personality factors are at the third level (the level of traits) and when factor analyzed reduce
to Eysenck’s three superfactors (Eysenck, 1990). Further, Eysenck was talking about factors at
the very top of the hierarchy (the type or superfactor level), but some measures of the five-
factor model claim to have identified traits yet instead have mixed habits and responses. When
you factor analyze these terms, you get the three superfactors of Psychoticism, Extraversion,
and Neuroticism (Eysenck, 1990). Indeed, although Eysenck acknowledged that aspects of the
five-factor model overlapped with his theory (e.g., Extraversion and Neuroticism), he countered
that the factors of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness were at the level of habits, and therefore “Personality psychologists
not comparable. Finally, he claimed that Openness is more of a cognitive factor and should not
who continue to employ their
be considered a dimension of personality (Eysenck, 1990).
preferred measure without
locating it within the five-
Five Factors: The Big Five and the Five-Factor Model
factor model can only be
The five factors that appear to be our best candidates for universal traits are Neuroticism, likened to geographers who
Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness and Conscientiousness (John, 1990; John et al., 2008).
issue reports of new lands
Because many researchers use slightly different terminology to summarize “their” five factors,
even using Roman numerals to identify the factors rather than words, Oliver John and his col- but refuse to locate them on
leagues (John, 1990, p. 96; John et al., 2008, p. 139) suggested that we think of the five factors a map for others to find.”
using multiple words: Ozer and Reise (1994, p. 361)

N: Neuroticism, Negative Affectivity, Nervousness (Factor IV)

E: Extraversion, Energy, Enthusiasm (Factor I)
O: Openness, Originality, Open-mindedness (Factor V)
A: Agreeableness, Altruism, Affection (Factor II)
C: Conscientiousness, Control, Constraint (Factor III)
Neuroticism, in contrast to Emotional Stability, refers to how well a person adjusts to the
“slings and arrows of daily life.” It refers to emotionality, psychological distress, and reactivity.
For example, does George worry a lot about what people think of him? Does Ally fall apart
under stress? George and Ally would be considered high in Neuroticism. Does Yang stay calm,
cool, and collected under pressure? Does James keep his feelings under control? Yang and James
are low in Neuroticism, and would be considered high in Emotional Stability. People who
are low in Neuroticism are not necessarily high in overall mental health (McCrae & John,
1992)—that would depend on the other factors and perhaps some aspects of personality not
captured by a trait model at all. People low in Neuroticism are even-tempered, calm, relaxed,
and unruffled (McCrae & John, 1992). One of the best indicators for Neuroticism is agreement
with the item “I often feel tense and jittery” from the NEO Personality Inventory—Revised
(NEO-PI-R; McCrae, 2007).
According to the NEO-PI-R, each of the five factors are made up of six subscales called
facets. If we think of Neuroticism as the superfactor, then the facets or narrow traits that
make up Neuroticism are anxiety, angry hostility, depression, self-consciousness, impulsiveness
(immoderation), and vulnerability to stress (Costa & McCrae, 1992; see Table 2.6).
People who are high in Neuroticism show poorer coping skills in stressful situations,
poorer health, and are likely to experience burnout and job changes (John et al., 2008). They
are also prone to negative emotions such as fear, sadness, embarrassment, anger, guilt, and dis- THINK ABOUT IT
gust (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Emotionally stable people show more commitment to work and
Why are people high in Neu-
great satisfaction with their personal relationships (John et al., 2008). Among undergraduate roticism more vulnerable to
students at one Swiss university, those who were high on impulsivity—an important facet of stress and poor health?
Neuroticism—spent more time on the phone, made more cell phone calls in a day, and reported
36 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

Table 2.6 Facets of Neuroticism Table 2.7 Facets of Extraversion

Anxiety Warmth
Angry hostility Gregariousness
Depression Assertiveness
Self-consciousness Activity
Impulsiveness Excitement-seeking
Vulnerability to stress Positive emotions
Source: From Costa and McCrae (1992). Source: From Costa and McCrae (1992).

being more dependent on their cell phones than people who were low in impulsiveness (Bil-
lieux, Linden, D’Acremont, Ceschi, & Zermatten, 2006).
Is Dominick full of life and fun to be around? Does Christine enjoy parties with lots
of people? Is April more reserved and quiet? Dominick and Christine are more extroverted,
whereas April is more introverted. The second factor listed, Extraversion, is contrasted with
Introversion and describes how one “surges” or energetically engages with the social world.
Extraverted people just like other people. They are assertive, active, talkative, and cheerful, enjoy
large groups and gatherings, and enjoy excitement (Costa & McCrae, 1992).
The factor of Extraversion is made up of the facets of warmth (friendliness), gregarious-
ness, assertiveness, activity, excitement-seeking, and positive emotions (cheerfulness; Costa &
McCrae, 1992; see Table 2.7). Extraversion also refers to energetically seeking out and inter-
acting with others (John & Robins, 1993; McCrae & John, 1992). One of the best indicators
of Extraversion is agreement with the item “I am a cheerful, high spirited person” from the
NEO-PI-R (McCrae, 2007).
Keep in mind that an energetic, optimistic person who shows enthusiasm and cheerfulness
is not necessarily low in anxiety or depression. Anxiety and depression are related to Neuroti-
cism (McCrae & John, 1992). Extraverts are likely to hold leadership positions in groups, have
many friends and a greater number of sexual partners, and are more likely to be selected as
foreperson of a jury than are Introverts. In contrast, introverts are more likely to experience
poorer relationships with parents and peers (John et al., 2008).
The third factor is Openness or “Inquiring Intellect” (Digman, 1996; Fiske, 1949). Open-
ness includes the facets of fantasy (imagination), aesthetics (artistic interests), feelings (emo-
tionality), actions (adventurousness), ideas (intellect), and values (psychological liberalism;
see Table 2.8). Does Jim have a very active imagination? Does Ellen get completely absorbed in
music she is listening to? Jim and Ellen are high in openness. Is Rick pretty well set in his ways? Is
Catherine against controversial campus speakers? People high in Openness tend to be imagina-
tive and creative, whereas people low in openness tend to be more conventional, practical, and
down-to-earth. People high in Openness tend to go further with their education, to succeed in
creative jobs, and to create distinctive work and home environments (John et al., 2008). One
of the best indicators of Openness is the experience of chills or goosebumps in response to an
aesthetic experience (McCrae, 2007). In sum, a person high in Openness is seen as

interested in experience for its own sake, eager for variety, tolerant of uncer-
Table 2.8 Facets of Openness tainty, leading a richer, more complex, less conventional life. By contrast, the
closed person is seen as being impoverished in fantasy, insensitive to art and
Fantasy beauty, restricted in affect, behaviorally rigid, bored by ideas, and ideologically
Aesthetics dogmatic. (McCrae, 1990, p. 123)
Feelings Openness refers to an appreciation of the life of the mind in such things as ideas,
Actions thoughts, fantasies, art, and beauty, and is not the same as intelligence. People can score high
Ideas in Openness without having a high IQ (McCrae & John, 1992). Similarly, artistic interests
are not the same as artistic ability, which is not a personality trait. Openness includes an
Values
appreciation of a wide range of feelings in contrast to touchiness or defensiveness, which is
Source: From Costa and McCrae (1992). part of Neuroticism (McCrae, 1990). Openness refers to an openness to ideas and new things
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 37

People high in Openness tend

to enjoy the adventurousness
of traveling abroad.

rather than an openness to people, which is part of Extraversion. Openness is not the same as
excitement-seeking, which is part of Extraversion. People high in Openness like new experi-
ences, not necessarily dangerous or exciting ones.
Having high Openness may sound better or more fun than being low in Openness, but
there’s no particular psychological benefit to being high or low on this factor (and the same
can be said for Extraversion). Rather, the value of creativity or conventionalism depends on the
situation, with people at either end found in everyday walks of life (Costa & McCrae, 1992).
Agreeableness refers to the quality of interpersonal relations—that is, how much a person
feels for and gets along with others; whether he or she seeks out such enjoyment, as would an
extravert, or does not, as would an introvert. Agreeableness can also be thought of as a prosocial
or communal orientation to others and is contrasted with antagonism or competitiveness (Costa
& McCrae, 1992; Graziano & Eisenberg, 1997; John et al., 2008). People low in Agreeableness show
hostility, self-centeredness, spitefulness, indifference, and even jealousy toward others (Digman,
1990). Agreeableness includes the facets of trust (of others), straightforwardness (honesty or
morality as opposed to manipulativeness), altruism, compliance (cooperation), modesty, and
tender-mindedness (sympathy; see Table 2.9).
Does Ramiro believe that most people are basically well intentioned? Does Betty have
great empathy for people in need? Ramiro and Betty would be high in Agreeableness, showing
trust in and sympathy for other people, a concern for social harmony, and getting along with
others. In contrast, people low in Agreeableness distrust the motives of others and are on the
lookout for others who might be trying to take advantage of them. For example, does Jasmine
bully or flatter people into getting them to do what she wants? Does Darnell believe that most
people will take advantage of you if you let them? Jasmine and Darnell are low in Agreeableness.
Some measure of Disagreeableness might be useful in situations requiring tough judgments
or “tough love.” Some of the most successful U.S. presidents have been low in Agreeableness
(Rubenzer, Faschingbauer, & Ones, 2000). Generally, people high in Agreeableness show better
performance in work groups than do those low in Agreeableness (John et al., 2008). People
low in Agreeableness are often at risk for cardiovascular disease, juvenile delinquency, and
interpersonal problems (John et al., 2008). However, Costa and McCrae (1992) noted that the
“readiness to fight” is often an advantage in life, and good science demands the skepticism and
critical thinking of the person low in Agreeableness.
Finally, Conscientiousness refers to an individual’s degree of organization, both physi-
cal organization, such as the organization of one’s office, or mental organization, as in plan-
ning ahead and having goals to be achieved. Conscientiousness also includes how we regulate
our own impulses such as thinking before acting, delaying gratification, or following norms
and rules (John et al., 2008). For example, does Brittany have separate files for each of her
38 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

Table 2.9 Facets of Agreeableness Table 2.10 Facets of Conscientiousness

Trust Competence
Straightforwardness Order
Altruism Dutifulness
Compliance Achievement-striving
Modesty Self-discipline
Tender-mindedness Deliberation
Source: From Costa and McCrae (1992). Source: From Costa and McCrae (1992).

classes? Does Dimitri put away his video games after he plays with them? If so, Brittany and
Dimitri are displaying aspects of Conscientiousness. But consider a person like Charlie who
THINK ABOUT IT is not dependable and who even cheats at solitaire! Or Lonette, who often does things on the
spur of the moment without thinking of the consequences. Both of these people are low in
Can people change how
agreeable they are? Conscientiousness and might be expected to place short-term pleasures ahead of long-term
accomplishments.
Conscientiousness includes the facets of competence (self-efficacy), order, dutifulness,
achievement-striving, self-discipline, and deliberation (cautiousness; see Table 2.10). Inter-
estingly, people high in Conscientiousness are rated by their peers and even their spouses as
well organized, neat, thorough, and diligent (McCrae & Costa, 1987). They also have higher
grade point averages and better on-the-job performance (John et al., 2008). People low in
Conscientiousness are more likely to smoke, abuse alcohol and other drugs, show attention
SEE FOR YOURSELF deficit disorder, have a poor diet, and not exercise enough. In contrast, people high in Consci-
entiousness are more likely to adhere to doctor’s orders, and—when compared to those low
Where do your personal-
in Conscientiousness—live longer (John et al., 2008)! But don’t be so smug if you are high in
ity traits fall on these five
factors? Conscientiousness; high levels of this trait may also lead to annoying habits such as fastidious-
ness, compulsive neatness, or workaholic behavior (Costa & McCrae, 1985).
If some of these factors sound familiar, they should: These five are very similar to Eysenck’s
three factors. That is, both the five-factor
model and Eysenck’s model identify Neu-
roticism and Extraversion as two impor-
tant dimensions of human personality.
Further, Eysenck’s Psychoticism factor
is a combination of Agreeableness and
Conscientiousness (Digman, 1996).

A Rose by Any Other Name? Two

Models of the Five Factors. Part of
the confusion for the names of the fac-
tors is that the factors, especially Open-
ness, look slightly different depending on
the method used to identify them. When
researchers start with the lexical approach,
they get the Big Five of Surgency (Extra-
version), Agreeableness, Conscientious-
ness, Emotional Stability, and Culture
(Goldberg, 1990; Norman, 1963). Gener-
ally, the phrase the Big Five refers to this
lexical solution. The Big Five factors are
People high in identified by Roman numerals that sig-
conscientiousness have
nify the frequency of the factor words in
higher grade point averages
the lexicon. For example, words that refer
than people low in this trait.
to lexical factor I, Extraversion, are more
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 39

common than words of lexical factor V, Openness. Roman numerals also have the advantage of “Factor analysis has
being neutral from a theoretical standpoint (McCrae & John, 1992). However, numbers are less improved the situation, as
memorable than mnemonics and so the OCEAN labeling has caught on more, especially among has clearer theorizing, but the
students of personality psychology (McCrae & Costa, 1985).
problem of naming factors is
At roughly the same time, Costa and McCrae (1976), using factor analysis, discovered
of course still with us.”
three factors: Anxiety-Adjustment (now called Neuroticism), Introversion-Extraversion, and
Hans Eysenck
Openness to experience. They devised an inventory to measure these three factors (the NEO;
McCrae & Costa, 1983, 1985), and then persuaded by the strength of the lexical findings, they
added scales to measure the factors of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness in 1990 and called
their solution the five-factor model (FFM; Costa & McCrae, 1992; Costa, McCrae, & Dye, 1991;
Digman, 1996). Indeed, comparing the lexical model with their five-factor model, McCrae
and Costa (1985) noted that “the similarities are far more remarkable than the differences”
(p. 720). Today, the five factors of the five-factor model—Neuroticism, Extraversion, Open-
ness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness—are measured using the revised version of the
NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R; Costa & McCrae, 1992). This ordering of the factors,
incidentally, reflects the amount of variance, from largest to smallest, accounted for by each of
the five factors.
So, what’s the difference between the two models? After all, they seem pretty similar. The
major similarity is, of course, a five-factor solution, which is no small feat given all the contro-
versy! Also, the two solutions identify virtually identical factors. One difference is the name of
the individual factors. What the Big Five calls Emotional Stability the FFM calls Neuroticism.
Both terms refer to the same dimension; the only difference is in direction, or which end of the
pole researchers wish to emphasize. Second, the Big Five Culture factor is a narrower view of
the FFM factor Openness, which refers to openness to aesthetic or cultural tastes, a wide range
of emotions, and a need for variety, and is not limited to creativity and intellectual interests.
Yet, both the Big Five and FFM solutions agree that creativity, imagination, and originality are THINK ABOUT IT
aspects of this factor (Saucier, 1992). Recall that there are fewer words in the English language
Can you think of traits to
that describe Openness of personality, so it’s no wonder there are disagreements about what
describe a person who
this factor represents. Maybe there are some aspects of personality we need questionnaires to appreciates art and beauty?
measure such as sensitivity to art and beauty (McCrae, 1990).
Other differences are more philosophical and deal with the history behind the two tradi-
tions and the empirical usefulness of the models. For example, the Big Five describes personality
without attempting to explain where these attributes come from (i.e., they are in our language
so they must be important). In contrast, the FFM theorizes, much in the tradition of Eysenck,
that the five factors are biological traits (Saucier & Goldberg, 1996). That is, these traits are
causal entities that correspond to neuropsychic structures that are in the process of being
identified (John & Robins, 1993). Second, because the Big Five is grounded in adjectives, it has
been replicated cross-culturally in many different languages. The NEO-PI-R, because it uses
sentences, may be more dependent on language and culture and may lose something in the
translation (Saucier & Goldberg, 1996). We’ll examine cross-cultural evidence for the five-factor
solution in the next chapter on traits. For now, we’ll use the term Big Five when referring to
lexically derived factors, five-factor model or FFM when referring to the questionnaire factors,
and five-factor taxonomy or the five factors when the specific model doesn’t matter.
Research on both the Big Five (using adjectival measures) and the FFM (using the NEO-PI-R
questionnaire) yield similar results (John & Robins, 1993), giving us even greater faith in a five-
factor solution of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness.

Is Five Really the Ultimate Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything? Although
that sounds like a simple question, the answer is quite complicated. Remember Cattell’s claim
that 16 was the right number of factors to describe human personality? Eysenck critiqued
Cattell’s model and noted that direct factor analysis of the 16PF questionnaire recovers 3 fac-
tors, remarkably similar to Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism (Eysenck, 1991). Inter-
estingly, though similar, this factor analysis failed to find the extreme antisocial aspects of
Eysenck’s Psychoticism factor. This suggests, according to Eysenck, that the Cattell scales are
missing key aspects of personality (Eysenck, 1991). Further, even though one study recovered
40 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

five factors from the responses on the 16PF questionnaire from more than 17,000 people (Krug
& Johns, 1986), Eysenck claimed that “it would need a lot of interpretive ingenuity” to make
these resemble the Big Five factors of Norman (1963; Eysenck, 1991, p. 778). Instead, the three
factors of Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism fit the data better (Eysenck, 1991). And
on top of it all, Eysenck claims, the 16 factors of Cattell are not even replicable!
Statistically, 16 factors explain more of the variance in personality than 3 factors do, but is
the difference theoretically, socially, or practically important (Eysenck, 1991)? It all depends on
what your goals are or on what you are trying to predict. We might think of the whole debate
as a trade-off of fidelity versus bandwidth (John, 1989). Would you rather have a radio that
picks up few stations with fantastic quality of sound or many stations with decent sound? Well,
it depends on why you are listening to the radio. When I was a kid, it was incredibly exciting
to discover that we could pick up far-away radio stations on our AM transistor radios—one
of my classmates claimed that he could hear people talking in French!—never mind that we
had to turn up the volume all the way and use a bit of our imaginations. On the other hand,
you may be an opera fan who wants to tune in to the Metropolitan Opera Saturday afternoon
broadcast to hear your favorite soprano in HD. So, if you are an explorer of personality, like
Cattell and the early researchers, then a higher number of factors suits your purpose. If you’re
trying to find out how people act differently depending on their traits, then a smaller number
may be better.
Another way to think of this dilemma of identifying the right number for a taxonomy of
personality traits is to consider what happens in a field such as biology with a well-established
taxonomy for animals. We can classify the new creature lapping our face at the pound as an
animal or as a dog or as a poodle or even as Mr. Bowser, the newest member of your family!
The “broadest level of the hierarchy,” says John (1989), is to “personality what the categories
‘plant’ and ‘animal’ are to the world of natural objects—extremely useful for some initial rough
distinctions but of less value for predicting specific behaviors of a particular object” (p. 268).
Researchers have championed anywhere from 1 to 16 factors. We’ll consider some of these
conceptualizations in turn.

A One-Factor Solution
The smallest number of factors that can account for human personality is, of course, one.
Researchers have called this the general personality factor or GPF (Musek, 2007; Rushton &
Irwing, 2008; van der Linden, te Nijenhuis, & Bakker, 2010). The GPF is hypothesized to explain
all of human personality in much the same way that g represents a general factor of intelligence
underlying all mental abilities (Musek, 2007). This GPF lies at the very top of a hierarchy of
personality traits (see Figure 2.3).
What exactly is the GPF? According to Musek (2007) this factor includes all the positive
aspects of the five factors: Emotional Stability, Agreeableness, Extraversion, Conscientious-
ness, and Intellect. Further, the GPF encompasses the two factors of Alpha (the emotional
stability to get along with others) and Beta (the flexibility to deal with change, challenges, and
demands) (Musek, 2007). People who are high in GPF are altruistic, sociable, able to handle
stress, relaxed, open to experience, dependable, and task-focused (Rushton & Irwing, 2008).
Rushton and his colleagues argued that these aspects of personality have been evolutionarily
hard-wired as they are necessary for survival (e.g., Rushton, Bons, & Hur, 2008; Rushton &
Irwing, 2008).
In one study, participants answered three different measures of the five-factor model and
other personality questionnaires (Musek, 2007). When their responses were factor analyzed it
turned out that the first factor, the GPF, accounted for 40 to 50% of the variance in participants’
responses. The second factor accounted for 17 to 26%. Further, this GPF correlated with mea-
sures of well-being and self-esteem. Other researchers found similar evidence for the same GPF
using different trait measures (Rushton et al., 2008; Rushton & Irwing, 2008, 2009).
Although this GPF sounds an awful lot like a general “social desirability” factor or a “con-
formity” factor, Musek (2007) argued that the pattern of results—how this GPF correlates with
other personality measures—rules out both of these alternative explanations. However, other
researchers believe that a two-factor solution is merely an artifact of the way we measure traits
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 41

GPF

Level 5
Constructs of
Alpha Beta
Theoretical
Systems

Level 4 Conscienti- Emotional

Agreeableness Extraversion Intellect
The Big Five ousness Stability

Level 3
Characteristics
Scales
Facets

Level 2
Habits
Act Frequencies
Items

Level 1
Responses

Figure 2.3 The Current Hierarchical Model of Human Personality. Source: Adapted from Musek (2007, Figure 2, p. 1225)
and Digman (1997, Figure 1, p. 1252). Musek, J. (2007), “A general factor of personality: Evidence for the Big One in the
five-factor model,” Journal of Research in Personality, 41, 1213–1233. Reprinted by permission of Academic Press.

and have evidence that a five- or six-factor solution is superior to a two-factor solution (Ashton,
Lee, Goldberg, & de Vries, 2009).

Six- and Seven-Factor Solutions . . . and Beyond!

An alternative to the five-factor taxonomy is the HEXACO (or six-factor) model (Ashton &
Lee, 2005, 2007; Lee & Ashton, 2004). The six factors are Honesty-Humility, Emotionality,
Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience. Five of the
factors are very similar to their five-factor counterparts; the major difference is the addition
of Honesty-Humility as a separate factor (Ashton & Lee, 2005). This factor emerged out
of research in other cultures and languages (e.g., Ashton, Lee, Perugini, et al., 2004; Fung
& Ng, 2006) and might be best thought of as a genuineness or trustworthiness factor in
English (Ashton, Lee, & Goldberg, 2004). Honesty-Humility includes the facets of sincerity,
fairness, greed avoidance, and modesty as contrasted with arrogance and egotism (Lee &
Ashton, 2004). Although this sounds similar to Agreeableness, the difference has to do with
manipulation and power. For example, a person high in Agreeableness is willing to help
another person even when it might be against his or her own self-interest (i.e., altruism).
Someone high in Honesty-Humility would not take advantage of another person, especially
if that person is disadvantaged in some way (Lee & Ashton, 2004).
However, the HEXACO is not without its critics. For example, McCrae and Costa (2008)
suggested that this sixth factor is just a variation of Agreeableness tapping more introverted
aspects of Agreeableness, whereas the standard facets of Agreeableness (trust, straightforward-
ness, altruism, cooperation, modesty, sympathy) tap the more extroverted aspects of getting
along with others. They believed that the six-factor model is redundant with the five-factor
model and not an improvement on it.
One criticism of five-factor solutions (cf. Saucier, 1997) is that many of them can be traced
back to Allport and Odbert (1936), who omitted adjectives that represented temporary states
(such as moods) or evaluations (i.e., judgments of character, such as insignificant, worthy).
When such terms are added back in, the result is a seven-factor solution (Almagor, Tellegen, &
Waller, 1995; Benet & Waller, 1995; Benet-Martínez & Waller, 2002). These “Big Seven” factors
42 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

are very similar to the Big Five, with the two additional factors of Negative Valence and Posi-
tive Valence. These additional evaluative dimensions are especially useful for understanding
pathology (Durrett & Trull, 2005).
This is one area of current research and debate as researchers try to garner evidence for
and against their theories. In sum, John et al. (2008) suggested that five factors is our current
best working hypothesis for the organization of human traits. There is much evidence from
cross-cultural studies to support this view as well, as we will soon see.

Then and Now: The Four Temperaments and the Five Factors
In ancient Greece, the philosopher Empedocles proposed that all of nature is made up of the
four elements of air, earth, fire, and water. Hippocrates, building on this early work, further
proposed that humans contained elements of the cosmos, therefore we have within our bodies
the corresponding “humors” that affected our temperament or personality. A predominance
of blood and one was cheerful and happy; too much yellow bile and one was quick to anger.
But it was the Roman physician Galen, around AD 150, who linked these temperaments to
diseases and is credited with being the first to recognize a relationship between physiology and
personality (see Table 2.11). We might dismiss these ancient personality theories today in favor
of empirically based theories, but the wisdom of the ancients is remarkably in line with many
modern personality theories.
Because our personality is expressed in our facial expressions, body movements, and
gestures, Gordon Allport showed illustrations of these four personality types to participants
and found that most people were able to correctly guess which temperament went with each
picture (you can try this yourself in Figure 2.4). Allport noted that the four temperaments fit
easily into two-factor theories of personality, whether the two factors be speed and intensity
of emotional arousal or activity level and a tendency to approach or withdraw from situations
(Allport, 1937/1961). Similarly, Hans Eysenck noticed that the four temperaments matched
the dimensions of emotional/nonemotional and changeable/unchangeable, two important
personality factors identified by the founder of modern experimental psychology, Wilhelm
Wundt in the 19th century (Eysenck, 1967). Perhaps you recognized that these dimensions
correspond to Neuroticism and Extraversion of both Eysenck and the current five-factor
taxonomy (see Figure 2.5).
Today, while researchers have pretty much decided that the five factors—Neuroticism,
Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness—are the major dimensions of
human personality; others have suggested that these five are aspects of a two-factor solution,
alpha and beta (Digman, 1997).
Factor alpha consists of Emotional Stability, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness whereas
Extraversion and Openness to Experience make up beta (Digman, 1997). Digman (1997) sug-
gested that these two factors represent the major tasks of personality development: socialization
and actualization (although he didn’t use these labels). By socialization he meant developing
according to “society’s blueprint” (p. 1250), including learning how to regulate one’s own emo-
tions and impulses, living up to expectations, and not being too defensive when interacting with
others. By actualization he meant personality growth, or going out into the world being open
to new experiences (recall that Surgency is another name for Extraversion) and adapt to them

Table 2.11 The Four Temperaments

Element Property Humor Temperament Characteristic
Air Warm and moist Blood Sanguine Hopeful
Earth Cold and dry Black bile Melancholic Sad
Fire Warm and dry Yellow bile Choleric Irascible
Water Cold and moist Phlegm Phlegmatic Apathetic
Source: Adapted from Allport (1937/1961, p. 37). Allport, G. W. (1937/1961). Pattern and growth in personality. New York: Holt,
Rinehart and Winston.
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 43

(Digman, 1997). Similarly, others

have suggested that all humans,
regardless of culture, may seek to
categorize people as benign versus
harmful (socialized) and stimu-
lating versus boring (actualized).
They have found evidence for
this two-factor solution in Greek
samples using Greek trait terms
(Saucier, Georgiades, Tsaousis, &
Goldberg, 2005).
These two aspects of person-
ality—socialization and actual-
ization—are common themes
in many theories of personality.
In fact, Wiggins (1968, p. 309)
called Extraversion and Anxi-
ety the “Big Two” because they
appear in numerous observa-
tions, theories, tests, and experi-
mental results of personality
psychologists. Although these two
factors were replicated by some
researchers using various meth-
ods (Blackburn, Renwick, Don- Figure 2.4 Physiognomic Representation of the Four
nelly, & Logan, 2004; DeYoung, Temperaments: Melancholic, Choleric, Phlegmatic, and
2006; DeYoung, Peterson, & Hig- Sanguine. Source: Allport, G. W. (1937/1961). Pattern and
growth in personality. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
gins, 2002; Markon, Krueger, &
Watson, 2005), other researchers
question these findings (McCrae et al., 2008; Mutch, 2005).
The two factors alpha and beta are very similar to the dimensions of emotional/nonemotional
and changeable/unchangeable first identified as part of the four temperaments of personality over
two millennia ago. As Eysenck pointed out, the ancients were not so much trying to devise theories
about human personality as they were describing what their “friends, Romans, countrymen” were
like. Time—and research—have proven their hunches remarkably accurate. Now if we could only
see how they decorated their ancient living spaces!

Figure 2.5 Eysenck’s

EMOTIONAL Representation of the Four
C CH
LI ANXIOUS QUICKLY Temperaments in Two
O ROUSED
O

Dimensions. Source: From

H

LE
NC

WORRIED EGOCENTRIC Eysenck (1967, p. 35). Reprinted

RI
LA

UNHAPPY EXHIBITIONIST with permission from Eysenck,

ME

SUSPICIOUS HOT-HEADED H. J. (1967), The Biological Basis

SERIOUS HISTRIONIC of Personality, (Springfield, IL:
THOUGHTFUL ACTIVE Charles C. Thomas). Permission
conveyed through the
UNCHANGEABLE CHANGEABLE
Copyright Clearance Center.
REASONABLE PLAYFUL
HIGH-PRINCIPLED EASY-GOING
CONTROLLED SOCIABLE
PH

PERSISTENT CAREFREE
LE

E
IN

STEADFAST HOPEFUL
GM

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AT

IC CALM CONTENTED
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NON-EMOTIONAL
44 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory

The Personality of Everyday Life

What can you tell about someone from his or her living space?
People’s personalities shine through in many aspects of their daily lives, as we saw in
the research study that opened this chapter (Gosling et al., 2002). Now that you know
about the various traits that are used to describe personality, you can use this knowledge
to understand what people are like based on the physical cues of their surroundings or
“native habitat.”
First, you must decide if the item or decoration was put there on purpose or if it was
just behavioral residue from everyday living. Of course, the person’s carelessness tells you
something about his or her personality as well!
If an item was put there on purpose, consider the following questions: Is the item
expressive of the individual’s true personality or was it put there to convey a particular
image? One way of telling this is to see if the item is in public view (e.g., a photo on a
desk facing outward) or in a place that only the occupant can see (e.g., a photo on a desk
facing inward). If it was put there to convey an image, what impression does the owner
wish to convey?
If an item is a true expression of the owner’s personality, what does it tell us? Recall
that people who are high in Conscientiousness tend to have rooms that are more orga-
nized, neat, and uncluttered. People who are high in Openness tend to have more decora-
tions in their living space and a greater variety of magazines and books.
As for Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Agreeableness, there are no specific cues you
can look for, but perhaps you may be able to take a guess. Recall that for these traits observ-
ers were pretty good at guessing the occupants’ personality, even though there was little
agreement on the specific cues they used to make their judgments.
By applying these findings from the Gosling et al. (2002) study you can be your own
Sherlock Holmes!

Chapter Summary
Study and Review In this chapter we defined traits as a person’s typical style of thinking, feeling, and acting. Traits
on mysearchlab.com can be organized into a hierarchy, moving up from specific responses to habitual responses
to traits to a psychological type. Psychologists have studied traits through the idiographic
Go online for more approach, describing a single individual with all of his or her idiosyncrasies, or through the
resources to help you nomothetic approach, describing any personality using a set number of key traits.
review. Within the idiographic approach, individuals may have central and secondary traits or,
rarely, a cardinal trait. Allport’s analysis of Jenny illustrates the idiographic approach.
Within the nomothetic approach, psychologists might start with a theory to which traits
are most useful for describing personality or conduct an analysis of the lexicon to see which
descriptions of personality have been coded into language, by statistical and mathematical
techniques, or by a combination of any of these approaches. Factor analysis, where numerous
traits are reduced to a few meaningful factors, is often used to identify the underlying structure
among a set of traits.
Psychologists have debated the right number of factors claiming that 1 to 7 or 16 factors
best account for personality. For example, Eysenck identified the three factors of Psychoticism,
Extraversion, and Neuroticism. Others have claimed that a single general personality factor
explains all of personality, whereas still others identify just two factors of socialization (alpha)
and actualization (beta). Today there is tremendous consensus that the five factors of Neuroti-
cism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness best account for human
personality. Some overlap occurs between the theories of Eysenck and the five factors, which,
 Chapter 2 Personality Traits: A Good Theory 45

amazingly enough, is similar to ancient conceptualizations of the four temperaments (air, earth,
fire, and water).
We opened this chapter with a study that found that observers are able to guess the
personality of individuals by observing their living spaces. We saw that people express their
personalities by the way they decorate their residence hall rooms, apartment bedrooms, and
even offices. In the next chapter, we will consider other ways people express their personali-
ties including music preferences, web pages, and careers and to what extent people change or
remain the same—or at least consistent in their personalities—across the life span.

Review Questions
1. What is a trait? Explain how traits are organized into a hierarchy.
2. What is the idiographic approach to the study of traits? Describe Allport’s case of “Jenny.”
How is this an example of the idiographic approach?
3. What is the nomothetic approach? What are the three main ways of identifying the most
meaningful and applicable words for describing human personality? What is factor analysis
and how is it used in the nomothetic approach?
4. What three factors best account for human personality, according to Eysenck?
5. What are the five factors? What facets make up each factor? What are some important
correlates of people high and low in each of the five factors?
6. Is human personality reducible to one factor? Two factors? Six or seven factors? Explain.
7. How is today’s view of personality similar to the view of the ancients?
8. What can you tell about a person from their living space?

Key Terms
Behavioral residue Factor analysis Openness
Trait Eigenvalue Agreeableness
Idiographic approach Factor loadings Conscientiousness
Nomothetic approach Big Five General Personality
Central traits Five-factor model Factor (GPF)
Secondary traits Narrow traits HEXACO model
Cardinal traits Psychoticism Alpha
Theoretical approach Extraversion Beta
Lexical approach Neuroticism
Measurement approach Facets
This page intentionally left blank
CHAPTER
3 PERSONALITY TRAITS:
PRACTICAL MATTERS
WHAT’S MISSING FROM THE Five Factors?
Is Intelligence a Personality Trait?
Is Religiosity a Personality Trait?
Is Sexuality a Personality Trait?
Indigenous Personality: Unique Personality Traits?
THE FIVE FACTORS IN OTHER CULTURES
Personality Traits Cross-Culturally: Personality Traits in China
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: TRIANGULATION AND TYPES OF DATA
EXPRESSION OF TRAITS IN EVERYDAY LIFE
Personality Traits of Presidents
Music Preferences and Personality Traits
Web Pages and Personality Traits
Careers and Personality Traits
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: WHAT DOES YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE SAY ABOUT YOUR
PERSONALITY?

PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT OVER THE LIFE SPAN: CONTINUITY, CHANGE, AND COHERENCE
How Consistent Are People Over Time?
How Much Do People Change in General?
How and Why Do Individuals Develop in Their Own Particular Ways?
Read the Chapter on Where Does Adult Personality Come From?
mysearchlab.com THEN AND NOW: THE GRANT STUDY OF HARVARD GRADUATES
PERSONALITY TRAITS: THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL CONCLUSIONS
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

47
48 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

C
“To all such questions about an you judge someone’s personality from his or her handshake? If we express our
the nature of human nature, personalities in our decorating tastes, can something as simple as a handshake also
trait psychology offers a express who we are? Amazingly enough, the answer to these questions is yes—at least
when it comes to the five factors of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and
single yet powerful answer:
Conscientiousness.
It varies.”
In one study, participants came to the laboratory for a study on “personality question-
McCrae and Costa (1996, p. 57)
naires” where they were greeted by four experimenters, one at a time (Chaplin, Phillips,
Brown, Clanton, & Stein, 2000). Each experimenter shook hands with the participant on
arrival and departure, twice in all, for each participant. These experimenters, two men
and two women, were trained extensively to rate handshakes on various scales including
strength, grip, dryness, temperature, vigor, duration, eye contact, and texture (training took
about a month for the experimenters to standardize and validate their judgments). Partici-
SEE FOR YOURSELF pants took a version of the Big Five Inventory which measured their personalities on the
five factors.
Next time you meet new
people, see if you can Because a number of the handshake qualities were related to one another, the experiment-
predict elements of their ers created a Firm Handshake Composite from ratings of duration, eye contact, completeness
personality from their of grip, strength, and vigor. They discovered that men had firmer handshakes than women and
handshakes. that personality for three of the five factors was significantly correlated with this Firm Hand-
shake Composite (Chaplin et al., 2000).
Neurotic participants tended to have a weak handshake, whereas those who were more
emotionally stable had a firmer handshake. In addition, extraverts had a firmer handshake
than introverts. Interestingly, there was a correlation between handshake and Openness for
women only, such that women who had a firmer handshake were more open to experience
than women with a softer handshake. Have you ever heard the advice “You never have a
second chance to make a first impression”? Well, the authors noted that you might want to
take the results of this study to heart, especially if you are nervous and shy on a job interview,
graduate school interview, or when meeting business contacts (advice your mother might
agree with!).
Our personality is expressed in many aspects of our lives, from our way of interacting
with others to the kinds of music we enjoy to the kinds of careers we choose. Indeed, not
only do we carry our personality around with us in various situations, but we are who we
SEE FOR YOURSELF are across our lifetimes as well. In this chapter we consider whether there are traits left out
of the five factors and if this model adequately explains the personality of non-Westerners.
What kind of person are Then we take a look at how we express our personalities in various areas of our lives. Finally,
you? What traits from the
we consider how personality develops—both stays consistent and changes—over time and
five-factor model would you
use to describe yourself? how we maintain a coherent personality over our life spans: all very practical matters for the
topic of traits.

What can you tell about the

personality of a job candidate
from his or her handshake?
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 49

“To say that the five

What’s Missing From the Five Factors? factors are unlikely to be
Take a moment to describe yourself. Do you use standard traits such as sociable, outgoing, fun- comprehensive in no way
loving, and sarcastic? But do you also have responses such as “exhausted,” “good time manager,” denies their profound
“athletic,” “handy,” and “beautiful”? Where do these fall on the five factors? significance.”
Some critics have claimed that the five factors are complete and can account for even these
Buss (1996, p. 204)
unusual traits (Saucier & Goldberg, 1998). Others—reanalyzing the same data—take a more
liberal view and identify additional factors (Paunonen & Jackson, 2000) illustrating how choos-
ing the right number of factors is more art than science, as we saw in Chapter 2. What is out
there beyond the five factors? If we eliminate adjectives that describe physical characteristics
(short, beautiful, heavy), demographics (employed, unemployed), unusual behaviors (evil, cruel)
and other adjectives not typically used to refer to personality, we have 10 possible candidates THINK ABOUT IT
(see Table 3.1). Paunonen (2002) even created the Supernumerary Personality Inventory to When do behaviors become
measure these factors! Just for the record, these clusters also fall outside the six-factor HEXACO personality traits?
model (Lee, Ogunfowora, & Ashton, 2005), discussed in Chapter 2.
Are these parts of personality? Are these traits? Or, are they attitudes, values, or social
behaviors? We consider a few of these questions in turn as we take a closer look at three possible
traits: intelligence, religiosity, and sexuality.

Is Intelligence a Personality Trait?

Generally, cognitive abilities are not considered personality traits. However, an early personality
psychologist, Raymond Cattell, identified ability traits such as memory, mathematical ability,
and intelligence (Cattell, 1946). So, is intelligence considered a personality trait today?
Maybe not. First, recall that early studies of the Big Five defined Openness as consisting of
sophistication, artistic and intellectual interests, and intelligence (Norman, 1963). Psychologists
in the lexical tradition thought of this factor as Culture rather than Openness to experience, as
we do today. However, other studies find that adjectives such as intelligent, knowledgeable, and
cultured load on a Conscientiousness factor (McCrae & Costa, 1985).
Second, when people rate themselves or a close friend on “intelligence” they are gener-
ally thinking of intelligent, rational and logical, clear-minded, mature, and similar adjectives
(Borgatta, 1964). These are personality descriptors that are clearly different from cognitive
ability or IQ, which is what we generally think of when we think of intelligence. We seem to
think of productive, motivated, hardworking, and well-organized people as having academic
intelligence, even though they do not score as such on IQ tests (Sternberg, Conway, Ketron, &
Bernstein, 1981). Indeed, when participants rate themselves on intelligence adjectives such as
hardworking, smart, and knowledgeable, these end up loading on a Conscientiousness factor and
are not related to measured intelligence (McCrae & Costa, 1985).
Third, there is evidence that there are individual differences in how people perceive and
process information about the social world. Some psychologists call this emotional intelligence
(Goleman, 1995; Salovey & Mayer, 1994).

Table 3.1 Adjectival Clusters Beyond the Five Factors

1. Religious, devout, reverent
2. Sly, deceptive, manipulative
3. Honest, ethical, moral
4. Sexy, sensual, erotic
5. Thrifty, frugal, miserly
6. Conservative, traditional, down-to-earth
7. Masculine-feminine
8. Egotistical, conceited, snobbish
9. Humorous, witty, amusing
10. Risk taking, thrill seeking
Source: Reprinted with permission from Paunonen, S. V., & Jackson, D. N. (2000),“What
is beyond the big five? Plenty!,” Journal of Personality, 68(5), 821–835. Permission con-
veyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
50 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

Finally, the whole topic of intelligence as an ability in the form of IQ has a long and contro-
versial history in psychology. But because IQ is quite a different concept than traits, this topic
is best covered in other psychology classes.

Is Religiosity a Personality Trait?

Think about the following adjectives: spiritual, prayerful, mystical, worshipful, devout, pious,
orthodox, godly, born-again, heretical, irreverent, and agnostic (Saucier & Goldberg, 1998,
p. 514). Do you think these form an important dimension of personality beyond the five
factors?
Despite the importance of religion in many people’s lives, religion has not occupied a
SEE FOR YOURSELF
central role in psychology, and certainly not in the study of personality (Emmons, Barrett, &
Is spirituality a core part of Schnitker, 2008). A chapter on the psychology of religion made its debut in only the third edi-
your personality? In what tion of the Handbook of Personality in 2008 (Emmons et al., 2008). For many people—up to
ways do you express this? 75% in some polls—spirituality is more than a belief, an attitude, a demographic, a tradition,
or a habit: It is a core part of who they are (Emmons et al., 2008).
Whether religiosity is an important dimension of personality beyond the five factors is a
source of some debate (cf. Paunonen & Jackson, 2000; Saucier & Goldberg, 1998). For example,
Saucier and Goldberg (1998) suggested that religiosity, like many dimensions beyond the five
factors, is more appropriately considered a secondary trait, applicable for certain purposes, but
not a core aspect of personality. Researchers consistently find correlations between religiosity
and Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and sometimes Openness and Extraversion depending
on the aspect of religiosity under study (Emmons et al., 2008). But can religiosity account for
personality beyond the five factors?
Consider the concept of spiritual transcendence, the ability of individuals to “stand
outside of their immediate sense of time and place to view life from a larger, more objec-
tive perspective” (Piedmont, 1999, p. 988). According to Piedmont, spiritual transcendence
includes a personal search for a greater connection rather than a spiritual encounter with a
higher being. The concept of spirituality goes beyond any particular religious tradition, and
in fact, Piedmont and his colleagues designed the Spiritual Transcendence Scale (STS) after
first meeting with experts from various faiths including Buddhism, Hinduism, Quakerism,
Lutheranism, Catholicism, and Judaism (Piedmont, 1999; Piedmont & Leach, 2002). The scale
has three facets: Prayer Fulfillment, feelings of joy and contentedness from connection with
the transcendent; Universality, seeing humanity as a single interrelated whole such that harm-
ing one harms all; and Connectedness, feeling belongingness to and social responsibility and
gratitude for, others across generations and across social groups (You can see how you score
in spiritual transcendence by taking the short form of the scale in Table 3.2 and finding your
score in Table 3.3).
In two different validation samples, Piedmont and colleagues discovered that scores on
each of the three transcendence scales were only slightly related to scores on the five factors
as measured by both adjectival scales and by scores on the NEO-PI-R. Further, factor analysis
yielded six independent factors: five for each of the five factors and one for spiritual transcen-
dence. Together, this suggests that spiritual transcendence is a dimension of personality separate
from the five factors of personality (Piedmont, 1999; see also MacDonald, 2000, who came to
the same conclusion using his own measure, the Expressions of Spirituality Inventory).
Further, scores on the STS predicted scores on measures of life outcomes beyond the five
factors and, in some cases, the effect of spirituality was stronger than the effect of personal-
ity! Specifically, spiritual transcendence and personality together predicted scores on locus
of control beliefs for health issues, vulnerability to stress, responsiveness to others, perceived
social support, prosocial behavior, positive sexual attitudes, and prochoice and prolife attitudes
toward abortion (Piedmont, 1999).
This evidence suggests that, indeed, we may think of spirituality as an important part of
personality. Whether spirituality, gratitude, ultimate concerns, or some additional aspect of
religiosity is best thought of as a trait, dimension, or as some other important part of human
personality is still to be determined by researchers (Emmons et al., 2008).
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 51

Table 3.2 The Spiritual Transcendence Scale Short Form (STS-R)

Agree or disagree with each of the nine questions below using the following scale:
Strongly Agree = SA
Agree = A
Neutral = N
Disagree = D
Strongly Disagree = SD

1. In the quiet of my prayers and/or meditations, I find a sense of wholeness. SA A N D SD

2. I have done things in my life because I believed it would please a parent, relative, or friend that had died. SA A N D SD
3. Although dead, memories and thoughts of some of my relatives continue to influence my current life. SA A N D SD
4. I find inner strength and/or peace from my prayers and/or meditations. SA A N D SD
5. I do not have any strong emotional ties to someone who has died. SA A N D SD
6. There is no higher plane of consciousness or spirituality that binds all people. SA A N D SD
7. Although individual people may be difficult, I feel an emotional bond with all of humanity. SA A N D SD
8. My prayers and/or meditations provide me with a sense of emotional support. SA A N D SD
9. I feel that on a higher level all of us share a common bond. SA A N D SD

To score, points are assigned to your responses to each item. For items 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, and 9 assign 5 points for each Strongly Agree
response, 4 points for each Agree, 3 points for each Neutral, 2 points for each Disagree, and 1 point for each Strongly Disagree.
For items 5 and 6, the opposite applies; give 1 point for each Strongly Agree, 2 points for Agree, 3 points for Neutral, 4 points for
Disagree, and 5 points for Strongly Disagree. Add your scores for all nine items together. See Table 3.3 for how you compare to
others who have taken the test.

Source: STS-R short form copyright © 1999, 2005 by Ralph L. Piedmont, Ph.D. No further copying, distribution, or usage is allowed without the explicit permission of Dr. Piedmont.

Is Sexuality a Personality Trait?

Do you know somebody who is “charming,” “flirtatious,” or “coy”? Can you account for these
aspects of his or her personality within the five factors? There’s a good reason for that: Words
that described aspects of sexuality or that were more applicable to one gender or the other
were purposely excluded from early lexical studies (Buss, 1996). This, according to evolution-
ary psychologist David Buss, “resulted in the near total omission of the individual differences
in sexuality” (p. 203).

Table 3.3 Average Scores on the Spiritual Transcendence Scale by Gender and Age
Prayer Fulfillment Universality Connectedness
Gender Age Total STS (Items 1, 4, 8) (Items 6, 7, 9) (Items 2, 3, 5)
Women Up to age 21 29–35 9–12 9–12 10–12
Ages 21–30 32–38 11–13 11–13 10–13
Ages 30 and up 35–39 11–14 11–13 10–12
Men Up to age 21 27–33 8–11 9–11 9–12
Ages 21–30 23–29 7–11 6–10 8–11
Ages 30 and up 34–38 13–15 11–13 10–12
This table presents the average range of scores by gender and age group. If your total score falls in this range, then you have an interest in understanding broader, transcendent
issues, but also have concerns for immediate needs. You balance both perspectives. If your score is higher than these values, then you have a strong spiritual transcendent
orientation. You are concerned with living a life that is in accord with values and meanings that originate with some larger understanding of the purpose of the universe. You
tend to see life in terms of “both and” rather than “either or.” Individuals whose score is lower than the tabled values are more focused on the tangible realities of daily living.
There may be more of a self-oriented focus to life, where personal concerns and issues are of greater concern.
Source: STS-R short form copyright © 1999, 2005 by Ralph L. Piedmont, Ph.D. No further copying, distribution, or usage is allowed without the explicit permission of Dr. Piedmont.
52 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

To rectify this problem, Buss and his colleagues identified all adjectives referring to sexual-
ity from standard dictionary and similar lexical sources (Schmitt & Buss, 2000). Undergradu-
ate students rated themselves on each of these 67 words along with an adjectival measure of
the Big Five. When Schmitt and Buss factor-analyzed these responses they found 7 sexuality
THINK ABOUT IT factors, referred to as the Sexy Seven: Sexual Attractiveness (e.g., sexy, stunning, attractive),
Can a person have a person- Relationship Exclusivity (e.g., faithful, monogamous, not promiscuous), Gender Orientation
ality trait that is expressed in (e.g., feminine, womanly, manly, masculine), Sexual Restraint (e.g., virginal, celibate, chaste),
only a few situations? Erotophilic Disposition (e.g., obscene, vulgar, lewd), Emotional Investment (e.g., loving,
romantic, compassionate), and Sexual Orientation.
Are these Sexy Seven factors personality traits beyond the Big Five? In an extensive series
of tests, Schmitt and Buss discovered that the sexuality factors overlap almost 80% with the
five factors, suggesting that they are not really separate factors. For example, when both the Big
Five and sexuality adjectives were factor-analyzed together, the result was five factors. Each of
these factors included a combination of both types of adjectives: Agreeableness and Emotional
Investment; Extraversion, Sexual Attractiveness, Erotophilic Disposition, Sexual Restraint; Open-
ness and Sexual Orientation; Neuroticism and Gender Orientation; and Conscientiousness and
Relationship Exclusivity. Because sexuality can be accounted for by a combination of factors and
facets of the five factors sexuality is not a separate personality trait. Rather, sexuality is—along
with musical tastes, room decorating, and handshaking—another way in which we express our
traits of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness (Schmitt
& Buss, 2000).

Indigenous Personality: Unique Personality Traits?

Although some have claimed that five factors misses important aspects of personality in
American culture, the picture is even more complicated when trying to apply the model to
other cultures. Because the five-factor taxonomy relies on measures that were validated in
mostly American samples, even if they adequately explain personality in another culture,
THINK ABOUT IT it is possible that we may have missed personality traits that are unique to that culture. For
example, consider a person who is polite, generous, responsible, respectful, and has a strong
In American culture, are phi-
lotimo and filial piety traits
sense of honor. We can readily understand what this means, but can you think of a single
or behaviors? word to describe these qualities? If you were Greek, you would immediately recognize this
as philotimo.
How about the qualities of caring for the mental and physical well-being of one’s elderly
parents, continuing the family line, and bringing honor to one’s family and ancestors? For
the Chinese, filial piety is a very desirable personality trait and is much more than obeying
and honoring one’s parents. Disappointing a family member is like letting down all of your
ancestors—and your future progeny (Ho, 1996; Zhang & Bond, 1998). According to cultural
tradition, this trait must be internalized by young people. Filial piety is not captured by the five-
factor model alone; indigenous personality traits are necessary to fully explain this construct in
Chinese college students (Zhang & Bond, 1998).
Can you think of a person on whom others depend? This person may even have a strong
social obligation to take care of others. Whereas this sounds a lot like the relationship between
parents and their children to our Western sensibilities, this characteristic of amae would seem
very natural among Japanese adults. Amae characterizes relationships between people of lower
and higher status, such as bosses and workers, in addition to the relationship between parents
and children (Doi, 1973).
Although these concepts are readily understandable by an outsider, they are examples of
indigenous culture-specific traits (cf. Goldstein, 2000). There is also the Korean concept of
cheong (human affection; Choi, Kim, & Choi, 1993), the Indian concept of hishkama karma
(detachment; Sinha, 1993), the Mexican concept of simpatia (avoidance of conflict; Triandis,
Marin, Lisansky, & Betancourt, 1984), and the Filipino concept of pakikisama (going along
with others; Enriquez, 1994), among others (Church & Ortiz, 2005). For the most part, these
indigenous personality traits lie beyond the five factors.
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 53

“All people must be

The Five Factors in Other Cultures responsive to danger, loss,
How do we go about applying the five-factor taxonomy to other cultures? Do we take the and threat; interact with
“transport and test” approach where we translate English measures and see if they apply to others to some degree;
people in other cultures? Or, do we start with the lexicon of a particular culture and try to choose between the risks
identify indigenous personality traits? There are pros and cons to each of these approaches and
of exploration and the
the results depend on which method, as well as the specific measures, experimenters employ.
Together, this line of research gets us closer to both identifying human universals in personality limitations of familiarity;
and understanding the impact of culture on personality. There are five main findings: weigh self against social
interest; balance work and
1. Questionnaire measures of the five-factor model reliably replicate across many cultures
and languages. The question-based NEO-PI-R, when translated and then carefully back-translated play.”
to ensure that the items are comparable, applies very well across many countries and cultures. So McCrae and John (1992, p. 100)
far, the FFM has been tested and validated in over 50 countries including most Western ones as well
as Israel, Argentina, Botswana, Ethiopia, Japan, Malta, Peru, South Korea, and Nigeria (McCrae,
2001, 2002; McCrae & Costa, 1997b; McCrae, Terracciano, & 78 Members of the Personality Pro-
files of Cultures Project, 2005a; McCrae, Terracciano, & 79 Members of the Personality Profiles
of Cultures Project, 2005b). In all of these countries, self-ratings and peer ratings converge just as
they do in the United States. In addition, five-factor scores correlate impressively with meaningful
external criteria on life outcomes such as life satisfaction and getting along with others (Benet-
Martínez & Oishi, 2008). In sum, there is “considerable evidence that the FFM dimensions are in
fact universally applicable” (McCrae et al., 2005b, p. 408).
2. Adjectival measures of the Big Five reveal variations of Neuroticism, Extraversion,
Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness but not Openness in many different cultures. The
closer a culture is to a Northern European culture, the closer the results are to the Anglo-based
Big Five (Saucier & Goldberg, 2001). This held true for 12 languages including German, Polish,
Czech, Turkish, Dutch, Italian, Hungarian, Korean, Hebrew, Filipino, Spanish, and Catalonian
(Saucier & Goldberg, 2001).
3. Openness varies across cultures. Why is this the case? Recall that for the lexical Big
Five model Openness is defined as intellect and imagination, but for the five-factor model THINK ABOUT IT
using sentences (as in the NEO-PI-R) this factor is Openness to Experience. Lexical models
Does speaking in another
find Openness (Norman’s V factor) to be language and culture specific. For example, according
language bring out different
to Saucier and Goldberg (2001) there were slight variations in which adjectives loaded on the aspects of personality? Sur-
Openness factor in German (intelligence, competence, talents), Turkish (intellect and unconven- prisingly, research suggests
tionality), Hebrew (sophisticated, sharp, knowledgeable), Filipino (intellect, competence, talent), that it can!
and Dutch (intellectual autonomy vs. conventionality).
Because the Openness factor does not consistently appear in other languages it may be that
this factor, though it exists cross-culturally, is defined differently in ways unique to a specific
culture (Bond, 1994). Indeed, Benet-Martínez and Oishi (2008) suggested that Openness might
be unique to Anglo-Saxon cultures. Aspects of Openness, particularly the facets of it such as
imagination, emotionality, psychological liberalism, and adventurousness, may tap into Western
culture’s emphasis on intellectual freedom, emotional expressiveness, and individual uniqueness.
However, consider the item “Sometimes when I am reading poetry or looking at a work
of art, I feel a chill or wave of excitement.” This is one of the strongest predictors of scores
on Openness of the NEO-PI-R in over 40 languages in 51 cultures, not just in Western cul-
tures but also in Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan, Lebanon, and Malaysia (McCrae, 2007). McCrae
(2007) explains that this item performs less well as a marker of Openness in African cultures in
Botswana, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Nigeria, possibly due to measurement problems
(e.g., acquiescence, and the fact that the NEO-PI-R was not given in their native language). That
this one item seems to embody a more visceral or physiological response leads us to suspect
that it may transcend culture and instead capture a human universal. Perhaps the feeling of
chills when one is moved is universal, whereas what is likely to give us chills varies by culture.
4. In some cultures more than five factors are needed to fully describe personality. In
cultures where this happens such as Hungarian and Korean (Saucier & Goldberg, 2001), these
54 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

additional factors tap culture-specific forms of Extraversion or Agreeableness, or aspects of

social evaluation (power, morality, attractiveness) that are particularly salient in that culture
(Benet-Martínez & Oishi, 2008). Because interpersonal relations are so important, natural lan-
guages have developed many terms for getting along with others. No wonder that these traits
may fall out on two factors in other languages, but on only one in English (McCrae & Costa,
2008)! In this way Agreeableness and Conscientiousness may tap both universal and culture-
specific aspects of personality (Benet-Martínez & Oishi, 2008).
5. We need more research on indigenous personality to truly see which aspects of per-
sonality are universal and which are unique to a culture. Although McCrae and Costa (2008)
claimed that indigenous traits, traits originating in another language and which are unique
to a culture, are “interpretable as characteristic adaptations within the Five Factor Theory”
(p. 169), others counter that both questionnaire measures and adjectival measures may miss
indigenous terms (Benet-Martínez & Oishi, 2008). To remedy this problem, some researchers
start with the lexicon of a specific culture and, like Allport and Odbert (1936) did with English,
see how many factors best account for personality in these cultures. This kind of research is
rare, but it has identified both convergence with the five factors and some culturally unique
factors (Benet-Martínez & Oishi, 2008; Cheung & Leung, 1998).
To understand some of these issues—as well as all of these findings on personality traits in
other cultures—let’s consider some of this research in depth in the next section.

Personality Traits Cross-Culturally: Personality Traits in China

To understand how complicated it can be to test the five factors in other countries, consider
current research in a country very different from America: China. China has a collectivistic
culture, stemming from roots in Confucianism which emphasizes the fundamental related-
ness among individuals (Ho, 1998). When the five-factor model is tested using the NEO-PI-R,
the results replicate the FFM for 29 out of the 30 facets (McCrae, Costa, & Yik, 1996). Indeed,
Chinese college students scored virtually identical to their American counterparts on this
translated version of the NEO-PI-R (McCrae et al., 1996). However, the facet of Actions, part
of Openness, did not load on any of the factors. This may indicate problems with the scale,
a genuine difference among the Chinese on this dimension, or simply measurement error
(McCrae et al., 1996).
Some have wondered if the basic replication of the five-factor model is due to the structure
of the questionnaire, the ubiquitous influence of Western culture in the world, or some other
explanation (McCrae et al., 1996). A more convincing case for the universality of the five fac-
tors would be to start with traditional Chinese values—that is, traits important within Chinese
culture—and see how these attributes apply to Chinese personality (McCrae et al., 1996).

Chinese culture emphasizes

avoidance of conflict, support
of traditions and norms, and
a family orientation. How well
will the five factors describe
Chinese personality?
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 55

Cheung et al. (1996) developed the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI)
by using a sort of lexical approach by identifying descriptions of Chinese personality from
literature, proverbs, surveys, and previous research. This led to the identification of 10 trait
clusters unique to the Chinese personality and not covered by Western personality inven-
tories: Harmony (tolerance, contentment), Ren Qing (traditional relationship orientation
emphasizing give and take and connectedness), Modernization (vs. traditionalism), Thrift
(vs. extravagance), Ah-Q mentality (defensiveness; named for Ah-Q, a well-known fictional
Chinese character depicted in a classic novel), Graciousness (courtesy, kindness, patience,
vs. meanness), Veraciousness-Slickness (trustworthiness), Face (reputation, social approval),
Family Orientation, and Somatization (expression of distress via physical symptoms). When
factor-analyzed, four factors emerged: Dependability (responsibility, practical-mindedness,
graciousness), Chinese Tradition (Harmony, Ren Qing, Face), Social Potency (leadership,
adventurousness), and Individualism (self-orientation, logical, Ah-Q mentality). These are
not quite the five factors we might expect!
However, perhaps focusing solely on traditional Chinese values is too narrow a conceptu-
alization of Chinese personality. What would happen if we factor-analyzed them all together?
After all, if Chinese personality is composed of both culturally unique and human universal
aspects this would be the way to find them.
Cheung et al. (2001) conducted a follow-up study in which they factor-analyzed responses
THINK ABOUT IT
to the CPAI and the Chinese NEO-PI-R together. They found six factors: five from the five-factor
model, as one might expect, plus an indigenous personality factor they called Interpersonal Might we see evidence
Relatedness made up of Harmony, Ren Qing, Ah-Q, and Face. This factor taps the indigenous of this sixth factor in the
depiction of people in Chi-
factors identified in the earlier study, traits that are uniquely encouraged in Chinese culture and
nese art, literature, TV shows,
not in Anglo-Saxon cultures: instrumentality of relationships, propriety, avoidance of conflict, plays, and movies?
support of traditions, and compliance with norms (Benet-Martínez & Oishi, 2008).
This six-factor model not only explained the variance among the responses of college
students, but it also applied equally well to a sample of nonstudent workers. However, the
six-factor model did not apply as well as the traditional five-factor model did to non-Chinese
undergraduate students. Here, items from the sixth indigenous factor loaded among the regular
five factors. This study supports the existence of a uniquely Chinese personality factor beyond
the Western five factors (Cheung et al., 2001).
Perhaps you’ve noticed that much of the research just reviewed on personality traits,
including personality traits in other cultures, is all based on self-report. How can we be sure
that we are capturing what people are really like and not what people claim to be like? This is
one of many problems with self-report data, but alas, self-report is often the most direct way
to find out what a person is like. However, personality psychologists have developed a way to
compensate for the weaknesses of any single research method, a topic we take up in the section
on Research Methods Illustrated.

Research Methods Illustrated: Triangulation and Types of Data

I
n ancient times, people would use triangles to measure distance or the height of objects such
as the pyramids. Imagine a triangle connecting three points: two on one side of a river and one
on the other side. By measuring the angles and applying geometry, they could figure out how
far away or high up an object was. This image applies to research in personality: By using different
methods we can better understand what a person is like than by using only one method. This
process of using multiple methods within a single program of research is called triangulation
(Brewer, 2000; Campbell & Fiske, 1959). Each method compensates for the weaknesses of the others.
There are four kinds of data that a personality psychologist might collect. The most obvious is
to administer personality tests or other self-report questionnaires, called self-report data or S data.
S data include objective personality tests, interviews, narratives, life stories, and survey research
(John & Soto, 2007). Even experience sampling procedures, where participants are “beeped” via
pagers or cell phones to fill out a questionnaire, are examples of S data. In one study, participants
were beeped every 2 hours, on average, to fill out a self-esteem questionnaire and mood measures.
Participants who had generally high self-esteem but which fluctuated over the day were angrier
and more hostile than participants with stable self-esteem (Kernis, Grannemann, & Barclay, 1989).
56 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

We could also place a person in controlled situations that test them to see how they respond.
Test data or T data include information from testing situations (not to be confused with objective
or self-report personality tests, which are examples of S data). T data come from experimental
procedures or standardized measures that have objective rules for scoring a person’s performance.
Examples of T data include intelligence tests, task persistence, and reaction times (John & Soto,
2007). The Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald & Farnham, 2000), a computerized reaction-
time test, for example, has been used to measure self-esteem. Some projective tests, such as
the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT; Morgan & Murray, 1935) or the Rorschach Inkblot Test
(Rorschach, 1921), which use standardized stimuli and have explicit scoring guidelines, are also
examples of T data.
Instead of relying on only self-reports, we might collect observation data or O data by watching
people in the laboratory or in their daily lives. One can also collect O data by coding behavior from
photos or video. Information from knowledgeable informants including friends, spouses, parents,
children, teachers, interviewers, and the like are also examples of O data (John & Soto, 2007). Indeed,
this is exactly what Costa and McCrae (1992) and others have done to measure the five factors.
Another study found that the facial expression of women in their college yearbook photos predicted
their marital satisfaction and personal well-being 30 years later (Harker & Keltner, 2001). Observing
people’s actual behavior, even when it is captured in a photo or a video, gets around the problem of
potential bias or memory problems in self-reports (Dunning, Heath, & Suls, 2004).
Finally, we could track down information about a person that is publicly available. Life data or
L data include graduating from college, getting married, getting divorced, moving, in addition to a
person’s socioeconomic status, memberships in clubs and organizations, number of car accidents,
Internet activity, and similar life events (John & Soto, 2007). Researchers have used sources as varied
as criminal records to measure antisocial behavior (Caspi, McClay, et al., 2005), counting bottles and
cans in garbage containers to measure alcohol consumption (Webb, Campbell, Schwartz, Sechrest,
& Grove, 1981), and counting the number of Facebook friends to measure social connectedness
(Ellison, Steinfield, & Lampe, 2007).
Together, these four methods of data collection spell out LOTS, which should remind us to
include lots of sources of data in our studies to maximize the validity of our research (John & Soto,
2007). During World War II, the Office of Strategic Services (a forerunner of the CIA) set up a program
to select the best candidates for espionage jobs behind enemy lines (Strategic Services, 1948). It
collected S data, O data, and T data on the candidates.
Men and women were brought to a special assessment center where they filled out personality
questionnaires (S data) and were interviewed (S data) and observed by psychologists who wrote
a paragraph describing each candidate’s personality (O data). To ensure that the assessment staff
would judge the candidates solely on their performance, they had no idea about the background of
the candidates (a notable absence of L data).
They even put the candidates through special tests (T data) to see if they could tolerate stress
and frustration such as getting their whole group over a large wall, building a wooden structure
with recalcitrant workers (who were actually confederates of the assessment staff ), staging a mock
interrogation, and performing other tasks to see if the candidates could stand up to the emotional

The stress situation: An

example of T data. Participants
were given 12 minutes to
develop a plausible cover
story for an imagined crime.
They were interviewed by a
panel of interrogators who
fired questions at them and
jumped on any hesitations or
inconsistencies in their stories,
all while being observed and
evaluated by psychologists.
(Strategic Services, 1948,
facing p. 212).
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 57

stress and the intellectual demands of keeping up a false identity while collecting information
behind enemy lines.
Using all these kinds of data the assessment team rated each candidate on intelligence,
physical ability, motivation, skill, and aspects of personality including emotional stability,
leadership, and social relations (a combination of Extraversion and Agreeableness). They hoped
to be able to track the actual performance of candidates to see which measures best predicted
performance.
Despite the best efforts of the assessment staff—which included many notable
psychologists such as Urie Bronfenbrenner, Donald Fiske, Clyde Kluckhohn, Henry Murray,
Theodore Newcomb, Edward Tolman, and Kurt Lewin—the government was unwilling to reveal
how a particular candidate fared in his or her eventual position due to security issues. The best
the assessment team could do was to select promising candidates and to eliminate obviously
unsuitable ones.
Although the Assessment Center failed in its original mission to develop a valid selection
procedure for selecting spies, it stands today as a fascinating example of how triangulation—the
use of multiple methods—can yield a more complete picture of a person.

Expression of Traits in Everyday Life

Our personality traits reveal themselves in lots of ways: body language, taste in decorating and
in music, our online presence on the Internet, and also in the careers we choose—even if we
happen to be the president of the United States! We can see the influence of traits in numerous
ways in our everyday lives.

Personality Traits of Presidents

Do you have what it takes to be a great president? What does it take to be a great president?
There is a long tradition in personality psychology of studying presidents, along with other
famous people, both fictional and real, ever since Sigmund Freud psychoanalyzed the writings
and speeches of Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States (Freud, 1967) and
Leonardo Da Vinci (Freud, 1910/1964).
Using the five-factor model, Rubenzer et al. (2000) identified the traits of great presidents.
To do this, they enlisted the help of presidential experts: biographers and people who had inter-
acted either professionally or personally with a president. Each expert filled out the NEO-PI-R
(Costa & McCrae, 1992) as they thought their target president would. They were instructed to
imagine what their subject was like in the 5-year period before he became president. In this way
they hoped to get a valid measure of presidents’ personalities not confounded by the demands THINK ABOUT IT
of the job or behavior in office so that each man’s personality could be correlated with his later
Why might low Agreeable-
performance as president. The number of raters per president ranged from 1 to 13 with an ness be a useful trait for a
average of 4.2 raters per president. Where multiple experts rated a single president, their ratings president?
were averaged into a single score.
Compared to the U.S. population at large, presidents tend to be more extraverted, less
open to experience, and less agreeable. They score higher than the general population on the
facets of achievement striving (Conscientiousness), and emotionality (Openness), but lower on
psychological liberalism (Openness), morality (Agreeableness), and modesty (Agreeableness).
In the words of Rubenzer et al. (2000):
[P]residents tends to be hardworking and achievement-minded, willing and
able to speak up for their interests, and value the emotional side of life. They
tend to trust in the traditional sources of moral authority, yet are willing to bend
the truth and to bully or manipulate people to get their own way. They tend to
see themselves as just as good as, and maybe better than, other people (p. 407).
Obviously, there is some truth to the stereotype of politicians as devious and bombastic!
But what about truly great presidents? How do they compare to the general population? Ruben-
zer et al. (2000) gathered data from past studies of greatness. Historians often conduct polls
assessing the ratings and ranking of the achievements of presidents and their overall historical
58 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

greatness. Presidents who are rated as truly great tend to be higher in Openness than the average
person. This is particularly interesting for, as the authors pointed out, Openness is moderately
related to general cognitive ability, suggesting that great presidents are smarter than average.
Great presidents are aware of their feelings and are imaginative and more interested in art and
beauty (artistic interests) than less successful presidents. They also tend to be willing to ques-
tion traditional values (psychological liberalism) and open to new ideas and trying new ways
of doing things (intellect).
As for the other four factors, there were only small correlations between greatness and
personality. Great presidents tend to be slightly more extraverted and conscientious and a little
less agreeable than the average person. They are particularly likely to show assertiveness (a facet
of Extroversion), perhaps as part of their leadership ability. Although showing sympathy for
the less fortunate (Agreeableness), great presidents are no pushovers. They tend to score low
on morality and cooperation (Agreeableness). The portrait emerges of a true politician who
THINK ABOUT IT is not easily led but instead argues, tricks, or even lies when necessary (low in morality). From
the Conscientiousness scale, it is no surprise that great presidents score higher in achievement
Did the myth of Washing-
ton telling the truth about striving and competence. Great presidents set high goals for themselves and the country and are
cutting down the cherry willing to do just about anything to achieve them. Finally, Neuroticism was not related to great-
tree originate as a way of ness, so that historically great presidents can be well adjusted or neurotic. However, presidents
demonstrating his Consci- who felt unable to cope with problems and who were upset by stress (vulnerability) tended to
entiousness trait? be given low ratings by historians.
Who would you consider to be our greatest president? When historians answer this ques-
tion, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln rise to the top of nearly every historical poll
taken (Rubenzer et al., 2000). What makes these two presidents so special? Figures 3.1 and 3.2
show the distribution of scores of these two great presidents. Whereas Washington’s exception-
ally high scores in Conscientiousness indicate that he had the traditional virtues of responsibil-
ity, dutifulness, self-discipline, as well as leadership (i.e., assertiveness, part of Extraversion) and
courage (he scored exceptionally low on vulnerability to stress, part of Neuroticism), he scored
low on friendliness (Extraversion) and sympathy (Agreeableness).
In contrast to Washington, Lincoln was higher in Agreeableness and indeed higher than
the average president. His scores on Openness and Neuroticism are no surprise given that he
suffered from bouts of depression (Rubenzer et al., 2000). He was particularly high in depres-
sion, anxiety, and in his awareness of feelings. Although he was high in achievement striving

Figure 3.1 Scores of

George Washington on the 72
NEO Personality Inventory 70
Washington
Compared to the average Avg. President
president. Source: Reprinted
with permission from Rubenzer,
S. J., Faschingbauer, T. R., & Ones, 60
D. S. (2000), “Assessing the U.S.
U.S. T Score

Presidents Using the Revised

NEO Personality Inventory,”
Assessment, 7(4), 403–420. 50
47
Permission conveyed through
44
the Copyright Clearance Center.
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 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 59

70 Figure 3.2 Scores of Abraham

Lincoin 66 Lincoln on the NEO Personality
Avg. President Inventory compared to the
average president. Source:
60 Reprinted with permission from
59 57 57 57
Rubenzer, S. J., Faschingbauer,
T. R., & Ones, D. S. (2000),
U.S. T Score

“Assessing the U.S. Presidents

50 Using the Revised NEO
Personality Inventory,”
Assessment, 7(4), 403–420.
Permission conveyed through
40 the Copyright Clearance Center.

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and self-efficacy, he tended to be disorganized (all facets of Conscientiousness). Despite his
nickname of “Honest Abe” he was willing to stretch the truth (scoring low on morality) but
was generally trusting of others (Agreeableness).
Many of the findings from this study are corroborated by related studies of personality and
the presidency using different measures and methods (Kowert, 1996; Rubenzer et al., 2000; cf.
Simonton, 1986; Winter, 2005; Young & French, 1996). This discussion about personality and
presidents may have you wondering: What about our current president? Well, what do you
think? What factors and facets do you think our president is notably high or low on? No doubt
the answer to that question is lying in some researcher’s filing cabinet awaiting publication in
a few years!

Music Preferences and Personality Traits

What’s your favorite type of music? Certainly, your choice of music reflects your personal taste,
but is it related to your personality? Do people high in Neuroticism enjoy different kinds of
music from extraverts? Interesting enough, Cattell wondered about this back in the 1950s and THINK ABOUT IT
believed that musical choice reflected unconscious motives (Cattell & Anderson, 1953; Cattell
What can you tell about a
& Saunders, 1954).
person from his or her favor-
More recently, Rentfrow and Gosling explored how the personality traits of the five-factor ite songs?
model relate to musical taste (2003). First, they asked over 1,700 college students to take the
Short Test of Music Preferences (STOMP). In this test, participants rate how much they enjoy
different types of music on a 1 (Not at all) to 7 (A great deal) scale. The researchers then used
factor analysis to identify the major types, or genres, of music (see Table 3.4).
Participants also filled out a series of personality questionnaires including the Big Five
Inventory (BFI; John & Srivastava, 1999). The researchers correlated scores on the STOMP with
scores on the BFI to see if there was a relationship between the kind of music college students
liked and their personality traits.
What did they find? First, there were no gender differences in music preference. Men
and women had similar tastes in music according to the STOMP test. Second, chronic mood,
like being depressed, had no impact on what music the participants liked. Although college
students might choose to listen to various songs depending on mood, overall there was no
relationship between mood and the kind of music participants preferred. Finally, different
personalities did indeed prefer different kinds of music (see Table 3.5).
60 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

Table 3.4 Types of Music and Representative Songs From the Short Test of Music Preferences (STOMP)
Factors Musical Genres Representative Songs
Reflective and Complex Blues Ray Charles: “Ray’s Blues”
Folk Bob Dylan: “Blowin’ in the Wind”
Classical Mozart: “Marriage of Figaro,” Overture
Jazz Miles Davis: “All Blues”
Intense and Rebellious Alternative Nirvana: “Verse Chorus Verse”
Heavy metal Marilyn Manson: “Fight Song”
Rock Jimi Hendrix: “Voodoo Child”
Upbeat and Conventional Country Johnny Cash: “Rusty Cage”
Religious Praise Band: “Rock of Ages”
Pop Christina Aguilera: “Don’t Make Me Love You”

Energetic and Rhythmic Funk James Brown: “Superbad Part 1”

Hip-hop/rap Tupac Shakur (featuring Snoop Doggy Dogg): “2
of Amerikaz Most Wanted”
Soul Aretha Franklin: “Chain of Fools”
Electronica DJ Shadow: “What Does Your Soul Look Like”

Source: Rentfrow and Gosling, 2003, Appendix, p. 1255–1256 Rentfrow, P. J., & Gosling, S. D. (2003). The do re mi’s of everyday life: The structure and personality correlates of
music preferences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(6), 1236–1256.

As you can see, people who were high in Neuroticism did not like classical, jazz, folk, or
blues, what the researchers called Reflective and Complex music. Or, to put it another way,
emotionally stable people enjoyed this kind of music, especially those low in angry hostility and
vulnerability (this later finding comes from a more detailed study of facets and genres by Zwei-
genhaft, 2008). Extraverts were particularly fond of the Energetic and Rhythmic music such
as hip-hop, funk, soul, and electronica, and Upbeat and Conventional music such as country,
religious, and pop, especially if they were high on excitement seeking or positive emotions (see
also Dollinger, 1993; Rawlings & Ciancarelli, 1997; Zweigenhaft, 2008). This result makes sense;
after all, where might you find a highly extroverted person on a Saturday night? Out clubbing
with other extroverts!
What about people who were high in Openness? As you might expect, they liked the more
cerebral classical and jazz music, part of the Reflective and Complex genre. This preference
was related to scores on openness to fantasy, openness to aesthetics, openness to actions, and

Table 3.5 Correlations Between Five-Factor Traits and Types of Music

Reflective Intense Upbeat Energetic
Trait and Complex and Rebellious and Conventional and Rhythmic
Neuroticism - .08* .01 .07 -.01
Extraversion .01 .00 .24* .22*
Openness .44* .18* -.14* .03
Agreeableness .01 - .04 .23* .08*
Conscientiousness - .02 - .04 .15* .00
Note: Numbers in the table are correlations between traits and liking of music. Recall that correlations can be positive or negative. Higher numbers mean that there is a
stronger relationship among the variables. Significant effects are noted by asterisks.
* = p 6 .05.
Source: Rentfrow and Gosling, 2003, Table 3, p. 1250 Rentfrow, P. J., & Gosling, S. D. (2003). The do re mi’s of everyday life: The structure and personality correlates of music
preferences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(6), 1236–1256.
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 61

openness to ideas (Zweigenhaft, 2008). These people also liked Intense and Rebellious music,
especially if they were high on openness to values, but they disdained the Upbeat and Conven-
tional especially if they were high in openness to fantasy, aesthetics, ideas, and values (Zwei-
genhaft, 2008). Again, it makes sense that people who are open to new ideas and experiences
would be attracted to the rebellious and turned off by the conventional, even when it comes
to musical preferences (see also Dollinger, 1993; Rawlings & Ciancarelli, 1997). Similarly, they
also liked bluegrass, world music, opera, punk, and funk, genres not part of the Rentfrow and
Gosling (2003) study (Zweigenhaft, 2008). Finally, people who were high in Conscientiousness
showed only a slight preference for the Upbeat and Conventional music, especially for people
high in dutifulness or achievement striving (Zweigenhaft, 2008). Interestingly enough, many of
these findings were replicated in a sample of college students from the Netherlands (Delsing,
TerBogt, Engels, & Meeus, 2008).
Even the way people engage with music seems to be related to personality (Chamorro-
Premuzic & Furnham, 2007). People high in Openness, as measured by the NEO Five Fac-
tor Inventory (Costa & McCrae, 1992), tended to engage with music in a more intellectual
way, concentrating on what they are hearing, enjoying analyzing complex compositions, and
admiring the techniques of the musicians. In contrast, people high in Neuroticism, and low in
Extraversion and Conscientiousness were more likely to engage with music in a more emotional
way, for example, to change or enhance their mood. These people tended to feel emotional
after listening to music, whether it be happy, sad, or nostalgic and they often associated specific
memories with a particular song.
Do you know somebody who loves to listen to loud music with the bass turned up extra
high? McCown, Keiser, Mulhearn, and Williamson (1997) looked at the relationship between
preference for exaggerated bass and scores on the Eysenck Personality Inventory. They found
that men, more so than women, and people high in Extraversion or Psychoticism enjoyed
this music more so than introverts or people low in Psychoticism. The part about extraverts
preferring the stimulation of a strong bass should come as no surprise knowing what we do
about how introverts need less sensory stimulation than extraverts (see Chapter 7). Personal-
ity preferences for this type of music are particularly interesting, because exaggerated bass is a
key component in club and rap music. The authors wondered if boosting bass might make less
popular forms of music—like classical—more appealing to certain audiences.
What about musicians themselves? If there are personality differences in the kind of
music people like to listen to, maybe rock musicians are different from, say, classical musicians.
One early study found that pop musicians were slightly higher on Neuroticism and Psychoti-
cism (Wills, 1984) than the average adult. Any ideas how the average self-taught, guitar-
playing rocker around age 30 would score on Openness? What about Conscientiousness or
Agreeableness? Gillespie and Myors (2000) recruited rock musicians from the metropolitan
Sydney, Australia, area for their study. One hundred musicians took the NEO-PI-R (Costa
& McCrae, 1992) and answered questions about their musical background. These musicians
were high in all six facets of Neuroticism and Openness. Although they were about average
in Extraversion, they were especially high in positive emotions and excitement seeking. In
contrast, they tended to be low in Agreeableness, especially on the facets of trust, straight-
forwardness, and compliance, and low in all six facets of Conscientiousness! This is shown
graphically in Figure 3.3.
Given how much of our personality we express in the music we like to play as well as listen
to, perhaps we should swap our iPod playlists of musical favorites instead of astrology signs
when making new friends.

Web Pages and Personality Traits

Living spaces, handshakes, musical preferences—is there any aspect of our behavior that doesn’t
reflect our personality? What about our presence on the Internet, such as usernames and Face-
book pages; do these also reflect our personalities? They sure do—of course, they may reflect
our true personality or they may reflect managed impressions specifically formulated to impress
others (Gosling, 2008).
62 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

1.6
1.4
1.2
1
0.8
0.6
0.4
z-score

0.2
0
⫺0.2
⫺0.4
⫺0.6
⫺0.8
⫺1
⫺1.2
⫺1.4
N O C N2 N4 N6 E2 E4 E6 O2 O4 O6 A2 A4 A6 C2 C4 C6
E A N1 N3 N5 E1 E3 E5 O1 O3 O5 A1 A3 A5 C1 C3 C5

Figure 3.3 Scores of rock musicians on the NEO-PI-R. Source: Adapted from Gillespie and Myors (2000,
Figure 1, p. 160). Reprinted with permission from Gillespie, W., & Myors, B. (2000), “Personality of rock
musicians,” Psychology of Music, 28, 154–165. Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.

One study found a personality difference between people who blog and people who don’t
(Guadagno, Okdie, & Eno, 2008). Bloggers tend to be higher in Neuroticism and Openness than
nonbloggers. In particular, women who are high in Neuroticism are more likely to blog than
more emotionally stable women.
Vazire and Gosling (2004) took the idea of online self-expression a bit further and judged
people’s personalities from their personal web pages. They had trained experts rate 89 randomly
selected websites listed in Yahoo!’s personal directory. Then they recruited web page owners
to take part in their study. Web page owners rated themselves and their ideal selves on the five
factors using the BFI. The researchers also recruited close friends of the owners so they could
get an outside opinion of what the owners were really like. They used these ratings to judge the
extent to which the web pages reflected what the owners were really like or if the page reflected
what the owner wanted people to think they were like.

What can you tell about this

person from his web page?
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 63

What did they find? First, observers got clear impressions about web page owners. Raters
not only agreed with each other, but they also could correctly judge a person’s Neuroticism,
Openness, and Conscientiousness. Openness was the easiest trait to judge from web pages and
was judged the most accurately.
Ratings of Extraversion and Agreeableness, although accurate, were closer to page owners’
ideals than to their true selves. After statistically removing the effect of “reality” (i.e., friends’
ratings) from owners’ ratings, Extraversion and Agreeableness were still judged accurately by
observers. That is, raters tended to see a person as extraverted or as agreeable as the person
wanted them to see it, rather than the true level of these traits. These results suggest that per-
sonal websites reflect both the owners “true” selves with a bit of impression management—of
how outgoing and likable one is—thrown in. If these findings have you wondering about what
your own web presence says about you, check out the Personality Of Everyday Life box below.

Careers and Personality Traits

Do you have what it takes to be a successful astronaut? Would you like to be a clinical psy-
chologist? As you might imagine, there are personality differences among various careers
and personality assessment is an important part of personnel selection in many businesses,
a point we will take up in the personality assessment Chapter 4. Take the career of astronaut.
A successful astronaut must be able to work effectively and smoothly with others in the complex
and highly stressful setting of a tiny spacecraft in close quarters far away from loved ones back

The Personality of Everyday Life

What does your online presence say about your personality?
Are you on Facebook? Twitter? Nearly everybody has some sort of an online presence
these days, whether it is a personal web page, a blog, a social media account, or a photo on
a school or employer’s page. The research reviewed in this chapter suggests that our web
presence reflects our personality, even without our awareness. What does your presence
say about you?
First, consider what impression your e-mail address or username creates. One study
found that people low in self-esteem picked usernames such as emotional_void_82 and
empty_heart, whereas kingtony23 and gorgeouschic were all high in self-esteem. Similarly,
people’s perceived competence also shone through—intentionally or unintentionally—in
their usernames. Compare stevethetennisace and smartguy to spacystacy and sloppycrazy-
andweird (Gosling, 2008).
Next, how does your page’s layout and design as well as content reveal your personal-
ity? Recall that observers easily and accurately judged users’ levels of Openness, Consci-
entiousness, and Neuroticism from web pages. Other studies show that bloggers reveal
their personalities by their choice of words. People high in Neuroticism use words related
to negative emotions, whereas people high in Extroversion use words related to positive
emotions. People low in Agreeableness use more swear words than people high in Agree-
ableness who refer more to community. People high in Conscientiousness write about
achievement more so than people low in Conscientiousness (Yarkoni, 2010).
Of course, Facebook profiles are an easy way for people to get to know you (Evans,
Gosling, & Carroll, 2008). Visitors are particularly likely to accurately judge personality
when users talk about their beliefs, joys, embarrassing moments, proud moments, spiritu-
ality, heroes, and when they link to funny videos. Sharing information about least-favorite
things is not as helpful in understanding what a person is like.
In sum, are you comfortable with what your online presence says about you? By
making yourself aware of the subtle and not-so-subtle ways self-esteem and traits are
manifested through online media, you can create a good impression and yet not reveal
more than you intend.
64 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

on Earth. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) must routinely process
2,000 to 4,000 applications to select the less than 1% who will eventually be selected as astro-
nauts (Musson & Helmreich, 2004). What are the characteristics that make up the “right stuff ”?
According to research reviewed by Musson and Helmreich (2004), successful astronauts—
as well as anybody, both women and men, who must live and work in confined and dangerous
settings with others—must be high in independence, achievement striving, and goal orientation
THINK ABOUT IT (what they call instrumentality); high in interpersonal warmth, sensitivity, and concern for
others (expressivity); and low in arrogance, egotism, complaining, nagging, and verbal sniping
Of the five factors, which (interpersonal aggression). In their analysis of the personality traits of aspiring astronauts, these
one do you think is most characteristics correlated with high Conscientiousness, high Agreeableness, and low Neuroti-
closely related to job
success?
cism. Applicants who were low in Agreeableness were clearly not cut out for space travel with
longer missions and more diverse crews traveling and working in space.
What about professionals, police officers, managers, and sales and semiskilled workers?
Which traits are related to success in these occupations? In a meta-analysis of over 117 studies,
Barrick and Mount (1991) found that among the five factors, only high Conscientiousness was
related to high performance ratings, productivity, training proficiency, low job turnover, and
higher salaries. This held true across all of the occupations studied for both men and women
including engineers, architects, attorneys, accountants, teachers, doctors, ministers, police offi-
cers, clerical workers, farmers, flight attendants, medical assistants, truck drivers, and grocery
clerks. In addition, being extraverted was helpful for managers and people in sales; introverts
were just as likely as extroverts to be working in any of the other occupations. In addition,
Openness and Extraversion were related to job training proficiency.
Rubinstein and Strul (2007) looked for personality differences among doctors, lawyers,
clinical psychologists, and artists in Israel using a Hebrew version of the NEO-FFI (McCrae &
Costa, 1989). Even though the men and women who volunteered for this study were all Israeli
professionals, their results were about what we might expect: Artists were the highest in Open-
ness to Experience, but they were only significantly higher than doctors, who scored the lowest
in this trait. Artists and lawyers were the highest in Neuroticism whereas doctors were the most
emotionally stable (clinical psychologists fell in between these groups but did not differ signifi-
cantly from the others). No differences were found among these occupational groups in Consci-
entiousness, supporting previous findings
that high Conscientiousness is related to
occupational success regardless of specific
job (Barrick & Mount, 1991).
A study of sales personnel at a chain of
health clubs in Great Britain echoed these
results (Furnham & Fudge, 2008). Sales asso-
ciates, regardless of gender, were more likely
to make their quota of selling memberships
if they were high in Conscientiousness and
Openness, and low in Agreeableness. The
authors surmised that people high in Open-
ness may have a more positive attitude and
open mind that helps them succeed at job
training (cf. Barrick & Mount, 1991), which
may then lead to better on-the-job perfor-
mance. Contrary to popular opinion, the best
salespeople are not necessarily those who
are sociable and enjoy the company of oth-
ers. Rather it is the hardworking, persistent,
go-getter—putting in long hours making
cold calls, following up with clients—who is
Does it take special
most likely to succeed. And being a bit tough,
personality traits to be an
pushy, and dogged (low in Agreeableness)
astronaut?
doesn’t hurt either!
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 65

Personality Development Over the Life

Span: Continuity, Change, and Coherence
Think back to what you and your friends were like in junior high. Can you imagine what “Everybody thinks that as
some of your friends might be like today? Will you be amazed at how much some people have you age, you get old. You
changed? Will some people have not changed at all? Will some people be into different activi- don’t. Inside I still feel like
ties and seem like different people, but underneath it all, are really still the same? Of course,
I’m 18. I just don’t look it
we know that everybody matures as they grow and move through adolescence and into young
adulthood—or do they? anymore.”
This mash-up of personality consistency, personality change, and personality coherence An 80-year-old woman to her
is what makes school reunions both fun and scary. The research on personality across the life grown grandson
span reflects the experience of running into old friends: Some people change, some people
don’t, and some aspects of personality are bound to change because people mature. How can
we make sense of all this? SEE FOR YOURSELF
First, when psychologists talk about development they refer to both continuity and
change in personality (Roberts, Wood, & Caspi, 2008). When we say that personality develops In what ways is your person-
ality different from when
as we grow from childhood into adulthood, we are saying that some aspects of personality
you were in elementary
stay the same—perhaps how sociable or nervous a person is—whereas some aspects are dif- school?
ferent: say how much self-esteem a person has or how thrill seeking he or she is. Continuity or
consistency in personality means that the amount of a trait stays about the same. Personality
change means that the amount of trait is different, either increased or decreased from what it
was previously. The difference is often one of degree rather than kind; people generally don’t
change into something opposite of what they were. That is, an extroverted child is not likely SEE FOR YOURSELF
to grow into an introverted adult nor is an anxious, nervous child likely to become a calm,
even-tempered adult. In what ways is your person-
ality the same as when you
Notice that we can talk about how traits change or are consistent in a group of people
were in elementary school?
or we can talk about how a person changes or remains consistent over time. People may
change or remain consistent compared to what they were like at a previous point in their
lives or they may change or remain consistent relative to their peers or some other com-
parison group.
Even when traits stay the same, we wouldn’t expect a trait, say thrill seeking, to look the
same in a 6-year-old as in a 16-year-old or a 26-year-old. A sensation-seeking 10-year-old
SEE FOR YOURSELF
might enjoy exploring the neighborhood on bicycle whereas a sensation-seeking 26-year-old
might enjoy extreme sports. This is an example of personality coherence in the trait of sensa- In what ways do you act
tion seeking. differently now compared
Personality coherence is when the underlying trait stays the same but the way it is expressed to when you were in
changes (Roberts et al., 2008). We can think of personality coherence as a type of continuity. elementary school? Can
any of these differences be
However, to identify true examples of personality coherence researchers must have a theory
explained by personality
for explaining how the two different behaviors are manifestations of the same underlying trait coherence?
(Caspi & Roberts, 2001).

Are they the same people

today (right) as they were 40
years ago when they were
in college (left)? Personality
remains remarkably
consistent across the life
span. However, against this
backdrop of consistency,
personality changes in
important ways.
66 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

For example, children who

show high task persistence in
childhood show high achieve-
ment orientation in adulthood.
You can see that working hard
and striving to excel are two
aspects of an underlying desire
for accomplishment. Shyness
also shows personality coher-
ence: Shy children live at home
with their parents longer and
marry older than their socially
bolder peers (Caspi, Elder, &
Bem, 1988).
Aggression is another per-
sonality variable that shows
strong coherence from child-
hood to adulthood. People
who had been rated by their
peers as aggressive at age 8 were
I love a parade. Personality more likely to commit serious
coherence in Extraversion: criminal acts by age 30. Men
Although the activities may who were rated as aggressive as
change, this extrovert was children were also more likely
always a joiner and loved the
to engage in physical aggres-
limelight whether it was Girl
Scouts in elementary school
sion and abuse their spouses
or folk dancing as an adult. by age 30 (Huesmann, Eron,
Lefkowitz, & Walder, 1984; see
Figure 3.4).
The only way to answer the question of how do people develop over their lives is to, well,
take a bunch of people and follow them over their lives! This is called a longitudinal study. In
the last 10 years or so there has been an increase in longitudinal studies and so our knowledge
of how people—and traits—change across the life span has increased as well.
A good metaphor to explain how personality changes over time is to picture a harbor
filled with different kinds of boats (Roberts, 2010). Some boats might sit lower or higher in
the water depending on their shapes, sizes, or cargo. The action of the tide coming in and
going out lifts and lowers all the boats in the water at the same time. This action is like gen-
eral change or mean-level change which affects nearly everybody as we grow from infancy
to adulthood. The boats are like individual people. Differences between the boats in how

Figure 3.4 Personality

Males Females
coherence in aggressiveness: 50
Mean seriousness of criminal
Criminal Acts by Age 30
Mean Seriousness of

acts committed by age 30 as 40

a function of peer ratings of
aggression at age 8. Source:
30
From Huesmann et al. (1984,
Figure 3, bottom, p. 1125).
20
Huesmann, L. R., Eron, L. D.,
Lefkowitz, M. M., & Walder, L. O.
(1984). Stability of aggression 10
over time and generations.
Developmental Psychology, 20, 0
Low Medium High Low Medium High
1120–1134.
Age 8 Aggression Group
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 67

Even though the boats are all

different, the tide coming in
and going out affects all boats
in the same way. Individual
people have different
personalities, but general
change such as maturity, or the
aging process, affects us all.

they sit in the water is like individual change in personality. Each boat can change in its
own unique way due to the actions of the owner who can change the load of a boat so that
it rises and falls independently of the other boats.
To understand how personality develops over the life span, we need to understand both
general change and individual change. Let’s consider three questions about personality devel-
opment (Roberts, 2010). First, how consistent are people over time? This is a general question
about the nature of personality. Second, how much do people change in general? This is a
question about general change in personality traits that affect nearly everybody. Third, how
and why do individuals develop in their own particular ways? This question looks at individual
differences in consistency and change over the life course.

How Consistent Are People Over Time?

Personality is relatively enduring over time; in fact, people become more consistent in their
traits across the life span (Roberts et al., 2008). Adults are more consistent in their traits than
teens who are more consistent than children, a finding verified by many longitudinal studies
(Caspi & Silva, 1995). This makes sense; after all, children are still in the process of developing
their personalities.
Personality is about as consistent as cognitive ability; more consistent than income, blood
pressure, and cholesterol levels; and much more consistent than happiness and self-esteem
across a person’s lifetime (Roberts, 2010). The peak of consistency is around age 50, a fact that
is surprising given that some notable theorists thought that personality was set in childhood
or adolescence. Sigmund Freud, for example, believed that personality was set by age 5, and
Erik Erikson believed that personality was set by the end of adolescence. Despite popular
notions of an adolescent identity crisis or a midlife crisis, people remain consistent in their
traits through these times. In fact, there are no periods of particularly dramatic personality
change anywhere in the life course (Caspi & Roberts, 2001; Caspi, Roberts, & Shiner, 2005;
Roberts et al., 2008).
During this time, and even beyond, the traits of the five factors are the most consistent of
all, showing great consistency across all five traits regardless of type of test (self-report, projec-
tive tests) or rater (self, observer; Roberts et al., 2008). Traits of the five factors start to become
consistent at age 3 and increase in consistency until after age 50. This means that personality is
remarkably consistent, despite the turmoil of the teen years or the massive changes that come
with starting careers and families in the 20s. These results illustrate the saying “the child is
father to the man.”
68 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

For example, based on a meta-analysis (see Chapter 11), a statistical summary of effects
from 152 longitudinal studies, Roberts and DelVecchio (2000) came to two conclusions. First,
stability increases over the life span, a finding illustrated in Figure 3.5. Second, personality traits
measured closer in time tend to be more similar than traits measured further apart in time.
According to reviews and meta-analyses, traits of the five factors show moderate consis-
tency across the life span (Ardelt, 2000; Bazana & Stelmack, 2004; Roberts & DelVecchio, 2000;
Schuerger, Zarrella, & Hotz, 1989; see Table 3.6). According to one study, the overall consistency
in all five factors across 81 studies suggests that about 29% of the variance in your personality
at one point in time can be explained by your personality at another point in time (Bazana &
Stelmack, 2004).
William James (1890) observed that “in most of us by the age of thirty, the character has set
like plaster, and will never soften again” (p. 121), a view once endorsed by many trait theorists
(Costa & McCrae, 1994). However, we now know that this isn’t so. Personality change does not
stop, nor does it slow down after age 30. Instead, personality shows small gradual changes with
age (Srivastava, John, Gosling, & Potter, 2003). Personality is consistent—but not unchanging.
Think about it: If less than a third of your personality stays about the same, then what hap-
pens to the other two-thirds? That’s where mean-level change and individual change comes in.
Even as personality stays consistent, there are subtle changes as we grow and develop, even into
adulthood and old age. Psychologists now believe that personality is like an open system that
can change throughout life in response to events and environments. Further, once our person-
alities respond to accommodate these new experiences, we tend to remain at this new level of
development for the remainder of our lives. In this way personality change is subtle at any one
point in time, but cumulative over the life course (Roberts & Mroczek, 2008).

How Much Do People Change in General?

Here we are asking about normative change (Roberts, 2010). Across both cross-sectional and
longitudinal studies there are similar changes in personality that, like how an incoming tide
affects all the boats in the harbor, affect everybody. The period of greatest normative change
occurs in young adulthood between ages 20 and 40. In general, people become more consistent,
as we just saw, and better with age.
Specifically, people become more assertive, warm, and self-confident (aspects of Extra-
version), agreeable (nice, nurturing), conscientious (responsible, organized, hardworking,
rule-oriented), and emotionally stable (calm and relaxed). Openness increases early in life—
paralleling being in school—and declines in old age, suggesting that maybe you can’t teach an
old dog new tricks. Emotional stability increases early in life and remains constant whereas

Figure 3.5 Consistency 1

across the life course at various
0.9
age periods. Personality
becomes more consistent with 0.8
Rank-Order Trait Consistency

age. Source: From Roberts and

DelVecchio (2000, Figure 1, 0.7
p. 15). Roberts, B. W., &
0.6
DelVecchio, W. F. (2000).
The rank-order consistency 0.5
of person- ality traits from
childhood to old age: 0.4
A quantitative review 0.3
of longitudinal studies.
Psychological Bulletin, 126(1), 0.2
3–25. Copyright American
0.1
Psychological Association.
Reprinted with permission. 0
0–2.9 3–5.9 6–11.9 12–17.9 18–21.9 22–29 30–39 40–49 50–59 60–73
Age Periods
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 69

Table 3.6 Average Consistency in Personality Over Time: Stability Coefficients

Trait Everybody Women Men
Neuroticism .52 .56 .52*
Extraversion .59 .63 .60*
Openness .52 .48 .55*
Agreeableness .48 .51 .46*
Conscientiousness .50 .50 .50
Overall Personality .54 .56 .55
Note: Stability coefficients range from 0 to .99, with higher numbers indicating a higher correlation in the trait among various
time periods. Average stability in the trait across intervals from as short as less than 3 years to as long as 25 years.
* Significant gender difference in consistency. From a meta-analysis of 81 studies using 95 different samples.
Source: From Bazana and Stelmack (2004).

Agreeableness increases later in life. Agreeableness and Conscientiousness continue to rise into
old age (Roberts, Walton, & Viechtbauer, 2006).
In an extensive meta-analysis of 92 longitudinal studies, Roberts, Walton, and Viecht-
bauer (2006) found evidence for continuity and change in six traits over the life course (see
Figure 3.6). They reached three conclusions. First, all six traits showed changes past the age of
30 and indeed four of them—social vitality, Agreeableness, Emotional Stability, and Consci-
entiousness—showed significant changes in middle or old age. This suggests that personality
continues to develop across the life course. Second, contrary to popular belief, young adult-
hood (ages 20 to 40) and not adolescence appears to be a key period in life when personality
traits change the most. Finally, except for Openness and social vitality, which decreased with
age suggesting that we experience less positive emotions and sociability, all of the other traits
became more positive with age. As we age, we become more self-confident, agreeable, emotion-
ally stable, and conscientious.
This same pattern of results was echoed in a study using a different design. In a cross-
sectional study, the researchers compared responses of 132,515 adults aged 21 to 60 who
responded to an Internet survey (Srivastava et al., 2003). One interesting difference, how-
ever, was that in this study, women but not men were more emotionally stable after age
30; older men had the same level of emotional stability as younger men at age 30. They
also found that people were less open in old age. These results also supported the idea that
personality continues to change slowly but steadily with age, showing small to moderate
systematic changes.
This pattern of older adults showing lower levels of Neuroticism, Openness, and some
aspects of Extraversion, and higher levels of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness than college
students, also holds for samples outside the United States including Germany, Italy, Portugal,
Croatia, and South Korea (McCrae et al., 1999).
Whereas consistency implies that there is a similarity in personality from one age to THINK ABOUT IT
another, it also suggests that there is a change. One reason why personality changes from child-
hood to adulthood and from young adulthood to old age is that people mature. Therefore, a How might maturation
affect a person’s levels
certain amount of change in personality is due to maturation (Roberts et al., 2008). In particu-
of Neuroticism and
lar, we develop higher levels of assertiveness, self-control, responsibility, and emotional stability, Conscientiousness?
especially from age 20 to age 40 (Roberts, Walton, & Viechtbauer, 2006). These changes may be
a result of positive experiences in work and personal relationships.
For example, working longer hours or attaining higher status increases aspects of Extraver-
sion (dominance, independence, and self-confidence) and Conscientiousness (self-discipline,
competence, and responsibility) in both men and women (Clausen & Gilens, 1990; Elder, 1969;
Roberts, 1997; Roberts, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2003). Positive work experiences may also help people
become more emotionally stable (Roberts & Chapman, 2000; Scollon & Diener, 2006; Van
Aken, Denissen, Branje, Dubas, & Goossens, 2006). For women, higher status at work is also
70 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

Social Vitality Social Dominance

1.2 1.2

1 1
Cumulative d Value

Cumulative d Value
0.8 0.8

0.6 0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0

⫺0.2 ⫺0.2
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Age Age

Agreeableness Conscientiousness
1.2 1.2

1 1
Cumulative d Value

Cumulative d Value
0.8 0.8

0.6 0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0

⫺0.2 ⫺0.2
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Age Age

Emotional Stability Openness to Experience

1.2 1.2

1 1
Cumulative d Value

Cumulative d Value

0.8 0.8

0.6 0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0

⫺0.2 ⫺0.2
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Age Age

Figure 3.6 Accumulated changes in traits over the life course. The graphs show the average change (d) in each trait from the
beginning to the end of a decade, added together over the life course. Social dominance and social vitality reflect two different
aspects of Extraversion. Social dominance includes dominance, independence, and self-confidence in social situations; social
vitality includes sociability, positive affect, gregariousness, and energy level. Source: From Roberts, Walton, and Viechtbauer
(2006, Figure 2, p. 15).

associated with an increase in masculinity and a decrease in femininity (Kasen, Chen, Sneed,
Crawford, & Cohen, 2006).
A stable and happy home life can also change people for the better. In particular, both
men and women in fulfilling relationships during their young adult years become less neurotic
(Robins, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2002; Roberts & Chapman, 2000; Scollon & Diener, 2006), and more
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 71

conscientious (Lehnart & Neyer, 2006; Roberts & Bogg, 2004) and agreeable (Lehnart & Neyer,
2006) over time. Even men who married or remarried in late middle age or old age also showed
a decrease in Neuroticism with age (women were not studied; Mroczek & Spiro, 2003).
As you can see, all of these normative changes are in the direction of greater maturity and
better functioning. The years from a person’s 20s to 40s are when most people are busy with
the twin concerns of family and career. This is the age when most people seek out a partner and
start a family. At the same time, people are choosing and starting careers and their life’s work.
Young people are also building identities by making commitments to social institutions such
as work, marriage, family, and community. These new roles come with expectations, demands,
and reinforcements that shape a person into becoming more socially dominant, agreeable,
conscientious, and less neurotic (Roberts et al., 2008). Social investment in the conventional
roles of adulthood, such as career or family, leads to normative increases in dominance, consci-
entiousness, and emotional stability in most people. These changes are small over short periods
of time, but are quite large over longer periods.
Our personality determines which situations, environments, experiences, or social roles we
THINK ABOUT IT
choose. Once we choose an environment or role, the new situation reinforces these aspects of
our personalities. The most common effect of life experiences on personality development is that What kinds of situations
our choice of environments and roles strengthens the very personality traits that selected them might impact the personal-
ity of people who are about
in the first place. Life experiences that elicit behaviors corresponding to a person’s disposition
to graduate college?
are validating and rewarding, often leading to similar behaviors and similar choices in the future.
The saying “life happens while you are busy making other plans” can apply to personality:
By making plans and acting on them, we both express and develop our personalities, often
without awareness of how we’ve changed. This type of personality change isn’t likely to make
headlines or be the topic for a movie-of-the-week, but it is quite powerful nevertheless.
This explains why personality change in adulthood is most often slow and steady, as a
result of being exposed to situations of our own choosing and less often as a result of a so-called
life-altering experience. Life-altering experiences are actually very rare, and their impact on
personality perhaps a bit overblown. In truth, people respond to devastating events with more
of their true selves: Individual differences are magnified when people face unpredictable or
ambiguous situations without guidelines for how to respond (Caspi & Moffitt, 1993).

How and Why Do Individuals Develop

in Their Own Particular Ways?
Have you heard the saying “there’s an exception to every rule”? When it comes to normative
influences (the tide) on personality (the boats in a harbor) some people do not experience these
normative changes. There are individual differences in personality development (Mroczek &
Spiro, 2003; Roberts, 1997; Roberts & Mroczek, 2008). Basically, nonnormative experiences make
for nonnormative development. For example, women who continued to smoke marijuana into
THINK ABOUT IT
midlife (Roberts & Bogg, 2004) and people who engaged in stealing, fighting, or coming to work
drunk (Roberts, Walton, Bogg, & Caspi, 2006) did not increase in Conscientiousness and actually What are nonnormative
decreased in emotional stability in their adult years. By consciously taking a stand against social- experiences that might
izing roles—wife, mother, responsible employee—some people exposed themselves to different cause people to develop
differently from their peers?
experiences and missed out on the kinds of personality development that most people go through.
In fact, researchers have identified reliable individual differences in personality change
during all stages of life (Roberts et al., 2008): childhood and adolescence (De Fruyt et al., 2006;
Pullman, Raudsepp, & Allik, 2006), young adulthood (Donnellan, Conger, & Burzette, 2007;
Vaidya, Gray, Haig, & Watson, 2002), middle age (Van Aken et al., 2006), and old age (Steunen-
berg, Twisk, Beekman, Deeg, & Kerkhof, 2005). These individual differences in personality
development are important because personality traits are linked to important outcomes in
work, physical health, mental illness, and longevity (Roberts & Mroczek, 2008).
For example, in a study of college students aged 20 to 32 enrolled in an introduc-
tory psychology class, participants varied in how much they changed in positive emotions
(related to Extraversion) and negative emotions (related to Neuroticism) over the subsequent
2.5 years (Vaidya et al., 2002). Those who had significantly decreased in negative emotions
72 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

had experienced fewer negative events, such as a family member passing away, receiving a
failing grade in a course, becoming a regular smoker, or experiencing divorce or separation of
their parents, compared to their peers. Those who had significantly increased in positive emo-
tions had experienced more positive events in their lives, such as receiving academic honors
or awards, getting promoted at a job, getting engaged, getting accepted into grad school, or
getting married, compared to their peers. This study illustrates that we do not merely react to
life experiences, but we may internalize them and become changed by them bit by bit until over
longer periods of time we become permanently changed by them.
In another study, both men and women who increased in hostility as they developed from
college age to about age 40 experienced a range of negative outcomes. People who increased
in hostility over their adulthood, compared to those who either maintained or decreased their
level of hostility, showed increased obesity, inactivity, social isolation, lower income (women
only), worse physical health, greater risk of depression, and the perception that their work and
family life was changing for the worse (Siegler et al., 2003).
Similarly, personality change in midlife was associated with successful adaptation to the
day-to-day concerns of this periods of life: well-being of family members, work stress, and life
satisfaction (Van Aken et al., 2006).
Finally, in a longitudinal study of male veterans aged 43 to 91, those who became more
neurotic over time showed a 32% increase in mortality over men whose level of Neuroticism
decreased (Mroczek & Spiro, 2007). In fact, the direction of change in neuroticism over the 18
years of the study—whether it was increasing or decreasing—was more important than whether
it was high or low to begin with (see Figure 3.7). Among men who were high in Neuroticism,
those who were changing to become less neurotic lived longer than men whose neuroticism
was increasing.

Where Does Adult Personality Come From?

There is still one big unanswered question: Where does adult personality come from? We know
that children have differing temperaments, or individual differences, that emerge during the first
year of life (Buss & Plomin, 1994). But how and when do these temperaments develop into the
five factors of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness? To
THINK ABOUT IT answer this question, we need longitudinal studies that follow infants from birth to adulthood.
Given that researchers have only recently reached consensus on the five-factor model, it will be
Are babies born with a per-
a good while until we can collect the right evidence to answer this question. However, there is
sonality? With personality
traits? With all five factors? little doubt that childhood temperament does predict to adult personality (Caspi, Roberts, &
Shiner, 2005; Caspi & Shiner, 2006; Caspi & Silva, 1995; Digman, 1989; Shiner & Caspi, 2003).

Figure 3.7 Survival curves for 1.0

four groups of men according
to neuroticism level and
c
change over time, controlling
0.9
for age, physical health, and b
depression. Source: From
a
Probability of Survival

Mroczek and Spiro (2007, Figure

1, p. 375). Mroczek, D. K., & Spiro, 0.8
A. (2007), “Personality change
influences mortality in older
men,” Psychological Science, 0.7
18(5), 371–376. Reprinted d
by permission of Blackwell
Publishing. Neuroticism Rate
0.6
a Low-Average Decreasing
b High-Average Decreasing
c Low-Average Increasing
d High-Average Increasing
0.5

0 4 8 12 16
Years
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 73

For example, in one study researchers identified five temperament groups among a sample
of 3-year-old children in New Zealand, based on psychologists’ ratings of the child’s behavior
(Caspi & Silva, 1995). The groups were Well-adjusted, Undercontrolled, Inhibited, Confident,
and Reserved. When the children were 18 years old, the five groups showed differences in
their personalities. Compared to Well-adjusted children, the Undercontrolled children at age 3
were higher in impulsivity, danger seeking, aggression, and interpersonal alienation at age 18,
whereas Inhibited children scored low on these variables. Confident children scored high in
impulsivity. Reserved children scored low on dominance. The Well-adjusted group grew up to
be, as you might imagine, typical teenagers. By age 3, children have developed individual dif-
ferences in behavior that are manifested as personality differences by age 18 and last to at least
age 26 (Caspi, Harrington, et al., 2003).

Then and Now: The Grant Study of Harvard Graduates

Only a longitudinal study can address the kinds of questions we’ve been asking about personality
in this section. As mentioned earlier, a longitudinal study follows the same group of participants
over time—from as short as a few months to as long as many years (Fleeson, 2007; Mroczek,
2007). Currently, only a handful of studies exist that have followed participants for more than
20 years, and far fewer than that have followed children from birth to the end of their lives.
The longest running study is the study of gifted children begun in 1921 by Lewis Terman
and slated to continue until the participants are no longer living (Holahan & Sears, 1995; Ter-
“To be able to study lives in
man, 1926). Another famous one is the Mills Longitudinal Study of Women, following women
from the 1958 and 1960 graduating classes from Mills College, a small, private college in Cali- such depth, over so many
fornia, to the present, when many of the original participants are in their 70s (Helson, 1967; decades, it was like looking
Helson & Wink, 1992; Roberts & Helson, 1997). These women came of age and lived through through the Mount Palomar
some of the most exciting and volatile times of the last century including the civil rights move- telescope.”
ment and the women’s movement. Many of the findings discussed in this section come out of George Vaillant as cited in Shenk
the study of the Mills women (e.g., Roberts & Bogg, 2004; Roberts & Chapman, 2000; Roberts (2009, p. 38)
& Helson, 1997).
Perhaps the most famous longitudinal study of all is the Grant Study of Harvard Gradu-
ates. The study began in 1938 when Arlie Bock, frustrated that medicine focused on pathology,
wanted to find out what combination of physical and mental health led to a successful life
(Shenk, 2009). The department store magnate W. T. Grant supported the fledgling research
project for the first 10 years, which is why today the study is known as the Grant study. They
recruited the most physically and mentally healthy members of the Harvard classes of 1942 to
1944 to volunteer for a lifetime of close scrutiny from a medical, psychological, and social stand-
point. They even questioned the men’s parents and close family members. The participants
received questionnaires every 2 years, physicals every 5 years, and interviews every 15 years. In
more recent years participants have been put through MRIs, DNA testing, and even a request
that they donate their brains to the study upon their death.
As the men grew into middle age, many of the study participants achieved great success
including President John F. Kennedy; former editor of the Washington Post Ben Bradlee; four for-
mer senate hopefuls; one presidential cabinet member; and one best-selling novelist. At the same
time, almost a third of the participants struggled with mental illness by age 50 (Shenk, 2009).
Psychiatrist George Vaillant, who took over the study in 1967, sought not so much to find
out what kind of troubles these men faced over a lifetime, but rather how they responded and
adapted to what occurred in their lives (Vaillant, 1977, 2002a). For Vaillant, the most inspiring
cases were often those where the men had overcome great hardships.
Vaillant studied the kind of defense mechanisms the men used to cope. He identified
the classic Freudian defense mechanisms and many others (Vaillant, 1977). Defenses ranged
from the most unhealthy such as paranoia or passive aggressiveness, to the healthiest or most
mature adaptations such as altruism, humor, and sublimation. Vaillant found that as people
matured, their defense mechanisms matured too. Between ages 50 and 75 the men used altru-
ism and humor more frequently and passive aggressiveness and fantasy less frequently. Mature
adaptations turned pain and emotional turmoil into occasions for achievement, creativity, and
connections with others.
74 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

Amazingly, the accomplishments of men from the original Grant study can be predicted
from their personality during college (Soldz & Vaillant, 1999). Out of the five factors, traits
measuring Conscientiousness were the best predictors of the men’s lives across a variety of
domains including personal adjustment, family relationships, work success, and health behav-
iors. Conscientious young men grew into successful and better-functioning older men.
However, neuroticism at age 65 was a good indicator of poor adjustment across various
domains as a result of, presumably, difficulties in life since college. Neurotic older men had
more psychiatric visits, depression, smoking, and use of drugs and alcohol in the course of their
lives as compared with more emotionally stable men.
Based on their results, the authors surmise that Extraversion in young adulthood drove
career and monetary success, whereas Neuroticism was related to adjustment and the inability
to quit smoking in adulthood. Openness was related to adult creativity. Low Openness was
related to a more conservative traditional and authoritarian political outlook and to psychiatric
usage in adulthood, although this may reflect a greater willingness to explore their inner lives
or an experience with psychological distress.
Today, the original Grant study is part of the Harvard Study of Adult Development. Due
to the efforts of then-Harvard Law professor Sheldon Glueck, the study was expanded in 1939
to include a control group of nondelinquent boys who were growing up in the inner-city
neighborhoods of Boston from 1940 to 1945. In the 1970s Vaillant and his colleagues joined
the project, now called the Glueck study, and conducted follow-ups with these men (Vaillant,
1995). At one point, Vaillant even tracked down and interviewed women from the Terman
study (Vaillant & Vaillant, 1990)! These additional cohorts were Vaillant’s way of broadening
his sample so that he could draw conclusions about adult development that were not limited
to a sample of upper-class, college-educated, elite men.
A journalist asked Vaillant what he had learned from his research on the Grant study.
“That the only thing that really matters in life are your relationships to other people” he replied
(Shenk, 2009, p. 46). From the Glueck study he learned that industriousness in childhood,
things such as holding a part-time job, taking on chores, or joining sports teams, was a more
important predictor of adult mental health than all other factors including family relationships.
From the women of the Terman study he learned that whereas social interventions can increase
a person’s chance of success, they can also destroy human potential (Vaillant, 2002b). Despite
having superior intellectual potential and educational advantages, only 5% of the Terman
women went on to successful business or professional careers.
At the heart of these findings are biology, environment, personality, and how experiences
in our lives affect who we are and what we grow up to be—the kinds of questions that can only
be answered with longitudinal studies like the Grant study.

What will you be like at your

40-year high school reunion?
 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters 75

Personality Traits: Theoretical

and Practical Conclusions
There you have it: all about traits in a nutshell! From the original lexical studies to modern “We are fully prepared
factor-analytic studies, from the ancients to the cutting-edge research of today, understand- to admit that personality
ing traits is key to understanding people. In particular, the identification of key dimensions psychologists have been
of personality—recognized in a simple handshake, as we saw in the opening of this chapter—
concerned with many aspects
and their applicability across cultures has inspired lines of research on nomothetic universals,
indigenous personality traits, and the numerous ways we express our personality, our traits, in of human nature beyond
all aspects of our lives. enduring dispositions . . . and
Of course, there is much more to personality than trait descriptions, as the side quote sug- we agree with commentators
gests. (See Block, 1995, 2001, 2010 for an impassioned critique of the five factors in particular.) who note that the five-factor
We might well wonder, for example, how we form an identity or how we are influenced by model does not and cannot
social roles (McCrae & Costa, 1996). One commentator noted that trait models are essentially
provide a complete model of
“psychology of the stranger” because they describe personality at only a superficial level. In
particular, McAdams (1992, p. 229) noted, trait models fall short when it comes to personality.”
McCrae and Costa (1996, p. 65)
1. Accounting for personality functioning and personality differences between people beyond
the surface level.
2. Adequately describing the richness of persons’ lives.
3. Providing a true causal explanation for human behavior rather than circular reasoning
(“Raj is outgoing because he’s extraverted. We know he’s extraverted because he likes to
meet new people.”).
4. Addressing the social context of human experience—that is, how the ways we interact with
others affect who we are.
5. Explaining personality integration and organization within an individual.
Only by studying other aspects of personality—genetics, physiology, identity, motivations,
to name only a few—can we come to a complete understanding of human personality.

Chapter Summary
In this chapter we questioned whether the five-factor model leaves out important traits such as
Study and Review
intelligence, religiosity, and sexuality and culture-specific traits such as philotimo, filial piety,
and amae. In some cases these traits are indeed an omission (e.g., spiritual transcendence); in on mysearchlab.com
other cases these traits are a combination of facets and factors (e.g., sexuality), or abilities (e.g., Go online for more
intelligence). However, the most important question is whether the five factors adequately resources to help you
account for personality in other cultures. review.
We discovered that there are culture-specific indigenous personality traits that are not
accounted for by the five factors (e.g., philotimo in Greece, filial piety in China, amae in Japan).
Sentence or questionnaire measures of the five factors replicate across many cultures and lan-
guages, but adjectival measures are more sensitive to cultural differences. In particular, Open-
ness varies across cultures and some cultures are best described by more than five factors.
Research that combined measures of the five factors with Chinese indigenous trait terms found
the five factors plus a unique sixth factor tapping the traditional Chinese values of Harmony,
Connectedness, Defensiveness, and Social approval.
People express their traits in many aspects of their everyday lives including handshakes,
music preferences, web pages, and careers, including being the president of the United States.
To study individuals in depth, psychologists use multiple methods, called triangulation,
in which they use LOTS of different methods including L data, O data, T data, and S data to
understand personality. They also use longitudinal designs to study people across time. Lon-
gitudinal studies such as the Grant Study of Harvard Graduates let us draw conclusions about
personality consistency, change, and coherence over the life course.
76 Chapter 3 Personality Traits: Practical Matters

Through these studies, we now know that personality is consistent over time, and that consis-
tency increases with age. The traits of the five factors are about as consistent as cognitive abilities
are, and show consistency across measures and raters as well as over a lifetime. By age 3 children
have developed individual differences in temperament which develop into traits in adulthood.
Against this backdrop of consistency, people do change over the course of a lifetime. In
particular, we mature, showing more Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stabil-
ity, and some aspects of Extraversion (assertive, warm, self-confident) as we enter into old
age, but less Openness and other aspects of Extraversion (positive emotions, sociability,
and vitality). People’s personalities change the most between ages 20 to 40, as they take
their place in the adult world of work, family, and community. At the same time, there are
individual differences in consistency and change, some related to important health outcomes
and well-being.
Traits are but one aspect of human personality, perhaps only scratching the surface of
understanding what people are like.

Review Questions
1. What traits may be missing from the five-factor model? Are they traits or abilities or some-
thing else? If they are traits, can they be accounted for by some combination of factors and
facets of the five-factor model?
2. What are indigenous personality traits? What do we know about universals in human per-
sonality and about the impact of culture on personality? How many factors best account
for personality in China? How would you describe these factors?
3. What is triangulation? What four kinds of data do psychologists use to understand per-
sonality? Give commonly used examples of each.
4. In what ways do we express personality traits in our everyday lives?
5. What is development? What is personality consistency, personality change, and personality
coherence?
6. How consistent are people over time? What traits are particularly consistent over the life
span?
7. How much do people change in general? What traits are particularly likely to change over
the life span?
8. Are there individual differences in personality development? How does adult personality
develop out of childhood temperaments?
9. What is a longitudinal study? What are some famous longitudinal studies? What have we
learned about human personality from these longitudinal studies?

Key Terms
Openness Interpersonal Relatedness Change
Spiritual transcendence Triangulation Personality coherence
Sexy Seven S data Longitudinal study
Philotimo T data Mean-level change
Filial piety O data Individual change
Amae L data Meta-analysis
Indigenous traits Development Normative change
Ren Qing Continuity Maturation
Ah-Q Consistency Temperaments
CHAPTER
4 PERSONALITY
ASSESSMENT
WHAT MAKES A GOOD PERSONALITY TEST?
Test Reliability: Generalizability Across Time, Items, and Raters
Test Validity
Test Generalizability
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: IS THE NEO-PI-R A GOOD PERSONALITY TEST?
PERSONALITY TESTS
Types and Formats of Personality Tests
Self-Report Tests
Performance-Based Tests
Response Sets
PERSONALITY TESTS AND SELECTION
Integrity Testing
Success Stories
Legal Issues
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: WHAT cAN THEY ASK YOU ON A JOB INTERVIEW?
THEN AND NOW: PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT AND MATCHMAKING
CHAPTER SUMMARY
Read the Chapter on REVIEW QUESTIONS
mysearchlab.com KEY TERMS

77
78 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

H
“You have to study the ave you ever taken a personality test on the Internet? According to some of these tests,
people and the ones that your favorite candy bar, city, ice cream flavor or even the way you eat an Oreo can
measure up are not always reveal your hidden personality. What is the difference between legitimate personal-
ity tests used by psychologists and the ones you find on the Internet? Amazingly, the need for
the ones you expect.”
standards in the measurement of personality had its start at a nightclub in the late 1940s way
American author Walter Lord
before the Internet made these sorts of tests so popular.
After a long, hard day of working with clients at a Veterans Hospital psychologist Bertram
Forer went to a nightclub for a bit of relaxation (Forer, 1949). He was approached by a man who
purported to assess people’s personality from a sample of their handwriting. The psychologist
declined, and offered to administer the graphologist a Rorschach inkblot test instead. Insulted
and hurt by the psychologist’s skepticism of his talents, the graphologist said he had “scientific
proof ” that his method was valid: Clients confirmed the accuracy of his interpretations. The
psychologist was not impressed. He replied that a blindfolded psychologist could give at least
as good a reading!
Forer went back to his introductory psychology class and conducted a little experiment.
Instead of giving students the true results of the personality test he had recently administered,
SEE FOR YOURSELF
he gave every member of the class the exact same feedback (see Table 4.1). He asked students to
Take a personality test that rate on a 0 (poor) to 5 (perfect) scale how accurate a description of their personality the feedback
you find on the Internet was. He found that all but one member of his class thought the description was a perfect or
from a dubious source (e.g., nearly perfect estimation of their true personality.
Facebook). Are the results
How is it that different people can believe that the same exact feedback describes them per-
descriptive of your person-
ality or so general that they fectly? The same way that people can believe the feedback from a nightclub graphologist in the
could apply to anybody? 1940s and Oreo-cookie-eating tests on the Internet in the 2010s. These fake personality tests rely
on general feedback that can apply to nearly anyone and the public’s goodwill to play along with
and not question too closely the contents of these tests, rather than scientific evidence. So, how do
we know when a personality test is accurate or not? That’s where personality assessment comes in.
Personality assessment is the measurement of the individual characteristics of a person.
Though there are many types of methods that researchers use to study personality, the most
commonly used are personality tests (see Table 4.2). You will see examples of nearly all of these
methods as we discuss research findings throughout the text. For example, in Chapter 7 we
discuss neuroimaging techniques, hormone levels, and autonomic arousal. In Chapter 5 we
discuss open-ended questions and interviews. The principles of good measurement apply to
all of these measures and methods.
There are many uses of personality assessment beyond the laboratory. Psychologists may
gather and evaluate information about a person from various sources including personality
tests, interviews, biographical material, and other people for hiring decisions, job placement,
diagnosis, or development of a case study (Wiggins, 2003). In clinical settings, personality
assessment may be used to develop models of disorders, design intervention programs, monitor
treatments, evaluate treatments, and to make diagnoses (Meyer et al., 2001).

Table 4.1 A Little Something for Everybody?

“You have a great need for other people to like and admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have a great deal
of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage. While you have some personality weaknesses, you are generally
able to compensate for them. Your sexual adjustment has presented problems for you.
Disciplined and self-controlled outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure inside. At times you have serious doubts as to
whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become
dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations.
You pride yourself as a independent thinker and do not accept others’ statements without satisfactory proof. You have found it
unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while at other times you are
introverted, wary, reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic. Security is one of your major goals in life.”
Note: How well does this describe your personality? If you are like most people, you will find this an accurate description of your personality. The trouble is, it is so general
that it accurately describes nearly everybody! The fact that people readily believe such feedback is called the Barnum Effect.
Source: Forer, B. R. (1949), “The fallacy of personal validation: A classroom demonstration of gullibility,” The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 44(1), 118–123.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 79

Table 4.2 Assessment Methods and Measures Used in Personality Research

% of Psychologists Who Reported That They
Type of Measure Have Used the Measure
Self-report scales and questionnaires 100%
Judgments of self and others 99
Behavioral observation 89
Informant reports 86
Behavioral responses 81
Other judgment tasks (e.g., of stimuli) 79
Structured interviews 76
Narrative/open-ended questionnaires 74
Experience sampling 65
Implicit measures 64
Memory tasks 62
Reaction time 61
Autonomic arousal 57
Judgments of groups/nations/cultures 43
Hormone levels 36
Neuroimaging (fMRI, etc.) 32
Molecular genetics/DNA testing 26
Note: Prominent personality psychologists (N = 72) were asked if they had ever used the method in their work.
Source: Adapted from Robins, Tracy, and Sherman (2007, Table 37.1, p. 676). Reprinted with permission from Robins, R. W., Tracy,
J. L., & Sherman, J. W. (2007), “What kinds of methods do personality psychologists use? A survey of journal editors and editorial
board members,” In R. W. Robins, R. C. Fraley, & R. F. Krueger (Eds.), Handbook of Research Methods in Personality Psychology, p.
673–678 (New York, NY: Guilford). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.

In this chapter we consider what makes a

good personality test and how people answer
personality tests, and see how the results of
personality tests have been used by busi-
nesses to select the right person for the right
job. Along the way, we will take a close look at
a few types of personality tests that are used
by personality psychologists today.

What Makes a Good

Personality Test?
According to standards set up by professional The Barnum Effect, named
organizations in education and psychol- for famed showman
ogy, including the American Psychological P. T. Barnum, suggests that
Association, the developers of a personality people falsely believe that
test must demonstrate that the test is valid invalid personality tests are
and reliable, and specify the conditions, good personality assessments
when they contain “a little
populations, and cultures the test applies to
something for everybody” like
(American Educational Research Associa-
a great circus.
tion, American Psychological Association, &
80 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

THINK ABOUT IT National Council on Measurement in Education, 1999). Test developers must also provide theo-
retical background and research evidence confirming (or disconfirming) that the test is related
Why is peer review an to certain outcomes. Where possible, developers should make sure that the results obtained are
important part of the valida- meaningful, and not just due to biased responding on the part of test-takers. Furthermore, this
tion process for personality
tests?
evidence should be published in scientific journals, where it has been reviewed and accepted
by other experts in the field (see Clark & Watson, 1995; John & Benet-Martínez, 2000; Simms
& Watson, 2007, for how to develop and validate a test).
The biggest difference between a personality test you might find on the Internet (“Does
your personality match your favorite animal?” “What eating an Oreo cookie reveals about your
personality”) and what you find in journals or purchase from a recognized publisher is that
legitimate personality tests have reliability, validity, and generalizability, backed by research
evidence that is available for public scrutiny.
When we have a good test, we know that we will be able to replicate a certain score (or come
close enough, allowing for measurement error) and trust that the test has a particular meaning,
which allows us to make inferences about behavior, a construct, or other variables (John & Soto,
2007). When evaluating a test, we should ask ourselves: What does this test measure? Is this test
reliable? For what purpose is this test valid? (Smith & Archer, 2008). The answers to these three
questions will tell us about the test’s reliability, validity, and generalizability.

Test Reliability: Generalizability Across Time, Items, and Raters

Reliability is a prerequisite for validity. We cannot know the correct time with an unreliable
watch (Smith & Archer, 2008). A measure must first be consistent in order to be a valid repre-
sentation of an underlying theoretical construct. Reliability is an estimate of how consistent a
test is: A good test gives consistent results over time, items, or raters (see Table 4.3).
“I made my own assessment Reliability describes the extent to which test scores are consistent and reproducible with
of my life, and I began to live repeated measurements (Cronbach, Rajaratnam, & Gleser, 1963; John & Soto, 2007). These
it. That was freedom.” measurements may be repeated at different times, across multiple items, or using multiple judges
or observers. We want to know that a test gives consistent results in all of these situations: across
Fernando Flores, Chilean
time, across items, and across raters. These are all kinds of reliability (Smith & Archer, 2008).
politician
One way of checking to see if a test has temporal consistency reliability is to have respon-
dents take the test a second time to see if their scores are similar (Cronbach, 1947). Of course,
when demonstrating test–retest reliability we need to be careful that participants are not
merely remembering what they originally said in the first test-taking session. We also need to
be careful that there are no practice effects, where participants perform better merely because
they’ve seen the test before. To eliminate all of these effects, we want the second test to be far
enough removed in time so that there is no memory or practice effects, yet not so much later
that our participants have changed in the interim (Campbell & Stanley, 1966).
One way of checking internal consistency reliability is to see if different items of the test
give similar results. In the early days of psychological testing developers would make up two
versions of a test that were comparable and checked to see that the scores on the parallel forms
of the test were similar—parallel-forms reliability (Cronbach, 1947). Sometimes they would
split a test in half and see if test-takers’ scores on one half correlated with scores on the other
half, to demonstrate split-half reliability (Cronbach, 1947). Today, most researchers rely on a
statistic called Cronbach’s alpha (a) (Cronbach, 1951).

Table 4.3 Generalizability Across Time, Items, and Raters

Type of Consistency Type of Reliability Facet of Generalizability
Temporal consistency Test–retest Across time
Internal consistency Parallel forms Across items
Split-half
Cronbach’s alpha
Rater consistency Interrater reliability Across raters
Source: Trochim W. M. K. (2006). Research methods knowledge base, 3/e. Cincinnati, OH: Atomic Dog Publishing.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 81

Imagine taking the correlation between the scores of two halves of a test. Now imagine SEE FOR YOURSELF
calculating the average correlation of all possible halves of the test. That is what Cronbach’s
alpha reliability estimates: the generalizability of the score from one set of items to another Some professors of very
(John & Soto, 2007). large classes use multiple
forms of the same test. What
Because an unreliable measure makes it harder to find a true effect, researchers will try to
kind of reliability must these
make sure that their measures have an alpha of .70 to .80, and even higher when designing tests tests have?
that will be used to compare or judge individuals, like IQ tests (Nunnally & Bernstein, 1994).
Here, alphas should be greater than .9 and, ideally, at least .95. However, this is not a hard-and-fast
rule; it is up to researchers to decide if their measures are good enough depending on the goals
of their research (Cortina, 1993; John & Soto, 2007). Good researchers will provide a discussion
of their rationale for accepting or rejecting an alpha when they publish their research findings.
To illustrate, suppose a researcher wants to measure Neuroticism. She constructs the scale
in Table 4.4. This scale will have a high alpha, but it may lack validity. That is, it may not
adequately represent the concept of Neuroticism. Recall that Neuroticism includes the fac-
ets of anxiety, angry hostility, depression, self-consciousness, impulsiveness, and vulnerability THINK ABOUT IT
(Costa & McCrae, 1992). Given the theory behind the scale, we would not expect the scores
What kinds of questions
of the various facets to correlate too highly with each other. However, we would expect high
would measure anxiety?
alphas among the eight questions tapping a single facet like anxiety. Of course, we would need Angry hostility?
to measure more than arachnophobia!
We also want to be sure our measures are reliable across multiple raters (John & Soto,
2007). To check for interrater reliability we might have two separate judges rate the personality
or behavior of a third person. Researchers will often calculate the average correlation among
the scores of all raters or the percentage agreement among raters. If the raters are consistent
in their judgments, then these correlations ought to be high. If there is disagreement among
raters, it could mean that the construct is ambiguous or too broad, the measure is problematic,
or that the raters misunderstand what they are judging. The researcher will need to rethink his
or her operationalization of the construct, revise the measure, or work with the raters to clear
up any confusion to improve the reliability of their ratings. Again, good researchers will report
interrater reliability and how it was achieved in their reports.
For example, consider the study discussed in Chapter 2, where observers tried to judge
people’s personality based on what their bedrooms looked like (Gosling et al., 2002). Observers
rated the personality of occupants using the five factors. Depending on the factor, the average
correlation of observers’ ratings ranged from a low of .08 for Neuroticism, to a high of .58 for
Openness, suggesting that observers were more likely to agree in their judgment of Openness
than Neuroticism from the appearance of people’s bedrooms.

Test Validity
Validity is the extent to which a test measures what it is supposed to measure (Loevinger, 1957). “[E]verything that we do as
Because there are many ways to investigate this question—Does the test correlate with other scientists comes back, in the
tests? Does it predict behavior? Does it predict some future outcome?—there are many kinds end, to the importance of
of validity. A test has validity if it is grounded in research evidence, that is, if it correlates with being valid.”
some standard (Loevinger, 1957). The exact standard or the kind of research evidence depends Personality researchers Oliver
on the specific type of validity a researcher wishes to demonstrate. P. John and Christopher J. Soto
(2007, p. 489)
Table 4.4 Redundancy Department: Example of a Scale With High Internal Consistency but With Question-
able Validity
I am afraid of spiders
I get anxious around creepy-crawly things
I am not bothered by insects (reverse scored)
Spiders tend to make me nervous
Note: This scale may be a good measure of fear of insects, but not a very good measure of Neuroticism.
Source: John and Soto (2007, p. 471). Reprinted with permission from John, O. P., & Soto, C. J. (2007), “The importance of being
valid,” as appeared in R. W. Robins & R. C. Fraley (Eds.), Handbook of Research Methods in Personality Psychology, p. 461–494 (New
York, NY: The Guilford Press). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
82 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

THINK ABOUT IT Every test aims to measure an underlying concept called a construct, which derives from a
theory. Therefore, ultimately, every test must have construct validity and successfully measure
Why is face validity insuf- the theoretical concept it was designed to measure (Loevinger, 1957; Simms & Watson, 2007).
ficient for establishing For example, the Eysenck Personality Inventory is designed to measure Extraversion, Neuroti-
construct validity?
cism, and Impulsivity, three dimensions that Eysenck theorized to be genetic, biological, and
determined by our physiology (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1975).
A test has face validity when it appears to measure the construct of interest (Cronbach,
1960). For example, you might reasonably figure out that a test that asks about suicide ide-
ation, mood, feelings of sadness, and changes in appetite is measuring feelings of depression.
This is an example of a test with high face validity. However, with neuropsychological tests
or tests asking about how one interacts with other people it would be harder to see exactly
what concept the test is measuring. These are examples of tests with low face validity (Smith
& Archer, 2008).
Face validity is not the most convincing type of validity. However, it is useful under two
conditions. First, face validity is important for personnel testing, or other situations where the
cooperation and motivation of the test-taker can affect the results of a test (Smither, Reilly,
Millsap, Perlman, & Stoffey, 1993). When a test has face validity, respondents view the content
of a test as fair and relevant to some situation or particular outcome, like job performance
THINK ABOUT IT
(Wiggins, 1973). Test-takers try harder and take a test more seriously if they can see how a test
What behavioral outcomes is related to the content of a job (Chan, Schmitt, DeShon, Clause, & Delbridge, 1997). When
should a test measuring test items seem obscure to job applicants, they may view the test as busy work or a waste of their
extraversion and introver- time. However, depending on the purpose of the test, test-takers might purposely respond inac-
sion correlate with in order
to have criterion-related
curately, such as presenting themselves as better or worse off than they really are, or to present
validity? themselves in a favorable light (Smith & Archer, 2008). Researchers often disguise the content
of a test to lessen the possibility that respondents might try to fake their answers, compromising
face validity to establish other kinds of validity (Holden & Jackson, 1979).
A second useful condition for face validity is when researchers are developing a new measure
of a concept. Often, they will think of items that appear to measure what they want the test to mea-
sure. Then they will administer their test to respondents and see which items are actually related
to the trait or concept the researcher wants to measure. When it comes to test validity, substance is
more important than looks. That is, we need evidence to support the validity of a test. Face validity
is not good enough; there must be other kinds of validity for a test to be considered valid.
Criterion validity determines how good a test is, by comparing the results of the test to
an external standard like another personality test or some behavioral outcome. For example, a

Which person do you think would score higher on the Need for Cognition Scale if the scale had construct
validity?
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 83

Table 4.5 The Need for Cognition Scale

1. I would prefer complex to simple problems.
2. I like to have the responsibility of handling a situation that requires a lot of thinking.
3.* Thinking is not my idea of fun.
4.* I would rather do something that requires little thought than something that is sure to challenge my thinking abilities.
5.* I try to anticipate and avoid situations where there is a likely chance I will have to think in depth about something.
6. I find satisfaction in deliberating hard and for long hours.
7.* I only think as hard as I have to.
8.* I prefer to think about small, daily projects to long-term ones.
9.* I like tasks that require little thought once I’ve learned them.
10. The idea of relying on thought to make my way to the top appeals to me.
11. I really enjoy a task that involves coming up with new solutions to problems.
12.* Learning new ways to think doesn’t excite me very much.
13. I prefer my life to be filled with puzzles that I must solve.
14. The notion of thinking abstractly is appealing to me.
15. I would prefer a task that is intellectual, difficult, and important to one that is somewhat important but does not require
much thought.
16.* I feel relief rather than satisfaction after completing a task that required a lot of mental effort.
17.* It’s enough for me that something gets the job done; I don’t care how or why it works.
18. I usually end up deliberating about issues even when they do not affect me personally.
Ratings were made using a - 4 to +4 Likert scale, in which +4 = very strong agreement, +3 = strong agreement, +2 = moderate agreement,
+ 1 = slight agreement, 0 = neither agreement nor disagreement, -1 = slight disagreement, -2 = moderate disagreement, -3 = strong disagreement, and
-4 = very strong disagreement. *Indicates reverse scored items.
Source: Cacioppo et al. (1984, Table 1, p. 307). Reprinted with permission from Cacioppo, J. T., Petty, R. E., & Kao, C. F. (1984), “The Efficient Assessment of Need for Cognition,”
Journal of Personality Assessment, 48(3), 306–307. Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.

test of extraversion-introversion should distinguish people who seek out the company of others
(extraverts) from those that don’t (introverts).
Take, for example, the Need for Cognition Scale (Cacioppo & Petty, 1982). This scale mea-
sures individual differences in the need for and enjoyment of effortful thinking (see Table 4.5).
To establish criterion validity, Cacioppo and Petty (1982) compared two groups of participants
assumed to differ in their preferences for heavy thinking: college professors and assembly-line
workers. Sure enough, the college professors scored higher on the need for cognition test than
the workers, suggesting that the test did indeed capture some important criteria that differed
between the two groups, demonstrating criterion validity.
In addition to criterion validity, we might check to see if our test is similar to other tests
of the same construct or to tests of related constructs. This establishes convergent validity
(Campbell & Fiske, 1959). At the same time, we want to be sure that our test is different
from tests of constructs that we theorize to be unrelated to the one we are interested in. We
might look for discriminant validity to be sure that our test taps a different concept entirely
(Campbell & Fiske, 1959). To establish construct validity we must demonstrate both what a
THINK ABOUT IT
test measures and what it doesn’t measure (John & Soto, 2007); neither type of validity alone
is sufficient (Trochim, 2006). Essentially, we want to be sure our test converges with similar If a high sensation seeker
constructs and discriminates between dissimilar constructs (Trochim, 2006). For example, and a low sensation seeker
the Need for Cognition Scale, as Cacioppo and Petty (1982) hypothesized, correlated with scored differently on a test,
what kind of validity would
open-mindedness but did not correlate with test anxiety or social desirability, demonstrating
this illustrate?
convergent and discriminant validity.
At the same time, a test ought to give feedback that is specific to a person or a group of
people who share a certain characteristic. A test that gives feedback so general, superficial, or
84 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

ambiguous that it could apply to virtually all people lacks predictive validity. Remember the story
of Professor Forer, who gave all his students the same personality feedback? He demonstrated
SEE FOR YOURSELF that people were quick to trust a test that gave general statements about their personalities.
The fact that people readily believe such feedback is called the Barnum Effect (Meehl, 1956;
Take a personality test from Snyder, Shenkel, & Lowery, 1977) after the circus showman P. T. Barnum, who believed that a
the Internet or a magazine. good circus had a “little something for everybody.” Such tests lack construct validity because
Do you think the test is
they distinguish no one. They give an illusion of accuracy when applied to a single individual
valid? Why or why not? What
could you do to test this? (Wiggins, 1973). This is why people think that feedback from a nightclub graphologist, horo-
scopes, palm readers, and questionable personality tests applies to them.
Many invalid personality tests—especially those circulating on the Internet for fun—
provide feedback so general that they can apply to anybody, so that an unthinking reader can
easily be taken in. Keep in mind our discussion of validity when you see one of these fake
personality tests, and try not to be one of the gullible masses of whom Barnum also said,
“There is a sucker born every minute.”

Test Generalizability
After designing a reliable measure and validating it, researchers also need to think about the
specific uses, settings, and population groups the measure is valid for (John & Soto, 2007). This
gets at the third question: For what purpose is this test valid?
Generalizability establishes the boundaries or limitations of a test. We cannot use a
test for a use other than what it was intended, nor administer the test to a group of people
it was not validated on. For example, the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory
(MMPI; Butcher, Dahlstrom, Graham, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 1989), the Rorschach inkblot
test (Rorschach, 1921), the Beck Depression Inventory (Beck, Steer, & Brown, 1996), and
other tests that were designed to diagnose mental disorders cannot be used to determine
the fitness of an applicant for work.
Many personality tests specifically note that they are for children or adults but not both.
A real challenge for researchers is to establish that their tests are valid for populations other
than college students (John & Soto, 2007). Age, gender, race, and cultural background are just
some of the population characteristics we must keep in mind when designing, validating,
administering, and interpreting tests.

Research Methods Illustrated:

Is the NEO-PI-R a Good Personality Test?

P
sychologists often use personality tests in their research. As a result, their research will only
be as good as the tests they use. Using an unreliable test will make it hard to find a true effect;
using an invalid test will render the results useless.

One size fits all?

Generalizability establishes
the limitations of a test, such
as the population for which it
is valid.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 85

When researchers publish a personality test, they must conduct validity and reliability analyses
and report their findings. For many tests, especially personality and clinical tests, this information
is published in the test manual or instruction booklet that comes with the test. Two examples of
this are the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI; Butcher et al., 1989) and the NEO
Personality Inventory—Revised (NEO-PI-R; Costa & McCrae, 1992). For some tests this information
is published in a book or in peer-reviewed journals, as is the case with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem
Scale (Rosenberg, 1965), the Crowne-Marlow Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlow, 1960), the
Need for Cognition Scale (Cacioppo & Petty, 1982; Cacioppo, Petty, & Kao, 1984), and the Snyder Self-
Monitoring Scale (Snyder & Gangestad, 1986).
Now that you understand what makes a good test—reliability, validity, and generalizability—
let’s evaluate one of the most extensively used personality tests: the NEO-PI-R (Costa & McCrae,
1992).

Does the NEO-PI-R Have Reliability?

To see if the NEO-PI-R is a reliable test, Costa and McCrae (1992) report Cronbach’s alpha for each
of the factors and facets. The alphas ranged from .56 to .81 for the various facets, which Costa and
McCrae find acceptable for scales of only eight items. The internal consistency of the factors is much
higher, as you can see in Table 4.6.
To check for test–retest reliability, college students took the NEO-PI-R at two different times,
3 months apart. As you can see in Table 4.6 the correlations were quite high indicating good
reliability.

Does the NEO-PI-R Have Validity?

To answer this question, let’s first take a look at construct validity. That is, does the NEO-PI-R
measure 5 and only 5 factors of personality? Table 4.7 presents the results of a factor analysis of
the 30 facet scales from the NEO-PI-R. The factor analysis yielded the 5 factors of Neuroticism,
Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness, as predicted. Together, these
factors accounted for 58% of the variance in responses (Costa et al., 1991). As you can see, each
facet had the highest loading on the appropriate factor. Some facets also loaded on a second
factor. Costa and McCrae (1992) deemed this acceptable because these additional correlations
made theoretical sense.
Based on these analyses, it appears that the NEO-PI-R is a good operationalization of the theory
behind the test. But does the test have criterion validity? Does it predict to a criterion outside the test?
This is where McCrae and Costa have done, and continue to do, a lot of research.
Costa and McCrae (1992) hypothesized that individuals in psychotherapy would
score high in Neuroticism and that drug abusers would score low on Agreeableness and
Conscientiousness, and indeed they do. In addition, there are significantly high correlations
between a person’s score on the NEO-PI-R and their friend’s or spouse’s ratings of their
personality (Costa and McCrae,1992). These two findings demonstrate that the NEO-PI-R has
criterion validity.
Costa and McCrae (1992) demonstrated both convergent and discriminant validity by
correlating scores on the NEO-PI-R with scores on other personality tests. As expected, scores on
Neuroticism and Extraversion correlate with the Neuroticism and Extraversion scales of the Eysenck

Table 4.6 Reliability of the NEO-PI-R

Factor Alpha Test–Retest Correlations
Neuroticism .92 .79
Extraversion .89 .79
Openness .87 .80
Agreeableness .86 .75
Conscientiousness .90 .83
Source: Adapted from Costa and McCrae (1992, Table 5, p. 44). Costa, P. T., & McCrae, R. R. (1992). Revised NEO person-
ality inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO five-factor inventory (NEO-FFI) professional manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological
Assessment Resources.
86 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

Table 4.7 Factor Structure of the NEO-PI-R

Factor
Scale N E O A C
Neuroticism Facets
N1 .81 .02 -.01 -.01 -.10
N2 .63 - .03 .01 –.48 -.08
N3 .80 -.10 .02 -.03 - .26
N4 .73 - .18 - .09 .04 - .16
N5 .49 .35 .02 -.21 - .32
N6 .70 -.15 -.09 .04 -.38
Extraversion Facets
E1 - .12 .66 .18 .38 .13
E2 - .18 .66 .04 .07 - .03
E3 - .32 .44 .23 -.32 .32
E4 .04 .54 .16 - .27 .42
E5 .00 .58 .11 - .38 - .06
E6 - .04 .74 .19 .10 .10
Openness Facets
O1 .18 .18 .58 -.14 -.31
O2 .14 .04 .73 .17 .14
O3 .37 .41 .50 - .01 .12
O4 - .19 .22 .57 .04 -.04
O5 - .15 -.01 .75 - .09 .16
O6 - .13 .08 .49 - .07 - .15
Agreeableness Facets
A1 - .35 .22 .15 .56 .03
A2 - .03 -.15 -.11 .68 .24
A3 - .06 .52 -.05 .55 .27
A4 - .16 -.08 .00 .77 .01
A5 .19 - .12 - .18 .59 - .08
A6 .04 .27 .13 .62 .00
Conscientiousness Facets
C1 –.41 .17 .13 .03 .64
C2 - .04 .06 -.19 .01 .70
C3 -.20 -.04 .01 .29 .68
C4 -.09 .23 .15 -.13 .74
C5 - .33 .17 -.08 .06 .75
C6 - .23 -.28 - .04 .22 .57
Note: Significant factor loadings appear in bold print.
Source: Costa and McCrae (1992, Table 5, p. 44). Costa, P. T., & McCrae, R. R. (1992). Revised NEO personality inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO five-factor inventory (NEO-FFI) profes-
sional manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 87

Personality Inventory (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1975). Similarly, facet scores on the NEO-PI-R correlate
with the appropriate adjective responses from the Adjective Check List (ACL; Gough & Heilbrun,
1983). For example, “friendly” correlated with Warmth and Tender-Mindedness but not with Anxiety
or Achievement-Striving. Similarly, “dreamy” correlated with Fantasy, but not any of the other facets
of Openness.
Finally, whereas the NEO-PI-R doesn’t have special questions or scales to help identify response
sets (see the following section), Costa and McCrae (1992) cautioned that if a person has left out
more than 40 items, their scores may not be valid.

Does the NEO-PI-R Have Test Generalizability?

As reported in the manual for the NEO-PI-R, the test is valid for use in many populations, including
adults and elders, White and non-White respondents, men and women, with high school or college
levels of education (Costa & McCrae, 1992). The test is also valid for use in clinical settings, such as
drug rehabilitation programs and individual psychotherapy. Many of these uses are described in
more detail in the manual. The NEO-PI-R has also been translated into other languages and appears
to be valid in other cultures as well (McCrae, 2002). The manual does note that the NEO-PI-R is for
adults, so that it would not be appropriate to try to give the test to people younger than 18 (Costa &
McCrae, 1992).
As you can see from this brief review of the many studies conducted, the NEO-PI-R does appear
to be a valid and reliable test. However, this is merely the beginning of research on the five-factor
model of traits. Psychologists may disagree with McCrae and Costa about their theory, the right
number of factors, appropriate populations, or the design of their research, but nobody is claiming
that the NEO-PI-R is invalid or unreliable. Now that McCrae and Costa have a good measure, it is up
to them and other researchers to use this test to explore human personality.

Personality Tests
Now that we’ve established what makes for a good personality test, let’s take a closer look at
personality tests. As you can imagine, there are many ways of asking people about their person-
alities and many different formats respondents can use to tell us. In addition, there is a whole
science behind the ways people respond to personality tests, such as identifying whether people
are just careless or if they are purposely trying to present themselves in a certain way by their
answers. Let us consider the types and formats of personality tests and some of the typical ways
people respond to them.

Types and Formats of Personality Tests

Psychologists generally divide personality tests into two kinds: self-report and performance-
based, once called objective tests and projective tests (Smith & Archer, 2008). In self-report tests THINK ABOUT IT
respondents answer questions about themselves. Response formats and question styles can Why were performance-
vary depending on the purpose of the test and the construct the researcher is trying to mea- based tests once called
sure (Smith & Archer, 2008). Performance-based tests use an unstructured format in which projective tests?
participants must respond to a stimulus in as much detail as they would like, often within
certain parameters set by the researcher. Because the stimuli used in these tests are ambiguous,
respondents must project their own meanings, significances, patterns, feelings, interpretations,
concerns, or worldviews onto the stimulus. These projections of people’s private worlds are
reflected in their answers (Smith & Archer, 2008).

Self-Report Tests. Self-report personality measures may use a dichotomous two-choice scale
(e.g., true–false, yes–no) or a Likert-type rating scale. Likert rating scales might ask participants
to rate their agreement (e.g., strongly disagree to strongly agree), degree (e.g., very little to quite
a bit), similarity (e.g., uncharacteristic of me to characteristic of me), or frequency (e.g., never to
always) using a scale, such as a 5- or 7-point scale (Simms & Watson, 2007, p. 246). Other pos-
sible formats include checklists, forced-choice scales, and visual analog scales (Clark & Watson,
1995; see Figure 4.1).
88 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

I work on problems because I’m supposed to.

Figure 4.1 Visual analog scale of one item from a test measuring intrinsic and extrinsic
motivation in children. The administrators explained verbally to the children that the boxes
represented a 1 to 5 Likert scale from not at all true for me to very true for me. Source: Lepper
Corpus, and Iyengar (2005, Figure 1, bottom, p. 187). Lepper, M. R., Corpus, J. H., & Iyengar, S. S.
(2005). Intrinsic and extrinsic motivational orientations in the classroom: Age differences and
academic correlates. Journal of Educational Psychology, 97(2), 184–196. Copyright American
“Responding to questionnaire Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.
items is like talking with For example, in the Adjective Check List (ACL; Gough & Heilbrun, 1983), respondents
an anonymous interviewer. select those adjectives out of 300 that best describe themselves. Based on the number and type
People use their item of items checked, various scales are scored including achievement, dominance, autonomy, self-
responses to tell an confidence, nurturance, and creativity. The Creative Personality scale for the ACL measures
creativity in college students (Gough, 1979; see Table 4.8).
anonymous interviewer who
they are and how they would
like to be seen.” Table 4.8 The Creative Personality Scale of the Adjective Check List
Psychologists Robert Hogan, Joyce
Column 1 Column 2
Hogan, and Brent Roberts writing
about personality measurement Capable Affected
and employment decisions Clever Cautious
(1996, p. 470) Confident Commonplace
Egotistical Conservative
Humorous Conventional
Individualistic Dissatisfied
Informal Honest
Insightful Interests narrow
Intelligent Mannerly
Interests wide Sincere
Inventive Submissive
Original Suspicious
Reflective
Resourceful
Self-confident
Sexy
Snobbish
Unconventional
Note: Circle those items which best describe yourself. Scoring: Give yourself 1 point for every item circled in the first column.
Subtract 1 point for every item circled in the second column. Scores can range from - 12 to + 18. In 1979, Gough reported that in
a sample of 1,121 college students, males averaged 5.03, significantly higher than females who scored 3.97. Graduate students
in psychology were the most creative group he tested.
Source: Gough, H. G. (1979). A creative personality scale for the adjective checklist. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
37(8), 1398–1405. Copyright American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 89

Tests with a forced-choice format present respondents with a limited number of choices
rather than a rating scale. True–false questions, or instructions to pick which of two state-
ments a respondent thinks best describes himself or herself are examples of forced choices.
Personality tests that use a forced-choice format include the Locus of Control Scale (Rotter,
1966), which we will talk about in Chapter 10, and the Machiavellianism Scale (Christie &
Geis, 1970; Geis, 1978).
The Machiavellianism Scale is named for Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) who was
“One who deceives will
an astute adviser and diplomat in Florence, Italy, during the Renaissance. He wrote a book,
The Prince, advising a fictional ruler on how best to acquire and stay in power. Machiavelli always find those who allow
believed that most people were too trusting, not very smart, and could readily be taken themselves to be deceived.”
advantage of for one’s own purposes. Personality psychologists Richard Christie and Florence Niccolò Machiavelli
Geis culled statements directly from The Prince to design a forced-choice questionnaire to
measure Machiavellianism, the extent to which a person believes that other people are easily
manipulable (Christie & Geis, 1970).
As you can see in Table 4.9, the items refer to types of interpersonal tactics, views of human
nature, and beliefs about morality (Wrightsman, 1991). Originally, the scale was in Likert for-
mat, but Christie and Geis devised this forced-choice format to control for the effects of social
desirability. Research conducted on this scale suggests that people who are high in Machiavel-
lianism, so-called High Machs are not more hostile, vicious, or vindictive than Low Machs; they
just have a cool detachment when dealing with other people, emotional issues, or potentially
embarrassing situations.

Table 4.9 Machiavellianism: Sample Questions From the Mach V Attitude Inventory
Please read each of the three statements in each group. Then decide first which of the statements is most true or comes the closest to
describing your own beliefs. Circle a plus (+ ) in the space provided on the answer sheet.
Just decide which of the remaining two statements is most false or is the farthest from your own beliefs. Circle the minus (- ) in the
space provided on the answer sheet.
You will mark two statements in each group of three—the one that comes the closest to your own beliefs with a + and the one
furthest from your beliefs with a - . The remaining statement should be left unmarked.
Statement Most True Most False
1. A It takes more imagination to be a successful criminal than a successful business man. + -
B The phrase “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” contains a lot + -
of truth.
C Most men forget more easily the death of their father than the loss of their property. + -
2. A Men are more concerned with the car they drive than with the clothes their wives wear. + -
B It is very important that imagination and creativity in children be cultivated. + -
C People suffering from incurable diseases should have the choice of being put painlessly + -
to death.
3. A Never tell anyone the real reason you did something unless it is useful to do so. + -
B The well-being of the individual is the goal that should be worked for before anything + -
else.
C Once a truly intelligent person makes up his mind about the answer to a problem he + -
rarely continues to think about it.
4. A People are getting so lazy and self-indulgent that it is bad for our country. + -
B The way to handle people is to tell them what they want to hear. + -
C It would be a good thing if people were kinder to others less fortunate than themselves. + -
Source: Adapted from Geis (1978, Table II-4, pp. 22–25). Geis, F. L. (1978). Machiavellianism. In H. London & J. Exner (Eds.), Dimensions of personality (p. 285–313). New York, NY.: Wiley.
90 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

Performance-Based Tests. Performance-

based tests such as the Rorschach inkblot
test (Rorschach, 1921) and the Thematic
Apperception Test (TAT; Morgan & Murray,
1935) are more often used in clinical set-
tings and forensic settings; however, the
validity of many performance-based tests
is highly controversial (Lilienfeld, Wood, &
Garb, 2000). Some scales derived from the
Rorschach and the TAT are valid for cer-
tain uses, but many other tests are indeed
questionable.
There are five categories of projec-
tive techniques (Lindzey, 1959; Morgan &
Murray, 1935):

1. Association techniques (e.g., Word

Association Test; Rorschach inkblot
test)
Self-report tests are frequently 2. Construction techniques (e.g., Draw-
used for job selection and
A-Person test; the TAT)
placement.
3. Completion techniques (e.g., sentence-
completion tests)
4. Arrangement or selection of stimuli (e.g., pick your favorite color, picture, or other
SEE FOR YOURSELF stimuli)
Write a story about the 5. Expression techniques (e.g., creative doll or puppet play; artwork)
photo below. Who is the
boy? What is he doing? How
The TAT is used by some personality psychologists to measure motives including the need
did he get here? What will
happen next? for affiliation, the need for power, and most often, the need for achievement (McClelland,
Atkinson, Clark, & Lowell, 1953). Respondents write a story in response to a picture. The stories
are then coded for certain elements indicative of achievement motivation.
For example, take a look at the photo below. A person high in need for achievement might
write a story like this:
In the picture I believe the little boy that I will call Jimmy has just come home
running from school because he has just gotten his first A on a test. He tells his

This original photo, from 1940,

by American photographer
Marion Post Wolcott
(1910–1990) was modified by
Henry Murray for use as one
of the cards in the Thematic
Apperception Test.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 91

parents how he knows that when he grows up he will be a doctor and can take
care of everyone in the town when they get sick. He will be known by everyone
and will be the best doctor in the whole world. His father says that he is positive
that someday he will be something really amazing. Jimmy now asks his mom
and dad, can I do a big boy chore as a reward for doing so good in school? I know
I can do it, you just have to give me a chance to try. His parents tell him that the
tasks of feeding the animals are still too dangerous for him, that maybe he can
do something else. He says that [is] fine and goes out and sits in the barn door
just thinking about all the wonderful things that he will accomplish during his
lifetime; he even is considering [a] career as an astronaut. This is where you see
him in the picture, just anxious to be able to do all the things that he wants and
knows he will be able to do.
This story, written by a college student, contains themes such as high standards, unusual
achievements, persistence, and an impediment toward success that suggest a high need for
achievement (McClelland et al., 1953).
Similarly, the Goodenough-Harris Draw-A-Person (DAP) test may be interpreted
according to the presence or absence of certain elements (e.g., size of the eyes may indicate
paranoia; absence of a face may indicate depression). Here, the figure drawn is believed to
represent the self-image of the respondent (Machover, 1949). Others have developed highly
specific scoring guidelines depending on the level of detail of the picture (Koppitz, 1968).
The global and sign approaches vary in their validity (Lilienfeld et al., 2000). The photo
below depicts a variation of the Draw-A-Person test used by an art therapist working with
cancer survivors.

Response Sets
There are pros and cons to both self-report and performance-based tests. Self-report tests can THINK ABOUT IT
give us access to an amazing amount of information about various aspects of people’s thoughts
When might a person wish
and experiences. Self-report tests are relatively easy to administer and to score. Indeed, self- to fake good? When might a
reports may be the only way to measure certain aspects of personality including well-being, person wish to fake bad?
values, and life goals (Paulhus & Vazire, 2007).
However, there are some notable problems with self-reports. People may not be the best
judges of their own skill, expertise, or knowledge, often overestimating their performance
(Dunning et al., 2004). People may also wish to present themselves in a certain light and answer
in a way that, unfortunately, jeopardizes the
validity of the test (Paulhus & Vazire, 2007).
For example, some people may answer
questions to make themselves appear bet-
ter than they really are by faking good, such
as appearing more psychologically healthy,
more qualified, or more experienced than
A variation of the Draw-A-
they really are. Others might make them-
Person test. An example of a
selves appear worse by faking bad, such as
self-portrait of a 48-year-old
appearing unqualified or in need of special woman recovering from
treatment. This is more problematic in clini- cancer depicting where
cal situations where people are evaluated for and how she experiences
a diagnosis or for treatment than in job hir- pain and health in her body.
ing and assessment (Tett et al., 2006). Luck- She experiences physical
ily, the incidence of deliberate faking among pain in her abdomen and
job applicants is rather low (Hough, Eaton, feet, psychological pain as
Dunnette, Kamp, & McCloy, 1990). anxious thoughts in her
Some people may portray themselves head, and responsibilities as a
weight on her shoulders. She
in an exaggeratedly positive manner where
experiences health when she
they try to appear more cooperative, lik-
feels love in her heart.
able, or socially appropriate than they really
92 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

are, often by not admitting to distasteful, but perfectly human tendencies such as enjoy-
ing gossiping or having sexual urges. Psychologists call this socially desirable responding.
Other people may be accommodating to the point of agreeing with whatever the question
is asking, engaging in yea-saying or acquiescent responding. On the flip side, others might
disagree with almost everything, engaging in nay-saying or reactant responding (Paulhus
& Vazire, 2007).
Others, may engage in extreme responding where they avoid the middle of the scale,
choosing the more extreme ends like choosing mostly 1s and 5s on a 5-point scale. Others, may
engage in moderate responding often choosing the midpoint of the scale in their responses.
THINK ABOUT IT Still others may respond in patterned responding by making patterns on an answer
sheet by marking their answers in a physical pattern like 1-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-1 or circling all 3s
What should a researcher
down the page. And then there’s just plain-old carelessness, where a person might leave out
do about noncontent
responding of a participant? a question, forget to turn a page, or circle an answer on the wrong line throwing off all the
answers.
When people have a set way that they tend to respond to self-report questions—either
deliberately or unknowingly—psychologists call these response sets or noncontent respond-
ing. Response sets can lead to false results (Cronbach, 1947, 1950). Yea-saying, for example, can
artificially inflate scores whereas nay-saying can artificially depress scores. Imagine an anxiety
scale that asks about which symptoms a person has experienced in the past week. A person with
a high score might truly be an anxious person—or he or she might be a yea-sayer.
Response sets can vary by culture. One study found that Canadian and American high
school students showed more extreme responding, compared to Japanese and Chinese students,
a tendency that correlated with personal ratings of individualism (Chen, Lee, & Stevenson,
THINK ABOUT IT 1995). Asian students showed more moderate responding. Despite a relationship between cul-
ture and response sets, response sets were not strong enough to account for cultural differences
Why do response sets vary
by culture? in individualism–collectivism scores. As you might expect, North American participants showed
more individualism than participants in the Asian cultures.
Test constructors have devised ways of identifying and minimizing response sets. For
example, designers might include the statement “I am happy” and its exact opposite “I am
not happy” to catch people engaging in acquiescent or reactant responding. A good way to
control both kinds of response sets is to write half the items so that a high rating indicates
that the responder has the trait and the other half so that a low rating indicates that the
responder has the trait (Paulhus & Vazire, 2007). This reverse scoring of some items prevents
a person from getting a high score simply by agreeing or disagreeing with each of the items
(Wiggins, 1973).
To identify pattern responding researchers might set up computer programs to catch cer-
tain patterns. Sometimes researchers will include extremely rare questions to check for pattern
or random responses. For example, it would be highly unlikely for a person to agree that he or
she were born in Pago-Pago or that he or she recently had a liver transplant (Paulhus & Vazire,
2007). Although any one of these usual items on an infrequency scale could be true, a number
of such answers suggests that all of a responder’s answers are suspicious. Such scales are often
called lie scales because they are designed to identify a person who is lying.
THINK ABOUT IT To work around the problem of extreme responding the Q-sort test (Block, 1961), for
example, forces respondents to limit the number of times each response can be used (Paulhus
What should a researcher
& Vazire, 2007). The 100 items of this test are listed on small cards. Some of the items include
do about a participant who
scores high on a lie scale? “Is a talkative individual,” “Is calm, relaxed in manner,” and “Feels a lack of personal meaning
in life.”
Respondents must sort the cards into 1 of 9 piles, representing a 1 to 9 scale, indicating
how characteristic of them each statement is. However, respondents must sort a set number
of cards into each pile. For example, respondents can choose only 5 items that are the most
characteristics of them (pile 9) and 5 items that are the least characteristic of them (pile 1),
and 18 in the middle pile indicating that they are neither characteristic nor uncharacteristic of
them (pile 5). This forces participants to use the full scale and avoids many types of response
sets including extreme responding, moderate responding, acquiescent responding, or reactant
responding.
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 93

Social desirability responding is a bit harder for researchers to control. Sometimes a forced-
choice format, where both statements make a person appear equally good, can make it easier
for respondents to answer truthfully rather than choose the one that makes them look better
than they are (Paulhus, 1991). Another method is to give participants a scale that measures their
tendency for socially desirable responding and then use their scores to statistically control for
social desirability in the score of interest (Paulhus, 1991).
One such scale is the Crowne-Marlow Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlow, 1960).
As you can see in Table 4.10, most people, if they were completely honest, would have to admit THINK ABOUT IT
that they have intensely disliked someone or have felt resentful. However, some people have
How might social desirabil-
a very hard time admitting that they have these all-too-human feelings. These are the kind of
ity responding invalidate a
people who would score particularly high in social desirability on the Crowne-Marlow scale and participant’s responses?
are likely to respond in a socially desirable manner to any personality questionnaire.
Another way to control for social desirability is to structure the testing situation to mini-
mize the pressure for participants to look good (Paulhus, 1991). This can be done by assur-
ing respondents of anonymity in their responses, physically separating respondents from each
other, or having respondents seal their responses in an envelope to be deposited in a box on
their way out of the testing room. Sometimes questions can be phrased to appear reasonable
so that a person will feel comfortable giving a true answer.
Finally, other researchers suggest that social desirability responding is merely a type
of impression management and needs to be treated as a personality difference and not as a
response set to be screened our or controlled for (Uziel, 2010).

Personality Tests and Selection

The area of psychological assessment has a lot to offer the business world. Personality tests, in
particular, can be used to aid in selection, training, and performance (Barrick & Mount, 1991;
Borman, Hanson, & Hedge, 1997; Hogan et al., 1996; Rothstein & Goffin, 2006).
When psychologists ask if a test works, they look for reliability and validity data: Does the
test give consistent results, and does it predict to a criterion in the real world? Employers need
to know the same information, but they ask the question differently. According to Hogan et al.
(1996), businesses want to know:
Has this test been used in our industry?
Has it been used for Job X?
Can it identify persons who will perform well in Job X?
Will it work in our unique company? (p. 472)
When applying personality testing to the employment situation, we must be careful.
Though our tests are not able to predict if a specific employee will be absent on a specific day,
say next Tuesday, for example, we can predict how people with these characteristics are likely
to behave on average when it comes to absenteeism or any work behavior (Barrick & Mount,

Table 4.10 Sample Items From the Crowne-Marlow Social Desirability Scale
1. Before voting I thoroughly investigate the qualifications of all the candidates.
2. I never hesitate to go out of my way to help someone in trouble.
3. *It is sometimes hard for me to go on with my work if I am not encouraged.
4. I have never intensely disliked anyone.
5. *I like to gossip at times.
6. *I sometimes feel resentful when I don’t get my way.
Note: Respondents answer True or False to each item. Items with an * are reverse scored. The full test contains 33 items.
Source: Crowne, D. P., & Marlow, D. (1960). A new scale of social desirability independent of psychopathology. Journal of Consulting
Psychology, 24(4), 349–354.
94 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

Personality tests are an

important part of job
selection for many industries
including foreign service, law
enforcement, airlines, and
even some medical schools.

THINK ABOUT IT 1991; Hogan et al., 1996). For example, Openness to experience is a good predictor of how well
a person is likely to respond to training, and Conscientiousness is a good predictor of many
Is it fair to use personal- indexes of performance, including tardiness and absenteeism (Barrick & Mount, 1991). Friend-
ity testing to hire and fire
liness, courteousness, responsiveness, and reliability—Agreeableness, Emotional Stability, and
people? Why or why not?
Conscientiousness—predict success in customer service positions (Frei & McDaniel, 1998).
Hiring the right person for the right job can save a business millions of dollars each year.
According to one industry expert, the cost of recruiting and training a new worker, includ-
ing productivity loss, equals about 150% of an employee’s annual salary (Gale, 2002). In a
company with 1,000 employees with an average turnover rate of 10% (considered low for
most industries), if the average salary is $50,000 the annual cost of turnover could exceed
$7.5 million a year.
Researchers are actively trying to determine the best combination of personality and skills
that can predict important job outcomes (Bartram, 2005; Borman et al., 1997). These may
include traditional outcomes such as production, sales, turnover, length of service, absenteeism,
accidents, theft, and fit between the person and the organization. But more and more, employ-
ers around the world are looking to maximize process-oriented outcomes of their personnel
including leading and deciding; supporting and cooperating; interacting and presenting; ana-
lyzing and interpreting; creating and conceptualizing; organizing and executing; adapting and
coping; and enterprising and performing (Bartram, 2005).
According to a 2001 survey (see Table 4.11) close to a third of employers use some form of
psychological assessment as part of the hiring process (Society for Industrial and Organizational

Table 4.11 How Many U.S. Companies Use Employment Tests? Percentage of Employers Who . . .
Test job applicants in basic literacy and/or math skills 41%
Engage in various forms of job skill testing 68
Use one or more forms of psychological measurement or assessment 29
Use cognitive ability tests 20
Use interest inventories 8
Use some form of managerial assessments 14
Use personality tests 13
Use physical simulations of job tasks 10
Note: Information from a 2001 survey of 1,627 human resource managers who are members of the American Management Association.
Source: Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (2010).
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 95

Psychology, 2010), including mental and physical ability tests, achievement tests, interest mea-
sures, work and personal values measures, and personality questionnaires (U.S. Department of
Labor Employment and Training Administration, 2006).
One 2006 study found that roughly 20% of companies in the Fortune 1000 use some form
of personality testing (Piotrowski & Armstrong, 2006). Further, some 28.5% of companies
screen potential employees for honesty and integrity and 22% for potential for violence. Surveys
have also found that businesses use personality testing to improve employee fit and to reduce
turnover. Indeed, some businesses reported a decrease in turnover ranging from 20% to as
much as 70% after personality testing programs were implemented (Rothstein & Goffin, 2006).
According to survey of 3,800 employees from seven companies across a variety of industries and
jobs, applicants with a combination of the personality characteristics of adaptability, passion
for work, emotional maturity, positive disposition, self-efficacy, and an achievement orienta-
tion are 14 times more likely than people without these qualities to be engaged and productive
employees (Development Dimensions International Inc., 2005).
The use of preemployment personality testing by businesses is currently on the upswing
(Rothstein & Goffin, 2006) due to better theoretical constructs, better testing methods, and the
power of personality tests to predict job outcomes above and beyond other selection methods
(Ones, Dilchert, Viswesvaran, & Judge, 2007; Rothstein & Goffin, 2006). Personality measures
that hold to the principles of good test construction discussed throughout this chapter can THINK ABOUT IT
help predict job performance and enhance fairness in hiring and personnel decisions (Hogan
What is criterion validity?
et al., 1996).
Why must employment
Employers can use personality tests to either screen out marginal applicants or to identify tests have this in order to
exceptional applicants. In either case, the measures they use—whether it be to identify knowledge, be legal?
attitudes, job skills, or personality—must have proven criterion validity (Hogan et al., 1996).
Businesses may streamline their hiring process when they have many applicants for a large
number of openings and need to fill the positions on a continuous basis. In such cases, employ-
ers screen out problematic applicants by using measures that predict accidents, absenteeism,
turnover, and other counterproductive work behaviors (Hogan et al., 1996). For example, New
Horizons Computer Learning Centers of Colorado, a small software training company, screened
for applicants who were Internet savvy by instructing them to take a test online. If they were
unable to navigate their way around the website, New Horizons learned from experience that
such a person was not a good fit for the organization. This allowed its recruiters to spend more
face-to-face time with applicants who were most likely to succeed (Gale, 2002).
However, if an organization has only a few applicants for a few openings, its goal is to hire
excellent applicants rather than screen out marginal ones. Here, it may use personality tests to
identify an applicant with characteristics that match the psychological requirements of the job
(Hogan et al., 1996). For example, applicants applying for jobs in sales should be extraverted
and ambitious (Deb, 1983; Oda, 1983), whereas people in customer service positions should
be friendly, stable, and dependable, scoring high in Agreeableness, Emotional Stability, and
Conscientiousness of the five factors (Frei & McDaniel, 1998).
For example, the web giant Google is notorious for its creative recruiting programs aimed
at identifying the very best programmers, engineers, and mathematicians. In 2004, mysterious
ads appeared in the subway system in Cambridge, Massachusetts; in Harvard Square; and along
a California Highway in Silicon Valley. One billboard simply read “the first 10-digit prime found
in consecutive digits of e.com” (NPR, 2004). The ads themselves were actually for job openings,
but because the company name didn’t appear anywhere on the signs, people had no idea they
were looking at recruitment ads for one of the largest and most prestigious tech places to work.
Anybody could try, but only the most qualified people succeeded in solving two mathematical
puzzles to find the correct website and password (see the photo on page 96) to view the full
advertisements and apply for the jobs (see the photo on page 96).

Integrity Testing
According to one estimate, employee theft costs employers over $100 billion worldwide each
year (Sauser, 2007). No wonder that about a third of employers use some form of integrity
testing (Berry, Sackett, & Wiemann, 2007; Ones, Viswesvaran, & Schmidt, 1993; Sackett,
96 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

Congratulations. You’ve made it to level 2. Go to

www.Linux.org and enter Bobsyouruncle as the login
and the answer to this equation as the password.

f(1) = 7182818284
The mysterious billboard led
to yet another mathematical
f(2) = 8182845904
puzzle which finally let to f(3) = 8747135266
another website . . . Source: f(4) = 7427466391
Vox (2004).
f(5) =

Burris, & Callahan, 1989; Sackett & Wanek, 1996). This is where employers test the honesty
of job candidates to see if they are likely to steal or cheat. “Strong ethics are critical for our
industry,” says a senior human relations specialist at Randolph-Brooks Federal Credit Union.
“These tellers are handling other people’s money” (Gale, 2002).
There are two kinds of integrity tests: overt integrity tests and personality-based measures
(Sackett et al., 1989). In overt or clear purpose integrity tests, responders understand that the
intent of the test is to detect honesty. These tests often have two parts, one that directly assesses
THINK ABOUT IT attitudes toward dishonest behaviors (e.g., “Do you think it’s okay to take home pens or enve-
lopes from the office?” “Under what conditions is it acceptable to steal from an employer?”),
Is it ethical to use disguised and a second part that asks about theft and other illegal activities, such as drug use and gam-
purpose integrity tests? Is
bling (e.g., “How often do you take drugs before going to work?” “How often have you let your
it more ethical to use overt
integrity tests? Why? car insurance lapse?”). Responses on these kinds of overt tests are easy to distort to create a
favorable impression or fake good on (Berry et al., 2007).
A more subtle way of assessing integrity is to use disguised purpose integrity tests, like
personality tests, to assess characteristics related to a range of behaviors including disciplin-
ary problems, violence on the job, absenteeism, tardiness, drug abuse, and theft. Personality
dimensions such as reliability, conscientiousness, adjustment, trustworthiness, and sociability
consistently predict these kinds of counterproductive behaviors (Ones et al., 1993).

Success Stories
Psychologists have studied personality assessment in many types of organizations, including
Foreign Service (Thayer, 1973; Wiggins, 1973), law enforcement (Bernstein, 1980; Hargrave
& Hiatt, 1989), airlines (Butcher, 1994; Hörmann & Maschke, 1996), and even some medical
schools (Hojat, Callahan, & Gonnella, 2004; Lumsden, Bore, Millar, Jack, & Powis, 2005; Tyssen

. . . where they were finally

rewarded with an invitation
to apply for a job at Google.
Source: Vox (2004).
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 97

et al., 2007; Urlings-Strop, Stijnen, Themmen, & Splinter, 2009). Ideally, preemployment testing
programs should first develop standards of what a successful employee is like by assessing all
employees and identifying those characteristics linked to successful job performance. Once cri-
terion validity for an assessment has been established, then employers can use the test to select
future employees. Programs following this model are in place at many restaurants, retailers,
grocers, and trucking companies including the grocery chain Albertson’s, and retailers such as
Neiman Marcus and Target (Cha, 2005).
This is precisely what Outback Steakhouse, known for its fun, friendly, and accommodating
atmosphere, did. In an industry with high turnover rates of 200% annually, we might wonder
how Outback maintains a turnover rate of only 40 to 60% among its approximately 45,000
employees. The key to Outback’s success is hiring the right people, thanks to a customized per-
sonality assessment program. First, Outback administered a personality test to all of its servers
and identified key personality traits such as sympathy, adaptability, gregariousness, sociabil-
ity, and meticulousness that characterized the typical Outback server. Then, when hiring new
servers, as part of a three-phase interview process applicants take a personality test and those
who don’t fit this mold, scoring below set cutoffs on certain characteristics like compassion and
initiative, are cut from consideration (Gale, 2002).
Even Universal Studios Hollywood Theme Park takes its entertainment business seriously
(Cha, 2005). Job applicants take a 50-minute online personality assessment and are classified
into groups depending on their scores. Applicants scoring in the green range for customer ser-
vice have an 83% chance of getting hired whereas those in the yellow range have a 16% chance. THINK ABOUT IT
Those scoring in the red range have only a 1% chance. Then, Universal interviews all applicants
Do preemployment testing
in case the assessment is wrong, but recruiter Nathan Giles explained that this almost never
programs dehumanize job
happens. Largely as a result of better hiring decisions, customer service and employee retention applicants? Why or why not?
are up at Universal and theft and absenteeism are down (Cha, 2005).
However, these preemployment testing programs have many critics. For example, the
reliability and validity data of their screening tests are not open to scientific scrutiny. Also,
disgruntled rejected applicants have posted answer keys on the Internet compromising the
validity of the test. There’s even a Facebook page against the company that designs and admin-
isters these assessment programs for allegedly dehumanizing the workforce! All of this raises
questions about the legality of preemployment testing.

Legal Issues
The U.S. government has established a set of uniform guidelines to ensure that employee selec-
tion meets federal laws that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex,
or national origin (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Civil Service Commission,
Department of Labor, Department of Justice, 1978). According to these guidelines, assessment
tests are legal unless they have a disparate impact on disadvantaged groups. Employers must
prove that their assessment predicts to job-related tasks or competencies by establishing con-
struct validity. For example, an employer would have to demonstrate that a higher-level mathe-
matics test predicts job success for engineers in order to use such tests to select employees. This is
what Google did before it advertised openings in its corporation with the mysterious billboards.
Personality tests may be used to select employees. This is perfectly legal as long as there
is evidence that preemployment personality tests identify personality characteristics that are
important for successful performance on the job. For example, successful pilots in a European
charter airline company scored lower in aggressiveness (impatient, impulsive, distrustful), neu-
roticism, empathy (affected by other’s misfortune, warm-hearted), and higher in vitality (active
in sports, robust, looking for physical challenge) than pilots who were dismissed, reevaluated,
downgraded, or experienced some other problem in their 3 years of employment (Hörmann SEE FOR YOURSELF
& Maschke, 1996).
Research suggests that preemployment integrity testing is valid, useful, and, according to Have you ever taken a test
meta-analyses of 665 measures, predictive of who is likely to engage in counterproductive behav- as part of a job interview?
Was it testing, skills, person-
ior on the job (Ones et al., 1993, 2007). Integrity tests predict supervisors’ ratings of job perfor- ality, integrity, or something
mance; absenteeism; tardiness; and disciplinary problems on the job such as theft, dismissals for else?
theft, and other illegal activities (Ones et al., 1993). At the very least, such tests alert applicants
98 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

The Personality of Everyday Life

What can they ask you on a job interview?
How old are you? Are you married? Pregnant? A U.S. citizen? What is your ancestry?
Your native language? Do you have any disabilities? Do you take prescription drugs? How
much do you smoke or drink? Though you might be tempted to answer any question a
potential employer throws at you in the context of a job interview, these questions may
violate privacy laws, equal opportunity laws, or the Americans with Disabilities Act and
are therefore illegal for interviewers to ask. What about personality tests?
For example, according to the Americans with Disabilities Act employers cannot ask
about disabilities or conduct a medical exam during the selection process. Under this law,
employers cannot use a clinical test, such as a depression inventory or the MMPI that can
diagnose a mental illness, to screen applicants. However, they can use nonclinical tests, and
indeed many do use tests measuring the five factors or other personality traits.
In contrast to clinical tests, which may carry the stigma of mental health, or medi-
cal information, which violate privacy laws, well-constructed personality inventories that
describe nonclinical populations can actually help people with disabilities, people from
disadvantaged groups, or members of groups likely to be unfairly excluded from hiring
based on ethnicity, age, gender, disability, and even other characteristics not protected by
law but which are known to affect people’s judgments such as attractiveness and weight
(Hogan et al., 1996). Because of the anonymity granted by many testing situations people
who might not present well in a one-on-one interview may be better able to demonstrate
their qualifications on a test.
In addition, people do have a right to privacy on selection tests unless an employer
can show a compelling need for personal information—again, establishing criterion
validity—about an applicant such as in positions where the safety of the public is at stake.
Employers must balance a person’s right to privacy with their own need to hire competent
people who are not a threat to others (Hogan et al., 1996).
So, what should you do if asked one of these questions or if asked to take an integrity
test or a personality test? You might ask the interviewer how a question—or a personality
test—bears on the requirements of the job (Reeves, 2009). Often, interviewers are merely
trying to establish friendly rapport when they inadvertently hit on an illegal question. As
a student of personality psychology, knowing about assessment and personality testing
makes you a more astute job candidate.

Tests that explicitly screen

for characteristics that are
important for success on the
job are legal. What kind of
personality traits make for a
successful server?
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 99

that a potential employer cares about theft and dishonesty in its workforce (Wanek, 1999).
Because the validity of integrity testing to predict job-relevant counterproductive behavior is
well established, such tests are allowable by law.
Hogan et al. (1996) cautioned that although personality assessment—when done correctly—
is appropriate, employers should evaluate the results along with other information about the
applicant including skills, job experience, and ability to learn. Relying solely on personality tests
to make hiring decisions may be misguided. A senior human relations specialist at Randolph-
Brooks Federal Credit Union explained that when she interviews a job applicant she will ask
them about their marginal answers. Because many applicants are just out of high school, they
may not understand appropriate behavior in the workplace. Talking with them may clear up their
misconceptions (Gale, 2002).

Then and Now: Personality Assessment and Matchmaking

What qualities go into a good marriage? Back in 1939 psychologist George W. Crane devised “Because if you don’t ask it,
the Marital Rating Scale to give couples feedback on their marriage (Joyce & Baker, 2008). Hus- you’re never gonna know.
bands or wives would take this test (see Figure 4.2) and rate the wives’ behavior. Wives would So we had tons of questions
then score “merits” and “demerits” depending on what they did or didn’t do.
on ability, even more on
For example, using slang or profanity would earn 5 demerits whereas “reacting with plea-
interest. Just every type of
sure and delight to marital congress” would earn 10 merits. The number of merits and demerits
would be tallied up and the wife would receive a score from “Very Poor (Failures)” to “Very personality aspect that was
Superior.” (Alas, we don’t know what happened to the husband’s rating chart, if Crane ever ever measured, we were
developed one.) measuring it all.”
Crane started out scientifically enough by interviewing 600 husbands on their wives’ Galen Buckwalter, vice president
qualities. He compiled the 50 most frequently mentioned positive and negative qualities and of Research and Development,
fashioned them into a questionnaire. However, the weighted scoring of the items came from eHarmony, as quoted in Gottlieb
his own personal biases about which qualities he felt were more important to a successful (2006, p. 60)
marriage.
Crane went on to establish the Scientific Marriage Foundation in 1957, where he claimed
to have arranged over 5,000 marriages by using principles of psychological testing. Men
and women filled out forms that were then matched into compatible pairs by using an early
computer.
Gender roles and qualities desired in a mate may have changed since Crane’s day—and
psychologists today view his questionnaire as dated and humorous—but the principle of using
psychological testing to match people is even more popular today. Witness the growth of online
dating services including Match.com, ScientificMatch.com, PerfectMatch.com, Chemistry.com,
and eHarmony.com, all of which use some form of personality assessment.
For example, eHarmony explicitly matches couples based on similarity of attitudes,
beliefs, interests, leisure activities, and personality, including stability, sociability, and desire
for closeness, using a questionnaire of over 400 items. In fact, it has created a model to predict
couple compatibility using advanced statistics including factor analysis, regression analysis,
and discriminant analysis. Its goal is to match couples to maximize their compatibilities and
minimize their differences on key attributes (Carter & Snow, 2004). In fact, eHarmony has the
only patented online matching system (U.S. Patent No. 6,735,568; Houran, Lange, Rentfrow,
& Bruckner, 2004).
“Similarities are like money in the bank,” said Neil Clark Warren, the founder of eHarmony.
“Differences are like debts you owe. It’s all right to have a few differences, as long as you have
plenty of equity in your account” (Gottlieb, 2006, p. 60).
In the only study publicly available evaluating online dating sites, coincidentally conducted
by eHarmony, married couples matched through eHarmony had higher happiness, optimism,
commitment, and overall success of their marriage compared to couples who were not matched
by eHarmony (Carter & Snow, 2004).
Although the test used to judge how successful couples were is a valid test—the Dyadic
Adjustment Scale (Spanier, 1976)—critics have questioned whether high scores on this
100 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

Figure 4.2 The cover page of the Marital Rating Scale. Source: Joyce and Baker (2008, Figure 1,
p. 144).

particular test actually predict a better marriage. They also question whether the test was vali-
dated for this purpose or for the age range of participants (Houran et al., 2004).
Finally, the two comparison groups differed in age, education, income, motivation, and
other variables (Houran et al., 2004). For example, the couples who met on eHarmony may have
been more motivated to see their relationships succeed; after all, they met through an online
dating service that promised exactly this outcome for a hefty fee!
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 101

Matchmaker, matchmaker:
Even online dating services
use personality assessment to
make matches.

The lesson to be learned from this story is that principles of good research design and good
testing—validity, reliability, and generalization—make the best partnerships. In the words of
Warren, “Twelve thousand new people a day taking a 436-item questionnaire! . . . We’ve got
more data than they could collect in a thousand years.”

Chapter Summary
In this chapter we learned all about personality tests: what makes a good personality test, kinds
of personality tests, format of tests, response sets, and the various uses of personality tests.
The biggest difference between real personality tests and fun personality tests you might “If you want to know what
find on the Internet is that real personality tests have been empirically tested to have reliability, Waldo is like, why not just
validity, and limited generalizability. Fake personality tests often use Barnum statements to fool ask him?”
people into thinking that they are accurate measures of personality. Personality researchers
Tests, like any good measurement instrument, such as a watch, must be reliable, giving a Delroy L. Paulhus and Simine
consistent measure of an underlying theoretical construct. A reliable test will give consistent Vazire (2007, p. 224)
results across time (temporal consistency reliability, test–retest reliability), across items (internal
consistency reliability: parallel-forms reliability, split-half reliability, Cronbach’s alpha), and
across raters (interrater reliability).
A valid test has construct validity, meaning that it has operationalized a theory, or predicts
Study and Review
to an external standard such as an outcome or behavior (criterion validity). Tests may or may
on mysearchlab.com
not look like they are measuring a specific construct (face validity), but respondents may be
more motivated to answer questions that make sense to them and have face validity. Go online for more
Scores on personality tests ought to be correlated with other measures of similar tests resources to help you
(convergent validity) but be uncorrelated with measures of unrelated constructs (discriminant review.
validity). Tests, are valid only for the uses, settings, and populations they were validated for.
Researchers and people using tests must consider the conditions under which tests are gener-
alizable or not. For example, tests may be applicable for adults or children, or for use within a
particular culture.
Using these criteria—construct validity, criterion validity, convergent validity, discrimi-
nant validity, test–retest reliability, interrater reliability, Cronbach’s alpha, generalizability—the
NEO-PI-R appears to be a good measure of the five-factor model of personality.
Personality tests can be self-report (objective) or performance-based (projective). Self-
report tests may use a Likert scale, checklists, forced-choice, or visual analog scales. The Creative
Personality Scale of the Adjective Check List and the Machiavellianism Scale are two kinds of
self-report tests. The Thematic Apperception Test and the Goodenough-Harris Draw-A-Person
test are two kinds of performance-based tests.
102 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment

When designing, administering, and scoring personality tests, we must be mindful of

response sets or noncontent responding of participants including faking good, faking bad,
socially desirable responding, acquiescent responding, reactant responding, extreme respond-
ing, moderate responding, patterned responding, and carelessness. Some tests include an infre-
quency or lie scale to identify people who may be purposely giving misleading answers to a
test. The Crowne-Marlow Social Desirability Scale can be used to identify people with a socially
desirable response set to statistically control for this tendency in their responses on other per-
sonality tests.
Businesses often use personality tests to screen applicants for important characteristics
related to success on the job or to eliminate applicants who are likely to show counterproduc-
tive work behaviors. Integrity testing, using either clear purpose integrity tests or disguised
purpose integrity tests, can be used to screen for honesty in job applicants. Legally, a business
must be sure that an assessment program does not have disparate impact on any protected
group and predicts to job-related tasks or competencies by demonstrating construct validity,
content validity, or criterion validity of the test. Medical tests and clinical tests are disallowed,
and other questions that may violate the right to privacy are allowed only when an employer
can demonstrate a valid need for personal information.
Although valid and reliable personality assessment is useful and appropriate, employers
should evaluate the results along with other information about the applicant including skills,
job experience, and ability to learn and not rely on testing alone to select potential employees.
Online dating sites often use personality tests to match people. These services are only as
good as the measures they use.
Personality assessment has been around for a long time, and continues to be important in
research, work, and, for some, their love lives. If you haven’t already, no doubt you will be asked
to take a personality test for one of these purposes. Understanding what goes into personal-
ity testing will help you perform your best and understand the impact of assessment in your
life—and to not be taken in by nightclub graphologists, circus showmen, or Oreo-cookie-eating
personality tests. Though P. T. Barnum believed that a sucker might be born every minute, you
need not be one of them!

Review Questions
1. What is personality assessment? What makes a good personality test?
2. What is reliability? What are the different kinds of reliability?
3. What is validity? What are the different kinds of validity?
4. What is test generalizability?
5. Is the NEO-PI-R a good personality test? Why or why not?
6. What are self-report tests? Describe various test formats used by personality psychologists
including dichotomous, Likert ratings, checklists, forced-choice scales, and visual analog
scales, giving examples of each.
7. What are performance-based tests? What are the five categories of projective tests?
8. What are response sets? Describe the common types of response sets. What is an infre-
quency scale? What is it designed to measure?
9. What is social desirability? How it is measured? What are some strategies for dealing with
a social desirable response set?
10. What kind of validity must employers demonstrate to legally use personality tests to screen
candidates?
11. What are counterproductive work behaviors? How might an employer screen for these?
What is integrity testing? How might an employer test for integrity?
12. What are some of the legal issues surrounding employment testing?
 Chapter 4 Personality Assessment 103

Key Terms
Personality assessment Convergent validity Acquiescent responding
Reliability Discriminant validity Reactant responding
Temporal consistency Barnum Effect Extreme responding
reliability Generalizability Moderate responding
Test–retest reliability Self-report tests Patterned responding
Internal consistency Performance-based tests Response sets
reliability Forced-choice format Noncontent responding
Parallel-forms reliability Association techniques Infrequency scale
Split-half reliability Construction techniques Counterproductive work
Cronbach’s alpha Completion techniques behaviors
Rater consistency Arrangement or selection Integrity tests
Interrater reliability of stimuli Overt integrity tests
Validity Expression techniques Clear purpose integrity tests
Construct validity Faking good Disguised purpose integrity
Face validity Faking bad tests
Criterion validity Socially desirable responding
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CHAPTER
5
SELF-CONCEPT
SELF AND IDENTITY

How Does the Self-Concept Develop?

Chimpanzees and Self-Recognition
Who Is That Baby in the Mirror?
The Developing Self in School
Adolescence and the Looking Glass Self
Our Grown-Up Selves
Impact of Culture on Self-Concepts
Individualism and Collectivism
Independent and Interdependent Selves
Possible Selves
Positive Possible Selves
Negative Possible Selves
THEN AND NOW: THE SELF
SELF-ESTEEM
Self-Esteem Level
Self-Esteem Stability
Self-Concept Clarity
Life Outcomes of High and Low Self-Esteem: Myths and Realities
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: SHOOTING YOURSELF IN THE FOOT
TO PROTECT YOUR SELF-ESTEEM
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: QUALITATIVE DATA AND CONTENT ANALYSIS
SOCIAL IDENTITY
Self-Presentation
Self-Monitoring
Read the Chapter on CHAPTER SUMMARY
mysearchlab.com REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

105
106 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

T
“[T]he self is harder to know he web sitcom series The Guild stars Felicia Day as a neurotic woman who is addicted—
and understand than, say, a along with five other misfits—to an online role-playing game. In one episode, the
table or a spoon.” 20-something Zaboo is trying to break free from the control of his overbearing mother,
Baumeister (1999, p. 2) who he fears will become an expert on the Internet and ruin his life there too. He laments “The
only place that I can be myself is online.” The show raises all sorts of questions about reality
and identity, like, who are we on the inside and how do we portray ourselves to others? To the
extent that these two aspects of our identity are slightly different, we might well wonder, along
SEE FOR YOURSELF with the characters in the show, who is the real me, or even the real you?
Let’s just start with this most basic question: Who are you? On a blank screen or piece of
Who are you? Give 20
paper, can you think of 20 answers to this question?
answers to the statement
“I am . . .” This was the exact task facing college students in a classic study. Most of their responses to this
Twenty Statements Test (TST) (Kuhn & McPartland, 1954) were of the form “I am . . . ” Students
gave anywhere from 1 or 2 responses on up to the full 20, with a median of 17 responses. One
interesting finding is that the first attributes people listed defined themselves in terms of social
SEE FOR YOURSELF groups or categories to which they belonged, such as “student,” “girl,” “ husband,” “from Chicago,”
“daughter,” “pre-med,” “Baptist,” and “oldest child.” Only later did they get into more idiosyncratic
How many of your answers trait terms such as “happy,” “bored,” “pretty good student,” “good wife,” and “interesting.”
to the Twenty Statements Additionally, Kuhn and McPartland (1954) found that members of religious minorities at the
Test were trait terms? Social
State University of Iowa at the time (e.g., Catholic and Jewish) were particularly likely to mention
categories? What does this
say about you? religious affiliation as an aspect of their self-concept and to mention it sooner than members of
religious majorities (e.g., Methodist, Presbyterian) or people without a religious affiliation.
This study illustrates that our self-concepts are defined by the social world: how we are
similar to others and how we are unique compared to others. In fact, we are constantly discov-
ering, creating, defining, and maintaining who we are—emphasizing either our connections
or our uniqueness—and how we feel about ourselves through our interactions with the social
world. In this chapter we explore these three aspects of the self: how we define or think about
ourselves (our self-concepts), how we evaluate or think of ourselves (our self-esteem), and what
we show to others (our social identity).

Self-Concept
Think about your 20 answers to the question “Who are you?” Together, these reflect your self-
concept: the set of ideas and inferences that you hold about yourself, including your traits,
“The self is not created social roles, schemas, and relationships (Baumeister, 1997). Part of what makes the self hard to
nor discovered in social know is that we are hardly unbiased observers. We take center stage in our own lives! In addi-
tion, the self may be difficult to know because we are constantly growing and developing as
isolation.”
well as revealing different facets of ourselves in different situations. In fact, it is through social
Baumeister (1999, p. 2)
interactions that we develop both our self-concepts and our evaluation of ourselves.

How Does the Self-Concept Develop?

Do you have a self? Of course you do, but how did you get it? It should be no surprise to you
that we aren’t exactly born with a self, but you might wonder, how do we develop one? Do we
just grow a self even as we grow taller? Or, do we need to have certain experiences in order to
form a self? The answer is a bit of both: We develop a sense of self out of physical development
and cognitive maturation along with social experiences.
THINK ABOUT IT In the 1970s, many psychologists and biologists supposed that humans were unique in their
capacity to reflect on themselves. This ability of being aware of having an experience and of
Do animals have a sense of
self? How would we know? reflecting on oneself—having self-awareness or self-consciousness—is believed to be evidence
of having a self-concept. Is it true that this ability is unique to humans?

Chimpanzees and Self-Recognition. Psychologist Gordon Gallup investigated this ques-

tion in a series of experiments with chimpanzees (Gallup, 1977). He placed a full-length mirror
in a room with a chimpanzee and observed how the chimp responded to this mirror stimula-
tion. For the first 1 or 2 days, the chimps acted as if the reflection were another chimp, showing
other-directed social responses such as bobbing, vocalizing, and threatening, much the way
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 107

a chimp would respond when confronting

a strange chimp in the wild. However, very
soon the chimps started to respond to the
reflection in the mirror with self-directed
responses: grooming places they couldn’t
normally see (e.g., picking food out of their
teeth), entertaining themselves by blowing
bubbles or making faces, and so on. But after
about 10 days, the chimps grew tired of this
sport and adapted to the presence of the mir-
ror. This is when the real test began.
At this point, the mirror was removed,
the chimps were anesthetized, and while they
were unconscious, bright red paint was placed
across the eyebrow ridge of one eye and on
the top half of the opposite ear. The research-
ers used a special paint that was odorless and
imperceptible to the touch. Indeed, upon The man in the mirror: Until
waking, the chimps did not pay any special about 1 or 2 years of age
attention to the newly marked areas. Then the babies do not recognize the
mirror was returned to their chamber. How reflection in the mirror as
do you think chimps responded to their own themselves.
reflections? Would they show other-directed
responses (e.g., vocalize at the mirror) or
would chimps touch their own brow and ear indicating self-recognition?
As it turned out, chimps spent over 25% more time touching themselves! And they spent
about twice as much time touching their eyebrows than their ears. However, chimps that did
not have the chance to adapt to the mirror did not pay any more attention to the marked areas
of their bodies than to the nonmarked areas. This suggests that self-recognition must have been
learned during their earlier experience with the mirror.
Gallup and others saw chimps’ self-directed behaviors in this mirror test as evidence of
self-recognition. It is no accident that great apes like chimpanzees and orangutans—humans’
closest relatives—show self-recognition. There is no evidence of self-recognition in rhesus mon-
keys, capuchin monkeys, java monkeys, spider monkeys, mandrill, hamadryas, baboons, stump-
tail macaques, or two species of gibbons (Gallup, 1977). Self-recognition seems to be more than
visual recognition: Baboons could not be trained to recognize themselves even using raisins as
rewards. Nor is self-recognition related to mirror use per se. Monkeys are able to use the mir-
ror as a tool to manipulate and find objects but are unable to recognize their own reflections

Happy, the elephant, at the

mirror touching the mark with
the tip of her trunk.
108 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

(Brown, McDowell, & Robinson, 1965). Using simi-

lar, or even improved, methods self-recognition
has been demonstrated in elephants (Plotnik, de
Waal, & Reiss, 2006), dolphins (Reiss & Marino,
2001), whales (Delfour & Marten, 2001), and even
magpies (Prior, Schwarz, & Güntürkün, 2008)! The
photos on pages 107 and 108 illustrate what this self-
recognition in animals might look like.
Now you might think that there is something
special about chimps who have spent their entire
lives living in a psychology laboratory, but on this
count, even chimps raised in the wild show self-
recognition on the mirror test (Gallup, 1977).
However, chimps who are taken from their moth-
ers soon after birth and raised in isolation without
contact with other chimps are unable to recognize
themselves. In fact, at first they pretty much just
sit and stare at their reflection in the mirror, never
becoming adapted to it. When they are anesthetized
and marked with the red paint they show no change
in viewing time, suggesting that they have no idea
Self-recognition in a dolphin. that it is their own reflection in the mirror.
Gallup and his colleagues suspected that lack of
social experience with other chimps somehow pre-
SEE FOR YOURSELF
vented proper emotional development including self-recognition. He gave two of these isolated
chimps remedial social experience by placing them in a cage with each other for 3 months.
If you know any infants When these chimps were placed before the mirror with paint markings, they started to show
under 2 years of age, what preliminary signs of self-recognition.
happens when they look in
the mirror? Do they recog-
nize themselves or do they Who Is That Baby in the Mirror? What about humans? At what age do human babies
think their own image is recognize that the image in the mirror is themselves? Self-recognition is one step along the
another baby? way to self-concept development. But to appreciate the import of this developmental land-
mark, we need to start at the beginning of self-concept development. Table 5.1 summarizes
the processes and major accomplishments of self-concept development (for more detail see
Harter, 1998, 2003).

Table 5.1 How We Develop a Sense of Self: Important Milestones in the Development of Self-Concept,
Self-Esteem, and Social Identity
Age Developing Aspect of Self Accomplishment
0–1 years Physical self-awareness Recognizing Me vs. Not me
1–2 years Self-recognition Mirror recognition
2–3 years Self-esteem Internalizing standards for behavior
3–4 years Skills and abilities Demonstrating new talents
5–12 years Social comparison Comparing abilities with others
Private self-concept Keeping secrets
Adolescence Identity Abstract thought
Reflected appraisals
Objective self-awareness
Adulthood The self Internalizing societal expectations
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 109

From birth to about 1 year of age infants are developing a sense of physical awareness.
Rather than having an awareness of themselves in the world, they are still trying to discern
what is part of them and what is part of the physical environment. If you have watched
young infants in their cribs perhaps you’ve seen their momentary surprise and delight at a
foot or an arm without the full recognition that it is their own limbs that are moving in such
fascinating ways. Although there is some evidence that even newborns react differently to a
recording of their own cry compared to the cry of another infant (Dondi, Simion, & Caltran,
1999)—indicating some basic self-recognition—an infant’s self is really just a physical self
(Meltzhoff, 1990).
Once children know that they are a physical being separate from other people and other
objects, then they can begin to find out more about themselves (Harter, 1983). Have you ever
tried the look-at-the-crying-baby-in-the-mirror trick to get an infant to calm down? Sadly,
that “trick” works only until children recognize a familiar image in the mirror at around 4 or 5
months (Legerstee, Anderson, & Schaffer, 1998). But is this merely visual discrimination or do
they really know that the image is them?
If you were thinking that we ought to do the mirror test to test for self-recognition,
much like Gallup (1977) did with his chimpanzees, you would be right. When a spot of
rouge is placed on an infant’s nose by the mother, under the guise of wiping the infant’s
nose, infants are able to recognize themselves in a mirror at 18 months of age, on average.
They touch their own faces and wonder at this new mark. Only about 25% of infants tested
could recognize themselves as early as 9 to 12 months of age, yet by the age of 21 to 25
months about 75% of infant-participants could recognize themselves in the mirror (Lewis &
Brooks-Gunn, 1979).
THINK ABOUT IT
By ages 2 or 3, children are able to recognize themselves in the mirror and in pictures
and have mastered language enough to use the words “I,” “me,” “my,” “mine,” and the phrase What is a 2-year old’s
“I’m . . . ” appropriately (Lewis & Ramsay, 2004). Perhaps a little too appropriately, as this baby favorite word?
sense of self is partially what makes the “terrible twos” so challenging. Children will often
want to exercise their developing selves by doing things without parental help or by refusing
to cooperate amid protests of “No!” Children at this age know certain facts about themselves
such as their sex, age, ethnic group, and family, and their self-concepts reflect this information
(Stipek, Gralinski, & Kopp, 1990).
Around this age we also see the very beginnings of self-esteem. Children start to understand
parents’ expectations for behavior and begin to internalize standards for good and bad behavior.
They will often voluntarily offer that they are “a good girl” or respond positively to such praise
(“good boy!”) from an adult.
By ages 3 to 4 children’s self-concepts reflect their developing skill and abilities in addi-
tion to physical attributes, preferences, and possessions (Harter, 1999). Children will often
enthusiastically run up to visitors wishing to show off their latest accomplishments: “Look at
me! I can jump!”

The Developing Self in School. During ages 5 to 12 children are further developing their
own abilities and at the same time becoming acutely aware of the abilities of other children
as they enter school. Have you ever seen kids at a park run to the top of a hill and vie for the
chance to declare “I’m king of the mountain!” Comparing themselves with peers becomes
very important between ages 5 and 6 and becomes increasingly important (Ruble, 1983).
Children gain a sense of their own talents by seeing how they measure up compared to others
(Harter, 2005).
As early as ages 3 or 4 children recognize personality characteristics and can use them to
describe other children. However, it is not until they are about 5 or 6 that children may further
progress and come to describe kids in their class using personality attributes in addition to
social comparison information: “He’s the smart one.” They may even be able to use traits to
judge the past behavior of others as well as to make predictions about their future behavior.
Imagine a child not wanting to invite another child to a birthday party because “she’s a baby.”
Why is she a baby? “She cried in school yesterday.” But it is not until ages 9 or 10 that children
110 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

The queen and kings of the

mountain: At about ages 5
to 12, children’s self-concept
includes comparing their
abilities with others.

SEE FOR YOURSELF come to understand what a trait is and recognize traits as enduring qualities within a person
Did you have an imaginary that are stable across time and situations (Alvarez, Ruble, & Bolger, 2001).
friend as a child? How old Also between ages 5 to 12 children start to develop a private sense of self as they recognize
were you at the time? that there are parts of themselves that others cannot see. They start to realize that they have
thoughts, feelings, and desires that are uniquely their own and not automatically known by
others. At younger ages this may appear as an imaginary friend. At a slightly older age the child
may taunt another child with “I know something you don’t know.” Later, children realize that
they can keep a secret as in “I know a secret.” Of course, they won’t realize until they are older
that to truly keep a secret you cannot even tell that you know a secret!
Consider this response of a 5-year-old girl to the Twenty Statements Test:

My name is Lizzie. I look like my mommy. I play a lot in the summer time with
my grandparents. I like to play at the beach. I have brown hair. My eyes are blue.
My teeth are white. I like to eat. I’m a girl. I like my hair. I like my eyes. I like my
teeth. I like everything I do. I am five years old. (Yavari, 2002).

Or this 9-year-old boy, with his original spellings and emphasis:

My name is Bruce C. I have brown eyes. I have brown hair. I have brown eye-
brows. I’m nine years old. I LOVE! Sports. I have seven people in my family.
I have great! eye site. I have lots! of friends. I live on 1923 Pinecrest Dr. I’m going
on 10 in September. I’m a boy. I have a uncle that is almost 7 feet tall. My school
is Pinecrest. My teacher is Mrs. V. I play Hockey! I’am almost the smartest boy
in the class. I LOVE! food. I love fresh air. I LOVE School. (Montemayor &
Eisen, 1977, p. 317).

Can you see how his self-description is very concrete? Compare Lizzie’s and Bruce’s
responses with this one from an 11-year-old boy:
I’m a person who likes to look in space; I love astronomy. I love using rockets.
I love playing outside and playing soccer. I love to swim. I’m smart. I’m a nice
and sweet and loving person. I’m a great swimmer. (Yavari, 2002)
Or this one from an 11.5-year-old girl:
My name is A. I’m a human being. I’m a girl. I’m a truthful person. I’m not
pretty. I do so-so in my studies. I’m a very good cellist. I’m a very good pianist.
I’m a little bit tall for my age. I like several boys. I like several girls. I’m old-
fashioned. I play tennis. I am a very good swimmer. I try to be helpful I’m always
ready to be friends with anybody. Mostly I’m good, but I lose my temper. I’m
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 111

not well-liked by some girls and boys. I don’t know if I’m liked by boys or not.
(Montemayor & Eisen, 1977, p. 317–318)

Adolescence and the Looking Glass Self. By the time we are adolescents, our self-concepts
have become more abstract, incorporating motivations, beliefs, and personality characteristics
in contrast to the more concrete descriptions of children’s self-concepts (Harter, 1999). You
can see this difference in the response by this 16-year-old male to the Twenty Statements Test:
I guess I would say I’m God’s creation made for a purpose. I have a natural
curiosity given to me by God. I have a strong will and desire to fulfill my pur-
pose in life and I also believe that as a man I have my weaknesses and strengths.
I sin and make mistakes, but I learn from them with God’s help. As a Chris-
tian, I think that I am better prepared for the world’s temptations and societies’
manipulations. I am trying to strive for goals, which are to be successful, intel-
ligent, spiritual, and happy. I think that my relationship with God helps me
to accomplish my goals and fulfill my purpose in life. Who I am as a person is
defined by my spiritual nature. (Yavari, 2002)
And in this 17-year-old female:
I am a human being. I am a girl. I am an individual. I don’t know who I am.
I am a Pisces. I am a moody person. I am a very curious person. I am not an
individual. I am a loner. I am an American (God help me). I am a Democrat.
I am a liberal person. I am a radical. I am a conservative. I am a pseudoliberal.
I am an atheist. I am not a classifiable person (i.e., I don’t want to be). (Mon-
temayor & Eisen, 1977, p. 318)
Adolescents, especially ages 15 to 16, are particularly sensitive to how they are perceived
and judged by others. This becomes a period of extreme self-consciousness, as anybody who’s
ever had a pimple can attest to! Adolescents experience objective self-awareness (Duval &
Wicklund, 1972), as they start to see themselves as the object of others’ attentions. They use the
views of significant others as a social mirror to form the basis of their own self-views. Through
these reflected appraisals adolescents internalize others’ evaluations of them, especially people
who are very important to them, such as family and peers. The American sociologist Charles
Cooley (1902) calls this the looking glass self and this forms the basis of the adolescent’s self-
esteem. In the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Each to each a looking-glass/Reflects the other SEE FOR YOURSELF
that doth pass.”
By the time the teenage years have ended, we not only respond to ourselves from the point What identity or identities
are imposed on you and
of view of a particular person, but we also are able to respond to the views of a number of
which have you willingly
others. We combine these views and come to internalize the view of “the generalized other” embraced?
(i.e. society; Mead, 1925).
We start to wonder during our teens about our place in society. We start to question our
identities. An identity is socially defined. It includes definitions and standards that are imposed
on us by others, including interpersonal aspects (e.g., roles, relationships), potentialities (e.g.,
who we might become), and values (e.g., morals, priorities) (Baumeister, 1986). People have
identities from birth (Baumeister, 1997), but they may not be aware of their import until the
teen years. That is, we may start to wonder if our ascribed identity matches what we’ve devel-
oped and recognize as our own unique self-concept.
Consider the following poem by a 13-year-old girl (Santana, 2005) struggling with the
various identities she imagines people placing on her:
The Girl
I am the girl who sits on her roof, who wishes she could fly
free, fly free from the
prison cell she lives in
I am the girl that most fear, whose reputation was forged on
terror.
112 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

I am the girl who tries her best, but people think she doesn’t
try her best, who tries to be
but fails miserably.
I am the girl who you wouldn’t know with a pen, whose
weapon of choice isn’t the
one that draws blood, but the weapon that can leave a bigger
mark: WORDS
I am the girl who wears a disguise, who fools you on who she
really is.
What if I wasn’t the girl who sits on her roof, who wishes she
could fly free?
What if I wasn’t the girl whose reputation was forged on
terror, the one who most feared?
What if I wasn’t the girl who tries her best, whom no one
thinks tries?
What if I wasn’t the girl you would need a pen to know, who
didn’t make her first
weapon of choice be words?
What if I wasn’t the girl who always wears a disguise?
But I’m not that girl. If I was then I wouldn’t be me, I’d just
be another face in the crowd.
So let’s go back to the beginning,
When all you knew was that,
I am a girl.
Source: “The Girl” by Santana, © 2005 in A. C. of Princeton (Ed.), Under age (Vol. 17, p. 16–17). Princeton,
NJ: Arts Council of Princeton.
Many people believe, much as the psychologist Erik Erikson did, that an identity crisis
in adolescence is inevitable, universal, and perfectly normal (Erikson, 1968). However, this
popular view is not supported by current research evidence (see Baumeister, 1997, for a com-
plete discussion). For example, only teens who openly question the beliefs, values, and goals
of their parents may experience an identity crisis as they experience a great deal of confusion
and anxiety over who they are and who they
wish to be. For such teens, the choice is to
either embrace these expectations or to form
their own identity that is true to their self-
concepts and yet satisfies the expectations of
their social worlds. Other teens embrace their
identity and do not experience a crisis.

Our Grown-Up Selves. As adults, we

have for the most part a good sense of who
we are (our self-concepts) and how we feel
about ourselves (our self-esteem), and we can
choose who we want to be or what aspects
of ourselves we wish to present to oth-
ers (social identity). Terms such as “wife,”
“bread-winner,” “father,” and “future doctor”
are all social identities that may also be part
of one’s self-concept. The difference is that
Starting at age 12, adolescents self-concept comes from within and iden-
start to develop objective
tity comes from others (Baumeister, 1997).
self-awareness and become
For example, some people may not fully
concerned about how they
appear to others. embrace their new identity as a college stu-
dent and may struggle to balance their studies
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 113

and the expectations of parents and professors with their own desires or the expectations
of friends. Similarly, people may impose identities on us—“Black man,” “old woman,” “disabled
kid”—based on certain attributes without knowing who we really are on the inside.
Consider this poem from a 30-something woman (Missuz J, n.d.). Can you see what social
identities she is alluding to?
I Am From . . .
I am from pink spongy curlers in my hair every Saturday night, for princess
hair on Sunday.
I am from days in the car—writing letters on crackers in squeeze cheese,
playing and fighting and sitting.
I am from job lists and sharing a room and “borrowing” my sisters clothes.
I am from salt smells and waves and fog; and naked red rock and juniper
and sage.
I am from The Mists of Avalon, The Red Tent, The Blue Sword, and
Dragonsinger.
I am from a religion that spread guilt like cheap margarine.
I am from the thrill and the burn, the laughter and hunger and sometimes
the truth.
I am from long sticky nights on the couch, filled with kisses, Cheers and Taxi.
I am from stony silence, and fighting it out, and talking it out, and loving
it out.
I am from stretch marks and breast pumps and diapers and a baby bouncing
on my hip.
I am from Funshine Bear and big girl panties and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
I am from South Beach and Atkins and Phentemine and bulimia.
I am from crying with Mandy, playing with Katy, singing with Kodie, dancing
with Jennifer, and regretting with Kelli.
I am from apostrophes, settings, topic sentences, and make-up work.
I am from driving with Janzen, reading to Sophie, and Erik holding my hand.
Source: Reprinted courtesy of Rebecca Jorgensen.
SEE FOR YOURSELF
“Missuz J” is a blogger who writes about being a mom, wife, teacher, sister, and woman, as
Do you currently struggle
well as an individual. She readily embraces all of these identities and integrates them into her
with aspects of your
self. This post was from November 2005 and was inspired by a writing assignment she gave her identity?
high school students.
Depending on the culture that we live in—and on our own characteristics—we may
have an easier or a harder time embracing our identity (Aronson & Rogers, 2008; Cass,
1979; Cross & Cross, 2008; Helms, 1990; Swanson, Cunningham, Youngblood, & Spencer,
2009; Swartz, 2008). We may hold certain ethnic, racial, gender, sexual, or class identities
that may be at odds with the dominant culture. For example, people who are made aware
of their membership in a stereotyped group may be unable to perform up to their potential
as a result of stereotype threat. This is when a person experiences distress when faced with
a stereotype that threatens his or her self-esteem or social identity. This apprehension then
causes the person’s performance to suffer, which ends up confirming the very stereotype he
or she felt threatened by (Aronson, Lustina, Good, Keough, & Steele, 1999; Aronson, Quinn,
& Spencer, 1998; Aronson & Rogers, 2008; Steele & Aronson, 1995; Steele, Spencer, & Aron-
son, 2002; Walton & Spencer, 2009). One need not believe the stereotype—or an ascribed
“The fact that everyone
social identity—to feel upset by it (Aronson & Rogers, 2008). However, new research suggests
that writing about things that are important such as creativity, family relationships, career, can use the term ‘self’ with
or having a sense of humor may counteract this effect by reinforcing a person’s values and such ease and familiarity
individuality (Miyake et al., 2010). suggests that the concept of
selfhood is rooted in some
Impact of Culture on Self-Concepts simple, universal human
As should be clear to you by now, we develop our selves—our self-concepts, self-esteem, and experience.”
social identities—by using three sources of knowledge: social comparison with others, the Baumeister (1999, pp. 1–2)
114 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Table 5.2 Coding Scheme for the Twenty Statements Test

Category Description Examples
Physical Physical qualities without implying “I am a male”
social roles or group membership such as “I am 18 years old”
the information you might find on a driver’s “I am short”
license
Social Social roles, institutional memberships, “I am a student”
socially defined status “I am a mother”
“I am Jewish”
Attributive Psychological and physiological states “I am a warm person”
or traits “I am a high energy person”
“I am introverted”
Global Descriptions so comprehensive or so vague “I am a human being”
that they do not distinguish that person from “I am light”
any other “I am me”
Source: Cousins (1989, p. 126).

reflected appraisals of others, and our own self-appraisals. The self is very much the product
of social interaction, in addition to cognitive developments (Harter, 2003). Given this, do you
wonder how you might be different if you were born at a different time? What if you were born
in a different place? As strange as it may seem at first, who we are depends a lot on the culture
SEE FOR YOURSELF we are born into.
Recall the Twenty Statements Test (TST) discussed in the study that opened this chapter
Using the coding scheme
(Kuhn & McPartland, 1954). One way of scoring the test is to classify participants’ responses
in Table 5.2, what are your
results like? into one of four categories (Cousins, 1989; see Table 5.2). With this standardized scoring scheme
we can compare the responses of people from various cultures to see if there are differences in
self-concepts across cultures.
In one study, Japanese and American college students answered the TST and their answers
were sorted into one of the four categories by three trained judges (Cousins, 1989). About 58%
of the responses of the American students fell into the Attributive self-description category,
referring to their own psychological attributes or traits, whereas for Japanese students Attribu-
tive descriptions made up significantly less, about 19% of their total responses (see Figure 5.1).
When Japanese students did refer to themselves, it was generally to their preferences, interests,
wishes, aspirations, activities, and habits more so than to their personal traits.
If they weren’t describing
themselves using Attributive or
Figure 5.1 Mean proportion 0.6
trait descriptions, how did the
of psychological attributes
Japanese students define them-
endorsed by American and 0.5 selves? They described them-
Proportion of Attributes in

Japanese students in the

two self-description tasks selves in terms of the social
Self-Description

0.4 groups to which they belonged.

of Cousins (1989). Source:
(Markus & Kitayama, 1991, About 27% of the Japanese
Figure 3, p. 233. Markus, 0.3 students’ responses fell into
H. R., & Kitayama, S. (1991). the Social self-descriptions
Culture and the self: 0.2 category compared to only
Implications for cognition, 9% of the American students’
emotion and motivation. 0.1 responses. Japanese students
Psychological Review, 98(2),
were also more likely to refer
224–253. Copyright American
0 to Physical self-descriptions
Psychological Association.
Twenty Contextualized (5%) than American students
Reprinted with permission. Statements Format
Test (2%). Interestingly, similar
results were found when com-
American Students Japanese Students paring Chinese and American
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 115

college students (Trafimow, Triandis, & Goto, 1991), in that the Chinese students were more
likely to describe themselves in social ways and the American students in attributive ways.

Individualism and Collectivism. What is it about Japan and China that lead to similar self-
descriptions by their natives that are very different from the self-descriptions of Americans? In
a word: culture. According to psychologist Harry Triandis (1990), cultures may be described
along two dimensions: individualism and collectivism. The extent to which cultures emphasize
individualism and collectivism actually affects how people define their very selves!
Individualism focuses on the uniqueness of the individual and distinguishes the person as
separate from the group. Under individualism, people develop their own selves including atti-
tudes and values as distinct from the group’s. Individualistic cultures place a value on bravery,
creativity, and self-reliance (Triandis, 1990).
Collectivism places greater emphasis on the views, needs, and goals of the group rather
than of the individual. Under collectivism, people emphasize being part of a social group and
sharing beliefs and customs. In the extreme, one’s beliefs, goals, attitudes, and values reflect
those of the group. Collectivistic cultures value obligation, duty, security, tradition, dependence,
harmony, obedience to authority, equilibrium, and proper action (Triandis, 1990).
Keep in mind that every culture has both individualistic and collectivistic components. Think of
collectivism and individualism like water and ice: Instead of being opposites, they are two different
states of the same substance (Triandis, 1990). Like water, we are connected to others, especially when
we are young and dependent on family. However, as we grow we may separate ourselves and become
individuals or nuclear families or social groups, much like ice crystals forming out of the water. Just
as water may be turned into ice and ice can melt into water, we can form and dissolve social bonds
with others. Cultures differ in the extent to which one state is emphasized over the other.
Cultures that emphasize individualism are considered individualistic cultures; cultures
that emphasize collectivism are considered collectivistic cultures. About 80% of the world’s
population live in collectivistic cultures (e.g., Africa, Asia, South America; Dwairy, 2002). In
Japan, for example, people value wa, the harmonious ebb and flow of interpersonal relations.
Similarly, the Chinese have jen, the ability to interact with others in a sincere, polite, and decent
fashion. Latinos talk of being simpático with each other, which means to both respect and share
another’s feelings (Markus & Kitayama, 1991).
Cultures may have developed to be more collectivistic or more individualistic due to cul-
tural complexity, ecology, mobility (both social and geographic), and affluence (Triandis, 1990).
As cultures become more complex, individuals must choose how to act from among conflicting
norms and diverse worldviews. Without a clear culturally defined norm for behavior, people are
forced to choose based on their own internal values and desires. Similarly, cultural complexity
increases as the range of possible jobs within a society increases, forcing people to specialize
rather than just do what everybody else does. Complexity also increases as people move from
rural to urban settings. Together, these trends push a culture toward individualism.
Individualism also increases when a country’s geography forces a separation among its
people (e.g., mountains, islands) or when individuals have migrated to distant lands (e.g., Great
Britain). This distance among members of a culture forces them to make individual choices,
fostering individualism in the culture. Triandis (1990) suggested that democracy was born in
ancient Greece because its geography of mountains and islands dispersed the population, forc-
ing cities—and individuals living in the cities—to develop their own governments and ways of
doing things. Finally, with affluence, individuals are less dependent on the group for survival
and are free to cultivate their own interests.
How do these differing themes of individualism and collectivism play out in a culture? For
example, in the United States, a place where individualism reigns, we tend to say “The squeaky
wheel gets the grease” encouraging people to stand up for their rights. What do they say in
Japan? “The nail that stands out gets pounded down,” to encourage getting along with others
and placing the harmony of the group above individual rights. Or, when you were growing
up, what did your parents say to cajole you into eating your vegetables? Often, it was some
variation of “Think of starving kids in Ethiopia, and appreciate how lucky you are.” What do
Japanese kids hear from their parents? “Think of the farmer who worked so hard to produce this
116 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

rice for you; if you don’t eat it he will feel bad, for his efforts will have been in vain” (Markus
& Kitayama, 1991, p. 224). These cultural values are also reflected in literature and cartoons.
Or, consider having a friend over for lunch. In the United States we would either ask our
guest what he would like to have or we would have a range of available foods and flavors so that
he could make a choice that reflects his personal preferences. What might happen in Japan? For
one, a good host wouldn’t come out and ask her guest what she would want. That would be
considered rude! Instead, she would anticipate—even read the mind of—her guest and prepare
just the right food (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Speaking up, not speaking up, eating what’s put
in front of you, no wonder we experience discomfort while trying to figure out what the polite
thing to do or say is while interacting with someone from a different cultural background!

Independent and Interdependent Selves. As a result of the contrasting emphasis placed

on the individual person compared to the group under individualism and collectivism, people
come to think of themselves differently. In individualistic cultures people develop an indepen-
SEE FOR YOURSELF dent view of the self, whereas people living in collectivistic cultures develop an interdependent
Answer the questions in view of the self (Markus & Kitayama, 1991).
Table 5.4. Are you more indi- An independent self exists apart from other people and is autonomous and self-contained.
vidualistic or collectivistic? Individuals are encouraged to embark on a process of self-actualization and self-discovery to
How do these values impact develop their potential. People are their truest selves when alone, apart from the influence of
your self-concept and others. In contrast, the interdependent self includes others. People cannot be understood when
self-esteem? You may wish
separated from their social group (e.g., family, friends, clan, coworkers, etc.); they are not truly
to reflect on Table 5.3 for
features to think about. themselves without others (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). However, this does not mean that a per-
son with an interdependent self merges, or loses himself or herself with others or that the person
is passive when interacting with others. These two views of the self are illustrated in Figure 5.2.
These two views of the self lead to differences in the demands that society places on people
in their respective cultures. There are also differences in what role others take in our lives. Even
the basis of healthy self-esteem depends on our view of the self and the culture to which we
belong. Keep in mind that well-being and self-esteem come from attaining culturally valued
outcomes, so that neither individualism nor collectivism is better than the other (Oyserman,
Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002). You can see these differences for yourself in Table 5.3, and
reflected in items from a scale measuring individualism and collectivism in Table 5.4.
An independent self is likely to be found in
more individualistic cultures like American and
Figure 5.2 Conceptual Mother western European (Markus & Kitayama, 1991)
representations Father and also Canadian (Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmel-
of the self. Source: Marcus & meier, 2002). An interdependent self is likely to
Kitayama (1991) Fig 1, p. 226. Self be found in more collectivistic cultures like Asian,
Sibling
Markus, H. R., & Kitayama, S.
Friend
African, Latin American, and southern European
(1991). Culture and the self:
(Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Of course, we need
Implications for cognition, Co-worker
emotion and motivation. to be careful not to overgeneralize or to assume we
Psychological Review, 98(2), know a person’s self view based on his or her cul-
224–253. Copyright American Friend ture, as there are many cultures and countries that
Psychological Association. A. Independent View of Self
have not been directly tested (Oyserman, Coon,
Reprinted with permission. & Kemmelmeier, 2002) and people can define
themselves as independent or interdependent—
Mother regardless of their culture—depending on the task
Father
(Oyserman & Lee, 2008; Trafimow et al., 1991).
Self In countries with very strong ethnic or reli-
Sibling gious identification, people may develop an inter-
Friend dependent self despite living in an individualistic
culture. For example, in the United States, Hawai-
Co-worker
ians, Quakers, African Americans, Latinos, and
women—not to mention Italians and others of
Friend
southern European ancestry or people living in
B. Interdependent View of Self small towns and rural areas—may have a more
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 117

Table 5.3 Summary of Key Differences Between an Independent and an Interdependent Self
Feature Compared Independent Self Interdependent Self
Definition Separate from social context Connected with social context
Structure Bounded, unitary, stable Flexible, variable
Important features Internal, private (abilities, thoughts, feelings) External, public (statuses, roles, relationships)
Tasks Be unique Belong, fit in
Express self Occupy one’s proper place
Realize internal attributes Engage in appropriate action
Promote own goals Promote others’ goals
Be direct: “say what’s on your mind” Be indirect: “read other’s mind”
Role of others Self-evaluation: others important for social Self-definition: relationships with others in specific
comparison, reflected appraisal contexts define the self
Basis of self-esteem Ability to express self, validate internal attributes Ability to adjust, restrain self, maintain harmony
with social context
Note: Esteeming the self may be primarily a Western phenomenon, and the concept of self-esteem should perhaps be replaced by self-satisfaction, or by a term that reflects
the realization that one is fulfilling the culturally mandated task. Source: (Marcus & Kitayama, 1991, Table 1, p. 230. Marcus, H. R., & Kitayama, S. (1991). Culture and the self:
Implications for cognition, emotion and motivation. Psychological Review, 98(2), 224–253. Copyright American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.

interdependent sense of self (Markus & Kitayama, 1991) as do many people living in the south- THINK ABOUT IT
ern United States (Vandello & Cohen, 1999). As you can see, it would be a mistake to overgen-
eralize and assume that all Americans have an independent self! Are today’s college students
more likely to describe
In fact, some have claimed that earlier generations of Americans, say in the 1950s to 1960s,
themselves using trait terms
were more likely to describe themselves using social roles, much like the Japanese and Chinese or social terms? Why?
college students of more recent times (Zurcher, 1977). This shifting of American self-concept Do you think this is likely to
from collectivistic to individualistic parallels the social upheavals of the 1960s to 1970s includ- change in the near future?
ing the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War,
the women’s rights movement, and the Watergate scandal of President Richard Nixon. What
have sociologists named the generation that came of age during this time of individual rights
and distrust of social institutions like government? The Me generation!

Table 5.4 Selected Items Measuring Individualism and Collectivism

Individualism
In the end, achievements define the man/woman.
A mature person knows his/her abilities and acts to obtain maximum utility from them.
A man/woman of character attempts to act on his/her values and attain his/her goals without
depending on others.
A man/woman of weak character forms his opinions in consultation with his/her friends.
I feel uncomfortable if I find I am very similar to the others in my group.
Collectivism
A mature person understands that he/she must act in accordance with the honor
of the group.
A man/woman of character helps his/her group before all else.
A mature person understands the needs of the group and acts to fulfill them.
What is good for my group is good for me.
Without group loyalty there is no self-actualization.
Note: Questions were answered on a 5-point scale from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree.
Source: Adapted from Oyserman (1993, Table 1. p. 9). See Brewer and Chen (2007) for a review of various measures of individualism
and collectivism. Reprinted with permission from Oyserman, D., Terry, K., & Bybee, D. (2002),“A possible selves intervention to enhance
school involvement,” Journal of Adolescence, 25, 313–326. Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
118 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Possible Selves
According to modern-day psychologists, an important aspect of our self-concepts encom-
passes our hopes—and fears—of what we might become. For example, hoped-for selves might
include the successful self, the creative self, the rich self, the thin self, or the loved and admired
self. Feared selves might be the alone self, the depressed self, the incompetent self, the alcoholic
self, the unemployed self, or the bag lady self. These images of our possible selves help us choose
our aspirations, maintain motivation, and provide continuity in our self-concepts over time
(Markus & Nurius, 1986).
A quote from William James stated (1890):
Not that I would not, if I could, be both handsome and fat and well dressed,
and a great athlete, and make a million a year, be a wit, a bon-vivant, and a
lady-killer, as well as a philosopher; a philanthropist, statesman, warrior, and
African explorer, as well as a “tone-poet” and saint. . . . Such different characters
may conceivably at the outset of life be alike possible to a man. But to make any
one of them actual, the rest must more or less be suppressed. So the seeker of his
truest, strongest, deepest self must review the list carefully, and pick out the one
on which to stake his salvation. All other selves thereupon become unreal, but the
fortunes of this self are real. . . . [We] . . . choose . . . one of many possible selves
or characters [to become]. (pp. 309–310)
Possible selves also help us make sense out of our current experiences, as they give us a
context to evaluate and interpret events. For example, a student with a possible self of physi-
cian will interpret a grade of A in organic chemistry differently from, say, a student with a pos-
sible self of lawyer. Or a person with a feared possible self of being alone or abandoned might
react more negatively to a broken lunch date than someone without this negative possible self
(Markus & Nurius, 1986).

Positive Possible Selves. Ideas for possible selves derive from our past experiences set
against the backdrop of our time, place, and culture. Our immediate social context has a big-
ger influence on our possible selves than demographics such as age, gender, or socioeconomic
status, and here again we see the influence of our social experiences in making us who we are
(Lee & Oyserman, 2009). Role models, either in the media or as real people in our worlds, pro-
vide powerful images of what we might become, or what we might fear becoming. For example,
about 33% of college students and 25% of adolescents mention physical appearance as part of
their desired self (Bybee & Wells, 2006). Using her media impact, Oprah Winfrey started a “Live
Your Best Life” campaign to help readers of her magazine and viewers of her talk show imagine,
strive for, and achieve a positive possible self. This campaign provides very vivid and powerful
images of women living well despite their circumstances or past failures and no doubt serves
as a motivating possible self for people, especially women, to change their lives for the better.
Psychologists have investigated the possible selves of many different kinds of people including
pregnant teens and teen moms (Nurius, Casey, Lindhorst, & Macy, 2006), young fathers in prison
(Meek, 2007), low-income mothers (Lee & Oyserman, 2009), juvenile delinquent teens (Oyser-
SEE FOR YOURSELF man & Markus, 1990), young women in counseling (Dunkel, Kelts, & Coon, 2006), gay men and
lesbian women (King & Smith, 2004), and young, middle, and elderly adults (Cross & Markus,
Do you imagine that you
1991). Let’s consider some of these findings in depth.
will be married someday?
Do you picture yourself as a Have you ever imagined what your life would be like if you married? Do you picture
good provider or as a good yourself as a good provider? A good homemaker? Both of these roles are examples of possible
homemaker? selves (Eagly, 2009). Can our possible selves change what we think is attractive in a potential
mate? Apparently they can.
College students were randomly assigned to imagine themselves as married with children
in one of three future self conditions: a homemaker role, a provider role, or a control condi-
tion in which they imagined themselves in whatever role came to mind. Then, while holding
this image of their future self, they rated how important various characteristics were in their
future mate. Although women rated provider characteristics as more important than men,
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 119

The easier it is to imagine

a possible self, like being a
mom or a dad, the more likely
this possible self will guide
our aspirations and increase
our well-being.

both women and men who imagined themselves as a future homemaker rated provider char- SEE FOR YOURSELF
acteristics (e.g., status, ambition, career focus, salary) as more important than participants in
the provider condition. Both men and women who imagined themselves as a future provider, What qualities do you find
however, rated homemaker characteristics (e.g., good cook, good with children, good house- attractive in a future mate?
How do your answers com-
keeper) as more important in a future mate. This study suggests that our possible selves can
pare to the results of the
even change what we think is attractive in a future mate! Eagly (2009) study?
Sometimes people discover that they are growing up to be a person they didn’t quite imag-
ine. Such may be the case for gay men and lesbian women, especially those who are raised in
conservative families or in a culture that assumes that heterosexuality is the norm. For example,
in the United States of the late 20th century, many gays and lesbians grew up imagining them-
selves living the proverbial American dream of marrying someone of the other sex and having
children. The realization that one is gay or lesbian requires that one abandon this straight pos-
sible self in favor of a gay possible self. How might an individual’s ability to imagine one self
or the other relate to well-being?
This question was investigated in a study in which gay men and lesbians were asked to
imagine their best possible straight and gay/lesbian future selves (King & Smith, 2004). Partici-
pants 18 to 66 years old rated how easily and vividly they imagined these possible selves. They
also rated the extent to which they were out to their family, friends, and coworkers. Finally, they
also answered questionnaires that measured their psychological distress, degree of regret or sec-
ond thoughts about their current gay/lesbian life, and feelings of well-being and life satisfaction.
The more salient a straight possible self was, the less life satisfaction and the more regrets
a participant reported. In addition, the less likely they were to be out to others. In contrast, the
more salient a gay/lesbian self was, the greater life satisfaction, the fewer regrets, and the more
open about his or her life a participant was. Further, at a follow-up study conducted 2 years
later, salience of straight possible selves was related to increased psychological distress whereas
salience of gay/lesbian selves was related to lowered distress 2 years later. The more people were
invested in their best possible gay/lesbian self—that is, easily and vividly imagining a gay/lesbian
life, being out to more people—the less distress participants felt over time.
SEE FOR YOURSELF
Negative Possible Selves. The studies reviewed so far focused on positive possible selves.
What about negative or feared possible selves? Imagine that you are an adolescent, 13 to 16 years What do you hope to be
true of you in the next 5
old, say, living in inner-city Detroit. Perhaps you’ve committed some minor crimes, perhaps
years? What do you fear
you’ve gotten into more serious crime, perhaps you are trying to stay out of trouble. What kinds might be true?
of possible selves are particularly salient to you?
120 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

This is the question investigated by Oyserman and Markus (1990). They identified four
groups of youths differing in their rates of delinquency. One group attended a regular public
school and had no history of crime. A second showed mild delinquency and were attending
either an alternative school or a delinquency intervention program as part of regular public
school. A third group showed moderate delinquency and attended a special school or lived in
a group home. The fourth group had a record of severe delinquency and were attending a state
training school as a last resort after other treatments had failed. The participants included Black
and White males and females.
Each teen was interviewed one-on-one by a trained researcher and asked to imagine pos-
sible selves over the next year. Specifically, they were asked to list three of each of their expected
selves (“What is most likely to be true for you in the next year”), hoped-for selves (“Possible
selves that you most hope to describe you in the next year”), and feared selves (“What do you
most fear or worry about being in the next year”).
There were stark differences between the nondelinquent group and the severe delinquency
group. Consider this reply from a young man in the public school group:
I expect to be doing better in school, to be almost independent—ready to move
out and to have a part-time job. I hope to study more, have a good paying
part-time job, and be independent of my parents. I’m afraid I might not stay in
school, I won’t get a summer job, and I’ll be homeless. (16-year-old male, public
school; Oyserman & Markus, 1990, p. 117)
Now, compare this reply with the reply from a teen in the severe delinquency group:
Next year I expect to be in trouble more, but trying to stay out of trouble, and
trying to stay in school. I hope to graduate high school, not be in trouble with the
police, and start a good job so I won’t steal for cash. I’m afraid I might be a thief, in
prison, dead—killed breaking into houses. (16-year-old male, maximum secu-
rity training school for delinquent boys; Oyserman & Markus, 1990, p. 117)
Overall, the possible selves of this sample were more likely to include criminal than
having a job or getting along well in school. Note that having a negative feared self—as
part of a self-concept—doesn’t necessarily set you up for failure, nor is holding a posi-
tive hoped-for or expected self enough to
lead to success. In a follow-up of the pub-
lic school and community placement teens
2 or 3 months later, those youths who had a
balance of positive and negative selves com-
mitted fewer and less serious crimes than
youths with more negative selves or more
positive selves. For possible selves to have
the greatest impact on motivation and long-
term behavior change, we need both hoped-
for and feared selves. That is, having a clear
positive hoped-for self helps us imagine
what we can do to avoid the negative feared
self, and a negative feared self can help us
be aware of what could happen if we don’t
achieve our positive hoped-for self.
Might it be possible to use these find-
ings on possible selves to help teens develop
alternative possible selves and to succeed in
school? Researchers developed an after-school
The right balance of hoped-
program specifically for African Ameri-
for and feared possible
can middle school students from inner-city
selves can be particularly
motivating. Detroit (Oyserman, Terry, & Bybee, 2002).
The 9-week intervention included group
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 121

activities and discussions to help the youths articulate academically oriented possible selves,
identify specific strategies to help achieve these selves, connect their possible selves to the selves
of successful adult role models, and improve their social skills.
An important aspect of this intervention was that it took account of their social context.
For example, the workshops took place after-hours in their regular schools and involved
other kids in their school and adults in the community. The workshops also addressed
issues these kids face on a regular basis including racism and how to deal with it, positive
aspects of racial identity, and academic achievement as part of racial identity. Compared
to boys and girls who did not experience the intervention, participants showed a greater
sense of bonding to school, a greater concern for doing well in school, more balanced pos-
sible selves, knowledge of more plausible strategies to achieve their possible selves, greater
school attendance, and, for boys, a decrease in getting into trouble at school (Oyserman,
Terry, & Bybee, 2002).
These results are pretty remarkable when you realize that without this intervention, these
middle school kids would be at risk for delinquency, much like the teens of the Oyserman and
Markus (1990) study discussed in the preceding pages. Other researchers have created similar
programs for at-risk youth, university-level student athletes, and middle school children (Hock,
Deshler, & Schumaker, 2006).

Then and Now: The Self

As I am writing this chapter a certain phone company is launching the debut of a new mobile “[The self ] has justly been
phone that is, in the words of the company, “the first phone that becomes 100% you.” The ad regarded as the most
goes on to explain that you can “make your phone as unique as you are” with customizable puzzling puzzle with which
accessories, applications, covers, and skins. As someone who can remember when phones were
psychology has to deal.”
not mobile, came in basic black, and were rented to customers by the one and only phone
William James (1890, p. 330)
company in existence at the time, the idea of customizing a phone would be like customizing
a microwave oven! Clothes and living spaces sure, but when did choosing utilities become an
important way of expressing ourselves?
According to Roy Baumeister (1987), the self has become a “problem.” For psychologists
the self is a fascinating puzzle and exciting research area and has been for the last 120 years or
so! For the rest of us, the self is something we need to find, become, express, or even have a crisis
over. Growing up in modern Western societies we view ourselves—and others—as unique and
special. But this was not always the case.
Drawing on the historical record and themes in literature of the time, psychologist Roy
Baumeister described how the self—including self-knowledge, potential and fulfillment, rela-
tion between individual and society, and self-definitions—has changed in the course of history
(Baumeister, 1986, 1987; see also Gergen, 1991, and Leary, 2004).
The history of self-knowledge can be traced at least as far back as the ancient Greeks. The
words “Know thyself ” were inscribed over the entrance to the Temple of Apollo at Delphi. Of
course, in ancient times this probably meant that one should appraise his talents to be able to
carry out his duties effectively, with good judgment and common sense. Even up to medieval
times, around the 11th to 15th centuries, a person’s identity simply came from his or her
duty or place in society, and depended on his or her social rank, family ties, and occupation
(Baumeister, 1987).
Notions about the self at this time paralleled early Christian beliefs that salvation
would come to humanity as a whole. However, this changed around the 12th century
or so when the Christian concept of the Last Judgment emphasized individual salvation,
suggesting that one’s eternal fate depended on the sum of one’s moral and spiritual life
(Baumeister, 1987).
During the 16th to 18th centuries people became fascinated with the distinction between
inner and outer life. Before that, people essentially equated the self with concrete outer appear-
ance: People looked like their station in life and that is who they essentially were. However, this
new fascination with misleading appearances led to recognition of a private, inner, real self that
was hidden (Baumeister, 1987). Just think of the themes in Shakespeare that reflect the contrast
122 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Under the repressiveness

of the Victorian era people
became self-conscious and
developed a fascination with
the hidden aspects of the self.

between appearances and realities: Romeo and Juliet (“O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou
Romeo? . . . ’Tis but thy name that is my enemy: Thou art thyself ”), The Merchant of Venice
(“Hath not a Jew eyes . . . if you prick us, do we not bleed?”), or Twelfth Night and other plays
in which people switch places or pretend to be others.
Puritanism during the 16th and 17th centuries increased self-consciousness as individuals
worried about their fate in the afterlife. Self-consciousness and self-awareness became impor-
tant values and people became concerned with their own self-deception. The self was deemed
difficult or impossible to know (Baumeister, 1987).
As people sought to understand this hidden side to the self, personality became more
important, as reflected in the increased popularity of biography and autobiography in the
literature of the 18th and 19th centuries. People recognized that personality, rather than
social status, defined the individual. It is interesting to note the psychologist and philosopher
William James and his brother, the writer Henry James, both tackled the problem of self from
different perspectives during this time. Politically, economically, and socially, this period saw
revolutions in America and in France, for example, and a rise in individual rights and social
equality (Baumeister, 1997). As a result, the Romantic era of the late 18th to early 19th centuries
emphasized the unique, individual, cosmic destiny that an individual was expected to discover
and fulfill (Baumeister, 1987, 1997).
Victorian repressiveness of the middle and late 19th century only served to further empha-
size the unique, but hidden self. High moral standards forced Victorians to become self-conscious
and to hide their true selves, lest they appear to fall short of impossibly high standards of behavior
(Baumeister, 1987). Victorians believed that the inner self could be revealed inadvertently, a feat
exemplified by Sherlock Holmes with his keen powers of perception (Baumeister, 1987). Sigmund
Freud may have captured this feeling best when he observed, “Betrayal oozes from every pore”
(Baumeister, 1987; Freud, 1905/1959, p. 94). Perhaps Freud’s ability to decode this hidden self
explains his popularity then and continued popularity today.
As a result of increasing modernization and mass production during the early part of
the 20th century, people felt an increasing alienation and discontent with work life. This
set the stage for self-exploration and belief in personal uniqueness that marked the self
of the latter part of the 20th century (Baumeister, 1987). By the time Erik Erikson coined
the phrase identity crisis (Erikson, 1968) the fervor with which people embraced the idea
suggests that he merely named, rather than discovered, an important human experience
(Baumeister, 1999).
By the end of the 20th century and into our own time, we struggle for a balance between
our individual uniqueness and our group membership (Brewer, 1991) as we embrace our
diverse social identities. What about the self of the 21st century? We have yet to see the full
impact of technology—such as the Internet with instant messaging (IM), social networking,
and yes, customizable phones—that simultaneously brings us closer to friends, family, and
strangers even as it invites deception or at least strategic self-presentation and experimentation
with various identities.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 123

Self-Esteem SEE FOR YOURSELF

How do you feel about
Self-esteem, the “greatest love” according to a classic song, is just that: the amount of value people
yourself? Take the assess-
place on themselves (Baumeister, Campbell, Kreuger, & Vohs, 2003). People with high self-esteem ment in Table 5.5 to find out.
have a favorable view of themselves, whereas people low in self-esteem have an unfavorable view
of themselves. Keep in mind that self-esteem is more of a perception or an opinion and does not
imply anything about whether the person actually is a good or a bad person. This might be con-
fusing, as people who are high in self-esteem may have an accurate and justified appreciation of
their own achievements and successes or they may have an inflated, arrogant, and conceited view
of their talents. Similarly, low self-esteem may reflect an accurate view of one’s shortcomings, or it
may be a distorted and problematic view of one’s perceived inferiority (Baumeister et al., 2003).
Self-esteem often refers to a general evaluation of one’s self-concept (e.g., Rosenberg, 1965),
but we can also have domain-specific self-esteem for work (e.g., Brockner, 1988), academics
(e.g., Marsh, 1993), athletics (e.g., Fox & Corbin, 1989), appearance (e.g., Franzoi & Shields,
1984), and even toward one’s social identity (Luhtanen & Crocker, 1992). Global self-esteem is
moderately correlated with domain-specific self-esteem.

Self-Esteem Level
People vary in the amount of self-esteem they feel, so that even though we talk about people
high or low in self-esteem, self-esteem is really a matter of degree. In fact, people rarely admit—
at least not on questionnaires to psychologists—that they feel bad about themselves. Low self-
esteem is really more like lacking positive views about the self (Baumeister et al., 2003). In
many experiments people are classified as low in self-esteem if they fall in the bottom half or
bottom third of a sample of people. You can get some idea of your own self-esteem by taking
the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965) in Table 5.5.
People with high self-esteem tend to agree with items such as “I feel that I’m a person of
worth, at least on an equal plane with others” or “I take a positive attitude toward myself” and to
disagree with items like “At times, I think I am no good at all” or “I feel I do not have much to be
proud of” (Rosenberg, 1965, pp. 17–18). People low in self-esteem, rather than feeling bad about
themselves and agreeing with the negative items and disagreeing with the positive items, tend to
be more neutral toward all items, sometimes agreeing or disagreeing, but not very strongly. In the
words of one researcher, “High scores are high, but low scores are medium” (Tice, 1993, p. 40).

Table 5.5 The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale

How do you feel about yourself? For each of the items below, strongly agree SA, agree A,
disagree D, or strongly disagree SD by circling the appropriate response.
1. On the whole, I am satisfied with myself. SA A D SD
*2. At times, I think I am no good at all. SA A D SD
3. I feel that I have a number of good qualities. SA A D SD
4. I am able to do things as well as most other people. SA A D SD
*5. I feel I do not have much to be proud of. SA A D SD
*6. I certainly feel useless at times. SA A D SD
7. I feel that I’m a person of worth, at least on an equal plane with others. SA A D SD
*8. I wish I could have more respect for myself. SA A D SD
*9. All in all, I am inclined to feel that I am a failure. SA A D SD
10. I take a positive attitude toward myself. SA A D SD
Scoring: SA = 3, A = 2, D = 1, SD = 0. Items with an asterisk are reverse scored, that is, SA = 0, A = 1, D = 2, SD = 3.
Sum the scores for the 10 items. The higher the score, the higher the self-esteem. Scores below 15 suggest low self-esteem.
Source: Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the adolescent self-image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
124 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

People with high self-esteem are better than people with lower self-esteem in coping with
failure. They persist longer and bounce back quicker from setbacks (Shrauger & Rosenberg,
1970; Shrauger & Sorman, 1977). People with lower self-esteem are more vulnerable to the
slings and arrows of everyday life, showing more reactivity to events and greater mood swings
(Campbell, Chew, & Scratchley, 1991). Also, people with lower self-esteem are more easily
persuaded by the social influence of others (Brockner, 1984). People with lower self-esteem
experience a conflict between wanting success and approval and being afraid of falling short
(Brown, 1993). People with higher self-esteem are even physically healthier than people with
low self-esteem (Brown & McGill, 1989).

Self-Esteem Stability
In addition to level of self-esteem (i.e., whether one’s self-esteem is high or low), researchers
study how changeable one’s self-esteem is. Self-esteem stability refers to how stable or variable
people’s general feelings of self-worth are over time (Kernis & Goldman, 2003). Although most
self-esteem scales ask about how people typically feel about themselves or how they feel about
themselves in general, self-esteem stability is measured by asking people how they feel about
themselves at the moment that they are answering the question. Then, researchers ask people
this question once or twice a day over a 4- to 7-day period.
People with stable self-esteem are consistent in how they feel about themselves. People with
unstable or variable self-esteem feel good or bad about themselves depending on what’s going
on around them. They seem to be very responsive—almost too responsive—to events that are
potentially relevant to their self-worth. These events may be actual events (e.g., a compliment or
an insult) or their own thoughts and reflections (e.g., thinking about one’s appearance). People
“I know who I am. No one with unstable self-esteem often feel fragile or vulnerable as if their self-esteem is continually in
else knows who I am. If I was
jeopardy (Kernis & Goldman, 2003).
There is some evidence that level of self-esteem interacts with stability of self-esteem. Low
a giraffe, and someone said
self-esteem may not be so bad if one is variable, compared to stable, in this negative self-view
I was a snake, I’d think, no, (Paradise & Kernis, 2002). However, people with unstable high self-esteem may have more
actually I’m a giraffe.” difficulty coping in their everyday life compared to people with stable high self-esteem. People
Richard Gere, to British newspaper with unstable, high self-esteem tend to be more defensive (Kernis, Grannemann, & Barclay,
The Guardian, when asked if what 1992), self-aggrandizing (Kernis, Greenier, Herlocker, Whisenhunt, & Abend, 1997), prone to
the press says about his private life anger (Kernis et al., 1989), and to have less satisfying relationships (Kernis & Goldman, 2003)
bothers him than people with stable high self-esteem.

Self-Concept Clarity
People with high and low self-esteem don’t differ only in how they feel about themselves; they
also differ in how they think about themselves. People with higher self-esteem know themselves
better. Self-concept clarity refers to how well people know—or think they know—themselves.
Although it is similar to self-esteem stability (Campbell et al., 1996), self-concept clarity refers
to consistency of our self-concepts whereas self-esteem stability refers to consistency of our
self-esteem, our feelings about our self-concepts.
In a very simple demonstration, college students described themselves using 15 pairs of
adjectives and then rated how confident they were (Campbell, 1990). For example, they were
asked how silly versus serious or how extravagant versus thrifty they were on a 7-point scale.
A person who is clearer in his or her self-concept would give more extreme answers—that is,
away from the midpoint—than a person who is more wishy-washy about himself or herself.
This is precisely what the researchers found. People with high self-esteem gave more
extreme responses than people with low self-esteem. They were also more confident in their
responses than people lower in self-esteem. In subsequent studies, participants high in self-
THINK ABOUT IT esteem were also faster at making self-ratings and more consistent in their ratings, than par-
Does knowing yourself ticipants lower in self-esteem (Campbell, 1990).
cause high self-esteem Similar results have been found by other researchers using different ways of defining and
or does having high self- measuring self-concept clarity (Stinson, Wood, & Doxey, 2008) and related concepts including self-
esteem help you know
concept confusion (Campbell & Lavallee, 1993), self-certainty (Baumgardner, 1990; Wright, 2001),
yourself?
self-ambivalence (Riketta & Ziegler, 2006), self-concept integration versus compartmentalization
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 125

People with low self-esteem

often self-handicap as a way
of protecting their self-esteem.

The Personality of Everyday Life

Shooting yourself in the foot to protect your self-esteem
As strange as it may seem, self-handicapping is when we purposely set ourselves up
for possible failure. If we fail, we have a ready-made excuse and some measure of self-
protection. And if we succeed despite the sabotage? Why, we look even better and increase
our worth in the eyes of others and ourselves! In this way self-handicapping can serve
either self-enhancement or self-protection motives, depending on the task and the likeli-
hood of success or failure.
In one experiment, participants who were high or low in self-esteem would have
a chance to practice and then perform a task (Tice, 1991). Participants were randomly
assigned to one of four conditions that differed in how important they thought the task was
and whether success or failure was meaningful on the task. For example, in one condition
participants believed success indicated that they had high ability but that failure indicated
nothing about their ability. In another condition, participants believed that failure meant
they lacked ability but that success indicated nothing about their ability. The differing
instructions suggested to participants that self-handicapping, in the form of not practicing
before their big evaluation, could either protect or enhance their self-esteem.
Sure enough, before their performance participants who were low in self-esteem prac-
ticed less and self-handicapped more than people high in self-esteem when they thought
it would protect their self-esteem (when failure reflected badly on their ability, but that
success was no big deal) whereas participants high in self-esteem practiced less and handi-
capped more than people low in self-esteem when they thought it would enhance their
self-esteem (when success reflected well on their ability but that failure was no big deal).
In a second study, these findings were replicated with participants choosing distracting
music as a self-handicap (Tice, 1991).
There are many ways that people, especially college students, can self-handicap. Perhaps
you’ve seen some of these strategies in yourself or others: making excuses, not getting enough
sleep, not trying your best, eating badly, arriving late, being distracted, not practicing, not
studying, trying to do too much, using alcohol and other drugs, and—everyone’s favorite—
procrastinating. Although self-handicapping strategies may provide a short-term benefit by
taking the pressure off, they are often detrimental in the long run because they prevent us
from performing our best. Even procrastination, despite most procrastinators thinking that
they “work best under pressure,” is detrimental (Tice & Baumeister, 1997). So the next time
you are tempted to self-handicap—or procrastinate—think again!
126 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

(Showers, 1992; Showers & Zeigler-Hill, 2007; Story, 2004; Zeigler-Hill & Showers, 2007), con-
tingent self-esteem (Crocker & Knight, 2005; Deci & Ryan, 1995), and fragile self-esteem (Kernis,
Lakey, & Heppner, 2008). However, one puzzle still remains: Does self-concept clarity cause self-
esteem or does self-esteem cause self-concept clarity? Perhaps they affect each other (Brandt &
Vonk, 2006; Hoyle, 2006; Showers & Zeigler-Hill, 2006). Only with more research will we be able
to know for sure.

THINK ABOUT IT Life Outcomes of High and Low Self-Esteem: Myths and Realities
Is self-esteem important? Psychologists and the general public alike agree that self-esteem is important for individual
Why? well-being. In fact, in the 1980s the California legislature went so far as to fund a task force to
increase the self-esteem of its residents. It believed—in the absence of scientific evidence—that
an investment in the self-esteem of the citizenry would pay dividends in a reduction of wel-
fare dependency, unwanted pregnancy, school failure, crime, drug addiction, and other social
problems. Is it true that increasing self-esteem can do all this? Take a look at Table 5.6 and test
your own knowledge about the supposed outcomes of self-esteem.
Myths? Truths? How can we know for sure? In 2003 the American Psychological Society
(now the Association for Psychological Science) charged a task force, including four researchers
in the area of self-esteem, to review and summarize available research to evaluate such claims
(Baumeister et al., 2003). The statements in Table 5.6 come directly out of the task force’s work.
Let’s take a closer look at some of what it found.
MYTH 1: Too many people suffer from low self-esteem.
FACT: There is no epidemic of low self-esteem in America or elsewhere in the world,
for that matter. Quite the opposite: The average person sees himself or herself as better than
average, in both the United States (Baumeister et al., 2003) and in 52 other cultures includ-
ing European, South American, Australian, Asian, and African, and in both individualistic

Table 5.6 Myths (and Realities) of Self Esteem—Which Is which?

Can you separate the myths of self-esteem from the true research findings? Take this quiz to find
out. Circle true or false to each of the statements below. The answers are given below and in the
text.
1. Too many people suffer from low self-esteem. True False

2. People with high self-esteem are smarter, more likable, and more physically True False
attractive than people with low self-esteem.
3. People with high self-esteem do better in school and achieve more on the True False
job, and have greater life satisfaction and happiness than people with low
self-esteem.
4. Interventions that aim to increase achievement by increasing the True False
self-esteem of school students are successful.
5. Relationships are more likely to break up if a partner has low True False
self-esteem than if a partner has high self-esteem.
6. Bullies suffer from low self-esteem so they need to lash out and hurt others. True False

7. People with low self-esteem are more likely to abuse alcohol and other drugs True False
than people with high self-esteem.
8. People with low self-esteem are more likely to engage in premature sex- True False
ual activity and to have an unwanted pregnancy than people with high
self-esteem.
Answers: All of the above statements are false.
Source: See the text and Baumeister et al. (2003) for details.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 127

Although self-esteem is
important, scientific evidence
suggests that interventions
to increase self-esteem may
be misguided.

and collectivistic cultures (Schmitt & Allik, 2005). In many experiments, the “low self-
esteem group,” defined as scoring in the bottom portion of a sample of participants, often
ends up scoring at least one standard deviation above the midpoint of the scale. In fact, the
average score on self-esteem tests is actually above the midpoint of the scale (Baumeister,
Tice, & Hutton, 1989). Although this lets us make comparisons between people higher
and lower in self-esteem, it does not suggest that low self-esteem is a problem. We might
well wonder if some of this self-reported high self-esteem is due to deliberate impression
management, defensive self-enhancement, narcissism, or a tendency to see everything more
positively (Baumeister et al., 2003). This heterogeneity of high self-esteem, where there may
be different kinds of high self-esteem, makes it difficult to detect significant effects of
self-esteem.
MYTH 2: People with high self-esteem are smarter, more likable, and more physically
attractive than people with low self-esteem.
FACT: There is a strong correlation between self-esteem and being smart, likable, popular,
and physically attractive, but this is true only for self-ratings. There is no correlation between
self-esteem and others’ ratings of how likable, popular, and physically attractive a person is,
or with objective measures of intelligence. What’s going on? People with high self-esteem
believe all these things about themselves, but they are not true by objective standards. In fact,
people high and low in self-esteem are equally likable and equal in physical attractiveness and
intelligence.
For example, in one study male and female college students rated themselves on self-esteem,
attractiveness, and intelligence, and took a standard intelligence test (Gabriel, Critelli, & Ee, 1994).
Then, experimenters took their photographs and rated each one on attractiveness compared to the
average college student. For both men and women, there was a significant correlation of r = .35
between self-esteem and self-rated intelligence but no correlation between self-esteem and scores
on the intelligence test (r = -.07). The results for attractiveness were similar, but fell just short of
statistical significance. There was a positive correlation between self-esteem and self-rated attrac-
tiveness (r = .23) but not between self-esteem and experimenter-rated attractiveness (r = .01).
Both men and women were guilty of this self-inflation. However, men inflated their own attractive-
ness ratings more than women did.
MYTH 3: People with high self-esteem do better in school, achieve more in their job, and
have greater life satisfaction and happiness than people with low self-esteem.
FACT: There is a correlation between self-esteem and success but self-esteem is the
result—not the cause—of success in school, work, and life. We have to remind ourselves that
correlation is not causation. In this case research has demonstrated that achieving commend-
able accomplishments, working hard for outcomes, developing our skills through effort and
128 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

practice, and coping with negative events all make us feel good about ourselves whether in
school, on the job, or in our lives.
All of the studies on workplace success and self-esteem are correlational in nature (Judge &
Bono, 2001), but school success is one of the most studied outcomes of self-esteem (Baumeister
et al., 2003). Numerous studies employing various methods, including longitudinal designs
which can test for causality, find little (Valentine, DuBois, & Cooper, 2004) or no (Baumeister
et al., 2003) effect of self-esteem on school achievement. Where there are significant correla-
tions between self-esteem and achievement, they are small and most often due to achievement
causing increased self-esteem rather than the other way around. There is also some evidence
that third variables, like family background, can cause both increased self-esteem and increased
school achievement.
MYTH 4: Interventions that aim to increase achievement by increasing the self-esteem of
school students are successful.
FACT: Alas, not only are such programs less successful than other, more traditional, meth-
ods of increasing achievement (e.g., getting parents more involved), but such methods may
actually backfire. For example, one study specifically targeted college students who got a C, D,
or an F on the midterm of their introductory psychology class and randomly assigned them
to one of three feedback conditions (Forsyth, Lawrence, Burnette, & Baumeister, 2007). For all
students, this feedback was administered via a weekly e-mail message that included a review
question on that week’s material. The control condition received this review question only. In
a second condition, students received feedback aimed at increasing their self-esteem. In a third
condition, students received feedback aimed at increasing their sense of control and taking
responsibility for their grades and study habits.
What happened when it came to the final exam? Take a look at Figure 5.3. The pattern of
results was opposite to predictions! Bolstering self-esteem actually led to poorer performance espe-
cially among the weakest students. That is, students in the self-esteem bolstering feedback condition

Figure 5.3 Mean final exam 80

scores for C and D/F students
in the self-esteem bolstering
75
condition (SE), the internal and
controllable (I/C) condition, and
SE
the control condition. Source: 70
Control
From Forsyth et al. (2007, C Students
I/C
Figure 1, p. 453). Reprinted
with permission from Forsyth, 65
D. R., Lawrence, N. K., Burnette, Control
J. L., & Baumeister, R. F. (2007),
60
“Attempting to improve the
academic performance of
Score

struggling college students by 55 I/C

bolstering their self-esteem: An
intervention that backfired,”
50
Journal of Social and Clinical
Psychology, 26(4), 447–459. D/F Students
Permission conveyed through 45
the Copyright Clearance Center.

40
SE

35

30
Test 1 Final
Assessment
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 129

actually performed worse than the other two groups, and none of the groups improved their grades
from the midterm to the final exam. The authors pointed out that not only did the self-esteem
group of D/F students perform significantly worse than the other two D/F groups, but they also
performed worse on a practical level: Their average final grade was below passing!
What went so wrong with this intervention? The authors agreed with the reasoning of
Baumeister et al. (2003) who cautioned that boosting self-esteem regardless of performance
encourages people to devalue their performance. After all, one very effective way of maintaining
self-esteem in the face of failure is to withdraw your effort from the task and convince yourself
that your self-esteem is not contingent on your performance (i.e., that failure doesn’t matter).
What happens to students who do not study, go to class, keep up with readings, or essentially
withdraw their efforts from their studies? They do poorly in their classes but—and here is
the amazing part—they don’t feel bad about it! Perhaps feeling bad when we know we’re not
performing our best is not such a bad thing. After all, our self-esteem might suffer a bit in the
short term, but our positive outcomes might increase in the long run.
MYTH 5: Relationships are more likely to break up if a partner has low self-esteem than
if a partner has high self-esteem.
FACT: Both high and low self-esteem cause problems in relationships, so self-esteem has
little to do with who stays together or who breaks up (Baumeister et al., 2003). However, low
self-esteem does cause some problems in relationships, such as often distrusting a partner’s
expressions of love and support.
MYTH 6: Bullies suffer from low self-esteem so they need to lash out and hurt others.
FACT: There is no correlation between self-esteem and self-report bullying or peer-reported
likelihood of bullying. People with high self-esteem, especially with unstable self-esteem, with
unrealistically positive self-views as in narcissism, or with defensive high self-esteem, are more
likely to react to perceived threats with violence than people with low self-esteem. These people THINK ABOUT IT
are especially sensitive to evaluation and react badly if they don’t measure up in their own
minds to what they think they deserve (Baumeister et al., 2003). Which of these myths did
you find the most surpris-
MYTH 7: People with low self-esteem are likely to abuse alcohol and other drugs than ing? Why?
people with high self-esteem.
FACT: There is no correlation between drug use and self-esteem (Baumeister et al., 2003).
MYTH 8: People with low self-esteem are likely to engage in premature sexual activity and
to have an unwanted pregnancy than people with high self-esteem.
FACT: Experiencing sexual activity before one is ready or having an unwanted pregnancy
are both events that make people feel bad about themselves and cause low self-esteem. Again,
just because there is a correlation, we can’t assume causation. If anything, people with high self-
esteem are often less inhibited and more willing to take risks than people with low self-esteem
(Baumeister et al., 2003). The problem appears to be with high self-esteem or the overconfi-
dence of unwarranted high self-esteem. One of the biggest puzzles of self-esteem for researchers
is to separate out true high self-esteem from overly high self-esteem or defensive self-esteem
(e.g., Jordan, Spencer, & Zanna, 2005; Lambird & Mann, 2006).
These myths and facts involve but a few of the many variables that have been assumed
by people to be related to self-esteem. In their review Baumeister et al. (2003) also discussed
research on self-esteem and group behavior, leadership, delinquency, antisocial behavior, smok-
ing, sexual orientation, and eating disorders, and came to similar conclusions. For most of
these outcomes there are no significant correlations with self-esteem, and even when there
are significant correlations, most of them are small, and evidence of a clear causal connection
between self-esteem and these outcomes is lacking. Their report started a wave of controversy
and renewed interest in understanding the correlates and outcomes of self-esteem (e.g., Swann,
Chang-Schneider, & McClarty, 2007). For example, newer evidence suggests that when we look
at aggression, antisocial behavior, and delinquency (including fighting, drug use, alcohol use,
and illegal activities) outside the laboratory and over time, there are small to moderate correla-
tions with low self-esteem (Donnellan, Trzesniewski, Robins, Moffitt, & Caspi, 2005). Clearly,
this is an exciting time to be a researcher in the area of self-esteem!
130 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

“Think about yourself in the Research Methods Illustrated: Qualitative Data

future, please tell me about and Content Analysis
the possible selves that you

S
uppose you were one of the researchers who posed these questions (see left margin) to their
think are most likely to be
participants. You’ve collected responses from 150 college students at 5 different universities in
true of you in the next year. the United States, Chile, and Japan (Unemori et al., 2004). Now what do you do?
These are possible selves This is an example of a study using qualitative methods, techniques that analyze
you expect to be true of broad themes or characteristics—qualities—reflected in participants’ responses. In contrast to
quantitative methods, where the data collected involve measures, questionnaires, test scores,
you. . . . Now think about
or other numerical data—quantities, amounts—qualitative data are often verbal. Qualitative data
ways you would not like collection is used more in sociology, anthropology, and sometimes in education. Psychology, and
to be next year. Ways you personality in particular, draws on both kinds of research, often in the same study (see Table 5.7
would like to avoid being or for a comparison of quantitative and qualitative research methods).
In personality psychology, sometimes the best way to study people’s thoughts, feelings, and
fear being.” reactions is through open-ended questions (Woike, 2007). Examples of open-ended questions are
Unemori, Omoregie, and Markus sentence-completion tests, essays, stories, and diaries (Woike, 2007). The challenge for researchers
(2004, p. 326) is to figure out a way of judging, categorizing, and analyzing the content of these responses in a
meaningful fashion (e.g., Bartholomew, Henderson, & Marcia, 2000). This is called content analysis.
Open-ended questions have several advantages over questionnaire measures (Woike, 2007).
First, they allow participants the freedom to express themselves without the constraints of a
questionnaire. Participants may express their innermost thoughts and emotional reactions, and
reveal their frames of reference and cultural assumptions in open-ended responses. Even when
questionnaires allow participants to choose between options, we have no way of knowing if the
options are relevant for participants or if they are merely choosing “the lesser of two evils.”
Second, what if we have left out some aspect of the topic that is important to participants? We
would never know this from a questionnaire. Because open-ended responses are self-generated,
we know that what participants say is personally relevant and important. Third, asking open-ended
questions can minimize the researcher’s unknown or hidden biases that may contaminate more
traditional measures.
Finally, asking open-ended questions may be the only way to understand how participants
think, feel, and react to a topic that has never been studied before.
So, how do researchers conduct a content analysis? Let’s take a closer look at the steps
involved (Smith, 2000; Woike, 2007) and see how they might apply to the study of the possible
selves of young adults from four cultural backgrounds (Unemori et al., 2004).
Step 1: Identify the research question.What are we trying to identify, describe, or measure?
Unemori et al. (2004) had two research questions in mind: What are the similarities and differences

Table 5.7 A Comparison of Quantitative and Qualitative Research Methods

Quantitative Research
Tests a hypothesis that the researcher begins with.
Concepts are in the form of distinct variables.
Data are in the form of numbers.
Theory is largely causal and is deductive (reasoning from general principles to particular facts).
Analysis proceeds by using statistics, tables, or charts.
Qualitative Research
Captures and discovers meaning from the data.
Concepts are in the form of themes, motifs, generalizations, taxonomies, and so on.
Data are in the form of words from documents, observations, transcripts, open-ended questions,
and so forth.
Theory can be causal or noncausal and is often inductive (reasoning from particular facts to
general principles).
Analysis proceeds by extracting themes or generalizations from evidence and organizing data to
present a coherent, consistent picture.
Source: Adapted from Neuman (1997, p. 329, Table 13.1). Neuman, W. L. (1997). Social research methods: Qualitative and quantitative
approaches. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 131

in possible selves (actual and feared) among young people of European American (EA), Japanese
American (JA), Chilean (CH), and Japanese (JN) cultural backgrounds? Do people have a similar
number of expected and feared possible selves, that is, a balance between the number of expected
and feared possible selves? Or, does one kind or the other predominate?
Step 2: Decide if content analysis will answer the research question either alone or
combined with other methods. Sometimes researchers will give a personality questionnaire like
the NEO-PI-R to measure the five-factor model of traits (Costa & McCrae, 1985), a self-esteem scale
(Rosenberg, 1965), or a measure of individualism–collectivism (Oyserman, 1993) along with open-
ended questions. The Unemori et al. (2004) study used content analysis combined with background
questions (gender, age, highest level of education attained by their parents, highest level of
education they expected to achieve) to explore their two research questions.
Step 3: Decide what type of material will answer the research question and how best to
obtain it. The key here is to make the instructions neither too broad and general (“Tell me the story
of your life”) nor too structured like a self-report questionnaire (“Are you more like a placid lake or a
babbling brook?”). The questions Unemori et al. (2004) used (“Tell me about the possible selves that
you think are most likely to be true of you in the next year” and “Ways you would like to avoid being
or fear being”) have the right amount of structure. Additional instructions to “rank the three that are
most meaningful to you” made sure that the researchers captured what was most important to the
participants. Mentioning the number three ensured that participants would give the right amount of
information, neither too much (making coding difficult) nor too little (rendering analysis impossible).
Step 4: Determine the unit of analysis to be coded. This might be a phrase, a sentence, a
paragraph, or even an essay. Once the unit is identified, we can create a scoring system to capture
and quantify the concept we are after. In the Unemori et al. (2004) study the unit of analysis was the
possible self described. For most participants, this was a short phrase or sentence.
Step 5: Select or develop a content coding system. In the Unemori et al. (2004) study, since the
researchers were building on past research, they used a coding scheme that had been validated in
previous research instead of devising their own scheme. Each of the expected selves and feared selves
was classified into one of the following categories: Intrapersonal (e.g., anxious, happy, rich), Interpersonal
(e.g., keep in touch with friends, strengthen relationships), Career/Education (e.g., worried about future
job, applying to medical school), Extracurricular (e.g., involved in clubs, swim more), Attainment of
material goods (e.g., have a regular income, have a car), and Health-related (e.g., in shape, less tired).
Step 6: Test and refine the coding system with pilot data. In the Unemori et al. (2004) study,
this was not necessary because they used a coding system that had already been validated with
college students. This step is crucial, however, when conducting research in a new area, with new
measures, or with a population that has not been tested before. Often, further refinement of a
coding system is necessary before researchers are ready to collect data.
Step 7: Train coders and obtain adequate intercoder agreement. While training coders in what
to look for and how to make their judgments, researchers must ensure that the coders are not aware of
the experimental hypothesis. This way the coders can be as free from bias in their ratings as possible.
Step 8: Collect responses. Here, researchers should be careful that data are collected under
the same conditions for all participants. Ideally, data should not be collected by the coders, so that
they do not inadvertently bias the responses.

Open-ended questions, an
example of qualitative data,
are often used to study
people’s thoughts, feelings,
and reactions.
132 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Step 9: Code the data. The first step here is to transcribe the responses and remove names
and other identifying information to protect the identity of the participants. Researchers will often
use code numbers or names to keep track of the data. Coders then make their judgments or ratings
and the researcher should verify that coders are using the coding system correctly and show
adequate agreement.
In the Unemori et al. (2004) study two groups of bilingual coders (English and Spanish; English
and Japanese) who were unaware of the purpose of the study each read through a subset of
responses. Once the coders achieved 92 to 96% agreement, one of each pair went on to read the
remaining responses of the European American, Japanese American, Chilean, or Japanese samples.
Step 10: Analyze the data. Here, researchers might look for patterns, tally the percentage of
responses that fall in various categories, calculate frequency data, conduct appropriate statistical
analyses, and draw tables and figures. For example, in the Unemori et al. (2004) study, researchers
tallied the number of possible selves that fell into each of the six categories for both expected and
feared selves. See Figures 5.4 and 5.5 for their results.
So, what did Unemori et al. (2004) find? Basically, there were cultural differences in both
expected and feared selves. The EA students reported more interpersonal selves whereas the JN,
CH, and JA students reported more career/education selves. The EA and CH samples showed more
balance in their expected and feared selves, whereas JA and JN samples showed more similarities
between their expected and feared selves.
Step 11: Interpret the results. The more open-ended the questions are, the more challenging
this part will be. Similarly, the more quantitative the coding system is, the easier this part will be.
Regardless of method, the first part of interpreting the results is to see what the data have to say about
the original research question. Then, researchers should think about how the results fit into what has
been done before. Finally, researchers should think about what kinds of questions remain for future
research. Often, the best studies raise more questions for future research than they actually answer!
In this study, Unemori et al. (2004) interpreted their results to mean that young adults who
are attending elite universities share similar expectations and fears about their futures involving
friendships, personal relationships, and careers, regardless of culture. However, the relative
importance of these areas varies by culture, with students in individualistic cultures able to focus

100%
4.9 7.6 4.8 15.3
27.2 14.5
90% 11.7

8.3
80%
37.9 26.5
25.0
70%
40.7
60%

50% 54.2
51.4

40% 42.8

30%
27.2 Category of Self
20% Extracurricular
Interpersonal
10%
Intrapersonal
Career/Education
0%
EA CH JA JN
Culture

Figure 5.4 Percentage of expected selves across four categories of self in European
American (EA), Chilean (CH), Japanese American (JP), and native Japanese (JN)
participants. Source: Reprinted with permission from Unemori, P., Omoregie, H., & Markus,
H. R. (2004), “Self-portraits: Possible selves in European-American, Chilean, Japanese and
Japanese-American cultural contexts,” Self and Identity, 3, 321–338. Permission conveyed
through the Copyright Clearance Center.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 133

100%
5.1 9.9 12.5 12.8
26.6
90%
22.7
21.3 12.8
80%

70% 32.3
49.4 43.3 31.2
60%

50%

40% 42.1
35.0
30%
Category of Self
20% 24.1
Health/Physical
19.0
Interpersonal
10%
Intrapersonal
Career/Education
0%
EA CH JA JN
Culture

Figure 5.5 Percentage of feared selves across four categories of self in European American
(EA), Chilean (CH), Japanese American (JP), and native Japanese (JN) participants. Source:
From Unemori et al. (2004, Figure 2, p. 331). Reprinted with permission from Unemori, P.,
Omoregie, H., & Markus, H. R. (2004), “Self-portraits: Possible selves in European-American,
Chilean, Japanese and Japanese-American cultural contexts,” Self and Identity, 3, 321–338.
Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
more on their internal attributes and relationships and students in more collectivistic cultures
living up to parental and societal expectations about school success, further education, and future
careers. Finally, more research is necessary to understand how similarities between expected and
feared selves can be motivating for Japanese students the way that a balance between these selves
is motivating to American students.
As you can see, the general process of conducting qualitative research is very similar to
quantitative research. The biggest difference is in the development and validation of the coding
system, the part we call content analysis.

Social Identity
An important part of who we are is who we are when we are with others. Do we purposely pres-
ent ourselves in a certain light to gain the esteem of others? Do we act a certain way to fit into a
situation? Perhaps William James’s statement is even more true today as the Internet provides
yet another way for us to define, refine, and present ourselves to others. In this section we will “A man has as many
discuss the common self-presentation strategies and explore a personality variable that captures social selves as there are
the extent to which people change who they are to blend into the social situation. individuals to recognize
him.”
Self-Presentation William James (1890, pp. 189–190)
Imagine yourself getting ready for a big date. You have been attracted to this person for a long
time, and now you will have the chance to go out one-on-one with the object of your affection.
You hope to make a good impression, so that this first date turns into a series of dates culminat-
ing in a lifetime of happiness. To make the best impression possible, what do you do? How would
you dress? What would you talk about (and avoid talking about) to make this person like you?
Or, think about going on a job interview for a job you really, really want. What image do
you want to convey to the interviewer? What will you wear? Might you, modestly of course, talk
about your talents and accomplishments? Would you try to steer the interviewer away from
134 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

“The image of myself which asking about your weakness? Would you find a way to put a positive spin on your faults (e.g.,
I try to create in my own “My friends say I work too hard”)?
mind in order that I may For most of us, first dates (Rowatt, Cunningham, & Druen, 1998) and job interviews (Rosse,
Stecher, Miller, & Levin, 1998) are two places where we are likely to engage in self-presentation: act-
love myself is very different
ing, speaking, or dressing in a certain way to convey a specific image of ourselves to others (Paulhus
from the image which I try to
& Trapnell, 2008). According to this view, “All the world’s a stage,” to quote Shakespeare and elabo-
create in the minds of others rated by sociologist Erving Goffman. Actors (i.e., people) strategically present themselves in certain
in order that they may love ways to establish, maintain, or refine a specific image in the mind of an “audience”—for example,
me.” another person, other people (Goffman, 1959). The regulation of public self-presentations is called
W. H. Auden, Hic et Ille (1956) impression management (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008; Schlenker & Pontari, 2000).
People can present themselves as they truly are with an authentic self-presentation or they
may attempt to create a specific image for some ulterior motive using a strategic self-presentation
“All the world’s a stage, (Jones & Pittman, 1982). For example, people tend to do a fair amount of self-presentation in their
And all the men and women online dating profiles to make themselves seem more attractive to a potential date (Toma, Hancock,
merely players.” & Eillison, 2008). Women lie more about their weight and men lie more about their height. Also,
William Shakespeare, As You Like people further away from the mean, on either weight or height, are more apt to stretch the truth.
It (Act II, scene vii, lines 139–166) People also report being the most accurate about their relationship information, but the least
authentic in their photographs.
Although there are many different kinds of self-presentational tactics—up to 12 by one
count (Lee, Quigley, Nesler, Corbet, & Tedeschi, 1999)!—the most common and the most
THINK ABOUT IT influential ones are the classic quintet identified by Jones and Pittman (1982): ingratiation,
intimidation, self-promotion, exemplification, and supplication (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008).
Sure, everybody wants to For each of these self-presentational tactics, the actor projects a specific image through verbal
make a good impression and nonverbal cues (DePaulo, 1992) and uses various psychological ploys to create a specific
on the first date, but what
about the second date?
impression. There is always a danger that self-presentation may backfire: Once the audience
Are you better off going sees it for what it is—a presentational strategy rather than an authentic self-presentation—the
with an authentic self- technique often stops working. Table 5.8 summarizes the most common tactics.
presentation or a strategic Who is more likely to use self-presentational strategies? First, we tend to use self-presen-
self-presentation? Why? tational strategies more with strangers than with friends (Tice, 1995). Second, people who
are apt to tell little lies in their everyday life are more concerned with self-presentation than
more truthful people (Kashy & DePaulo, 1996). Third, extroverts may be more apt to use self-
presentational strategies than introverts. For example, when it comes to choice of picture on a
social networking site, there is a lot of room for self-presentation as you might imagine. Turns
out that extroverts are more likely than introverts to present themselves in a less conservative
manner by the choice of a unique profile photograph (Krämer & Winter, 2008). Can you guess
who the extroverts might be in the photo on page 135 Finally, some people—high self-monitors
(Turnley & Bolino, 2001) and the politically astute (Harris, Kacmar, Zivnuska, & Shaw, 2007),
for example—are more effective at using self-presentational techniques than others.

Table 5.8 The Five Most Common Self-Presentation Tactics

Image Emotion
Strategy Projected Aroused How Achieved Avoid Illustration
Ingratiation Likable Affection Flattery Being found out “Flattery will get you
Agreement Seen as a sycophant everywhere”
Similarity
Solidarity
Interest
Intimidation Dangerous Fear Respect Being too threatening “I’ll huff and I’ll puff”
Self-promotion Competent Respect Claims of Performance Conceit “When you’ve got it
flaunt it”
Exemplification Good example Guilt Self-denial Hypocrisy “Do as I do”
Supplication Helpless Nurturance Arouse empathy Loss of self-esteem “You’re my only hope”
Invoke responsibility Victim blame
Source: Reprinted with permission from Jones, E. E., & Pittman, T. S. (1982),“Toward a theory of strategic self-presentation,” as appeared in J. Suls (Ed.), Psychological perspec-
tives on the Self, p. 231–262. (Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 135

Self-presentation 2.0.
Extroverts are more
likely than introverts to
present themselves as less
conservative through the
use of an unusual or stylized
photograph rather than a
realistic color picture. Pictures
from the German social
network site StudiVZ illustrate
the normal style of photo
(top left) and different types
of photos. Top (from left to
right): serious photo, partial
face, different style (e.g., black
and white). Bottom (from
left to right): making a face,
posing, location. Source: From
Krämer and Winter (2008,
Figure 1, p. 109).

Self-presentation is related to a whole host of social behaviors including the giving and
receiving of help, conformity, reactance, attitude expression, attitude change, response to
evaluation, aggression, and emotions (Baumeister, 1982). For example, putting our “best face
forward” by trying to make a good impression on others actually improves our own mood
(Dunn, Biesanz, Human, & Finn, 2007).
Yet, self-presentations can be hazardous to our health. One review suggested that reluctance
to use sunscreen, use of certain cosmetics, engagement in unsafe sex, use of steroids, eating
disorders, smoking, injuries and accidental death, failure to exercise, and alcohol and other
drug use may all be related to the desire to present ourselves in a certain light when we are with
others (Leary, Tchividjian, & Kraxberger, 1994).

Self-Monitoring
Is it possible for a person to use self-presentation all the time? Whereas most of us would monitor
our behavior and emotional expressions at certain times, some people seem to be especially aware
of the images they portray. Self-monitoring is a personality trait that describes the extent to which
people are aware of and manage their self-presentations, expressive behaviors, and nonverbal dis-
plays of emotion to control the images and impressions others form of them (Snyder, 1979). Like
other traits, self-monitoring describes behavior on a continuum from low to high.
High self-monitors are particularly sensitive to the behavior of others in social situations,
and use other people as a guideline for their own behavior. In contrast, low self-monitors have less
concern for social appropriateness and so pay less attention to what others in a situation are doing.

Table 5.9 Sample Items From the Self-Monitoring Scale

High self-monitors would agree with these statements:
1. I guess I put on a show to impress or entertain people.
2. In different situations and with different people, I often act like very different persons.
3. I’m not always the person I appear to be.
4. I may deceive people by being friendly when I really dislike them.
Low self-monitors would agree with these statements:
1. I find it hard to imitate the behavior of other people.
2. My behavior is usually an expression of my true inner feelings, attitudes, and beliefs.
3. At parties and social gatherings, I do not attempt to do or say things that others will like.
4. I can only argue for ideas which I already believe.
Source: From M. Snyder (1974, Table 1, p. 531). Snyder, M. (1974). Self-monitoring of expressive behavior. Journal of Personality
and Social Psychology, 30, 526–537. Copyright American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.
136 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Low self-monitors audit and control their self-presentations far less than high self-monitors do.
Ratings from the peers of high and low self-monitors confirm these differences (Snyder, 1974).
When in a new situation, high self-monitors seem to ask themselves, Who does this situation want
me to be and how can I be that person? (Snyder, 1979, p. 102). Low self-monitors are more apt to
think, Who am I and how can I be me in this situation? (Snyder, 1979, p. 103). Table 5.9 presents
sample items from the Self-Monitoring Scale (Snyder, 1974; Snyder & Gangestad, 1986).
Professional stage actors, as we might imagine, are higher than college students in self-
monitoring whereas psychiatric inpatients are lower (Snyder, 1974). Self-monitoring may well
be a skill good politicians have mastered to their advantage. For example, the popular Depres-
sion-era mayor of New York City, Fiorello LaGuardia, was reputed to have been so skilled at
reading a crowd and adopting their mannerisms, that one could tell which ethnic group he was
addressing by watching silent films of his appearances (Snyder, 1974).
Low self-monitors are more consistent in their expressive behavior across situations and show
greater correspondence between their attitudes and behaviors than high self-monitors (Snyder,
1979). They also differ in their social interactions (Ickes, Holloway, Stinson, & Hoodenpyle, 2006).
High self-monitors tend to take the lead in initiating conversations and managing smooth social
interactions with a stranger, especially in an unusual situation (Snyder, 1979).
Although we might view high self-monitors as social chameleons, they see themselves as
flexible and adaptable (Snyder, 1979). On the other hand, low self-monitors would agree with
Polonius’s advice to the college-bound Laertes in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “To thine own self be
true” (Snyder, 1987).
In addition to differences in self-presentation, awareness of their own attitudes and emo-
tions, and sensitivity to situational demands, high and low self-monitors also show differences
in friendship choice, close relationships, consumer behavior, and even workplace behavior
THINK ABOUT IT (Leone, 2006). High and low self-monitors seem to want different things in their friendships,
romantic relationships, and long-term relationships (Leone & Hawkins, 2006). For example,
Do you more often choose
friends for activities or
imagine that you’ve won free passes to one of the hottest bands in town. Who would you rather
activities for friends? take, your very best friend, or an ordinary friend who is really into this band?
When it comes to choosing friends for activities, high self-monitors choose friends for activi-
ties whereas low self-monitors choose activities for friends (Snyder, Gangestad, & Simpson, 1983).
That is, high self-monitors think in terms of what the activity requires and then pick a friend to
invite along accordingly (e.g., “Even though John’s a better friend, he’s just not the right person to
go to a concert with”). Low self-monitors think in terms of a friend they want to spend time with,
and then they pick something to do (e.g., “Jan’s my best friend. Besides, she’s the most fun to be
“A man’s Self is the sum around, whatever the activity”; Snyder et al., 1983, p. 1069). As a result, high self-monitors tend
total of all that he CAN to have many separate groups of friends (e.g., “My soccer friends,” “My work friends,” “My school
friends”). Low self-monitors tend to have overlapping groups of friends (Snyder et al., 1983).
call his, not only his body
High and low self-monitors seem to want different things in their romantic relationships,
and his psychic powers, but
too (Jones, 1993). Low self-monitors report more pleasure in their relationships from simply
his clothes and his house, his being with their partners, and to value kindness and consideration, faithfulness and loyalty,
wife and children, and honesty in a potential dating partner more so than high self-monitors. High self-monitors
his ancestors and friends, report more external rewards from their relationships (e.g., social connections, opportunities)
his reputation and works, his than low self-monitors, and to value the qualities of physical attractiveness, sex appeal, social
status, and financial resources in their potential dating partners more so than low self-monitors.
lands and horses, and yacht
High and low self-monitors also differ in the kinds of ads that appeal to them (DeBono,
and bank-account. All these
1987, 2006; Snyder & DeBono, 1985). High self-monitors are attracted by glitzy ads that empha-
things give him the same size the image use of a product projects, whereas low self-monitors are more swayed by ads
emotions. If they wax and emphasizing the quality of the product. High and low self-monitors also evaluate consumer
prosper, he feels triumphant; products differently (DeBono, 2006). For high self-monitors a quality product is one that can
if they dwindle and die away, enhance their image. For low self-monitors, quality comes from product performance.
Even in the workplace high and low self-monitors act differently (Day & Schleicher, 2006). High
he feels cast down,—not
self-monitors are better than low self-monitors at getting along with others and in job performance.
necessarily in the same
They also tend to become leaders of their work groups. Self-monitoring is not related to rates of job
degree for each thing, but in turnover per se, but it is related to reasons for switching jobs (Jenkins, 1993). Low self-monitors are
much the same way for all.” more likely to leave a job once their commitment flags. High self-monitors don’t care as much about
William James (1890, p. 188) commitment to an organization, but are more likely to leave when the job becomes unsatisfying.
 Chapter 5 Self and Identity 137

Is there an advantage to being high or low in self-monitoring? Is one style any healthier
than the other? People high and low in self-monitoring do not differ in neuroticism, intel-
ligence, academic achievement, social anxiety, achievement anxiety, or vocational interests
(Snyder, 1979). Also, high and low self-monitors do not differ in their rates of depression,
but they do differ in what triggers depression. High self-monitors are more upset when their
self-presentation is threatened, like when they fail to make a team, secure a part in a play, or
land a job offer. Low self-monitors are more upset when they are unable to be their true selves,
like working with people they do not like, being told they are hypocrites, or discovering that a
close friend no longer shares important values or attitudes (Snyder, 1987). Basically, these are
just two different ways of approaching and engaging the social world.

Chapter Summary
Who am I? By now you should have a better idea of how personality psychology answers this
Study and Review
question. Our selves are made up of self-concepts (ideas about what we are like), self-esteem
on mysearchlab.com
(how we feel about our selves), and our social identity (the parts of ourselves we show to others).
Our self-concepts develop from our experiences with the social world along with matu- Go online for more
ration and cognitive development. Self-recognition, as demonstrated by the mirror test, is a resources to help you
very sophisticated skill, one shared by great apes, dolphins, elephants, and humans. From our review.
interactions with others, we come to develop and refine our self-concepts, develop our self-
esteem, and understand our identity (i.e., how we are viewed by society). In short, we develop
our selves through three sources of knowledge, two of which are based on our interactions with
other people: social comparison, reflected appraisals, and our own self-appraisals.
Culture has a huge impact on how we think about ourselves. People who live in more
individualistic cultures develop an independent self-concept, whereas people in more collectiv-
istic cultures develop an interdependent self-concept. These self-concepts differ in definition,
structure, features, tasks, the role of others, and the basis of self-esteem. The Twenty Statements
Test has been used to compare self-concepts of people across cultures.
Also contained in our self-concepts are our possible selves, including how we expect to be,
what we hope to be, and what we fear becoming in the future. These different selves can help
us set goals and stay motivated to achieve those goals.
The idea of self, identity, and identity crisis is a modern one. What the self is has
changed through the ages and has become more complicated since William James, the father
of psychology, defined the self in 1890.
Self-esteem, the evaluative component of the self, can be described as high or low, and
stable or unstable, and can be global or specific to a domain. People with high self-esteem have
greater self-concept clarity than people low in self-esteem.
No doubt feeling good about ourselves is a good thing, but is low self-esteem the root of all
social ills? Although people think that those with high self-esteem are smarter, more likable, and
more physically attractive, do better in school, achieve more on the job, have greater life satisfaction
and happiness than those with low self-esteem, this is not supported by research. Similarly, it is not
true that low self-esteem is problematic, causing relationship problems, aggressiveness, alcohol and
other drug abuse, premature sexual activity, unwanted pregnancies, and other social ills.
Many of these myths derive from misinterpreting research, the different kinds of high self-
esteem masking the true effects of self-esteem, the inherent bias existing in self-ratings, not
realizing that low self-esteem is really only moderate self-esteem, and mistaking correlation for
causation. For example, self-esteem is often the result—not the cause—of achievement in school,
work, and life. Also, the role of third variables (e.g., family background) has not been sufficiently
investigated. Interventions that attempt to boost self-esteem through noncontingent rewards such
as praise are misguided and may even backfire if they teach that one’s efforts are unimportant.
Personality psychologists use quantitative and qualitative methods in their research. Quan-
titative methods involve measures or scores whereas qualitative methods involve the content
analysis of verbal material. Many steps are involved in conducting a study using content analy-
sis, the most important being to ask the right open-ended question and to take care in coding
and categorizing participants’ responses.
138 Chapter 5 Self and Identity

Finally, our social identity is that part of ourselves that we share with others. We may show our
true selves in an authentic self-presentation or we may use a strategic self-presentation to project
a specific image or impression for others. Images may be agentic or communal. The regulation of
public self-presentations is called impression management. The most common self-presentational
strategies are ingratiation, intimidation, self-promotion, exemplification, and supplication.
Some people—that is, high self-monitors—seem to constantly monitor a situation and change
their behavior accordingly. High self-monitors strive to be what a situation calls for; low self-
monitors strive to be themselves in all situations. High and low self-monitors differ in behavioral
consistency, self-presentation, awareness of their own attitudes and emotions, sensitivity to situa-
tional demands, friendship choice, close relationships, consumer behavior, and workplace behavior.
These are but a few of the many aspects of the self studied by personality psychologists.
One thing we can say for certain: Studying our selves is among the most fascinating topics in
personality psychology.

Review Questions
1. What are the three parts of the self studied by psychologists?
2. What is a self-concept? Do animals have a self-concept? How do we know? How does a
self-concept develop? What are some major milestones in the development of self-concept,
self-esteem, and social identity?
3. Describe the Twenty Statements Test. What are the four categories of responses in the TST?
How does culture impact self-concepts? What are the important differences between an
independent and an interdependent self?
4. What are possible selves? What are the different kinds of possible selves identified by
psychologists? What impact do positive and negative possible selves have on adjustment?
Can possible selves be changed? How?
5. How has the self changed through time? How do personality psychologists define the self now?
6. What is self-esteem? What are people high in self-esteem like? What are people low in self-
esteem like? What is self-handicapping? Is this an effective strategy? Explain your reasoning.
7. What are some popular beliefs about self-esteem? What does research evidence have to say
about these beliefs?
8. What is qualitative data? What is quantitative data? What is content analysis? What are
some of the steps involved in doing content analysis?
9. What is a social identity? What is an authentic self-presentation? What is a strategic self-
presentation? What are some ways of strategically presenting ourselves?
10. What is self-monitoring? What are some key differences between people high and low in
self-monitoring? Is it better to be one or the other?

Key Terms
Twenty Statements Test (TST) Individualism Quantitative methods
Self-concept Collectivism Content analysis
Mirror test Individualistic cultures Social identity
Objective self-awareness Collectivistic cultures Self-presentation
Reflected appraisals Independent view of the self Impression management
Looking glass self Hoped-for selves Authentic self-presentation
Identity Feared selves Strategic self-presentation
Identity crisis Possible selves Ingratiation
Stereotype threat Self-esteem Intimidation
Attributive self-descriptions Self-esteem stability Self-promotion
Social self-descriptions Self-concept clarity Exemplification
Global self-descriptions Self-handicapping Supplication
Physical self-descriptions Qualitative methods Self-monitoring
CHAPTER
6 GENETICS

NATURE AND NURTURE AS ALLIES

GENES AND ENVIRONMENT AS CO-ACTORS
Heritability
Environmentality
Shared and Nonshared Environments
Estimating Heritability
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: CORRELATIONAL DESIGNS I: THE LOGIC OF ADOPTION
AND TWIN STUDIES

HERITABILITY OF COMMON PERSONALITY CHARACTERISTICS

THEN AND NOW: THE SCIENCE OF GENETICS
GENES AND ENVIRONMENT: A DIALECTICAL SYNTHESIS
Genotype–Environment Interactions
Genotype–Environment Correlations
Types of Genotype–Environment Correlations
What’s the Evidence? Researching Genotype–Environment Correlations
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: WHAT CAN GENETICS RESEARCH DO FOR US?
CHAPTER SUMMARY
Read the Chapter on REVIEW QUESTIONS
mysearchlab.com KEY TERMS

139
140 Chapter 6 Genetics

D
“What a piece of work is o these words sound familiar to you? Of course they do, but do you recall the few lines
man! How noble in reason! preceding these classic words?
How infinite in faculty! I have of late—but wherefore I know not—lost all my mirth.
In form and moving how
And earlier in Act I, scene ii:
express and admirable! In
action how like an angel! In O, that this too, too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
apprehension how like a god!
Or, that the Everlasting had not fix’d
The beauty of the world! The
His canon ’gainst self-slaughter! O God! God!
paragon of animals!” How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,
William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act II, Seem to me all the uses of this world!
scene ii
Hamlet is depressed. Of course, he has good reason to be, with his father recently dead,
his uncle trying to take over the kingdom, and his mother remarrying too soon. What makes a
person depressed? Is depression caused by a genetic predisposition, such that some people are
doomed to be depressed? Or is depression caused by experiences that are so devastating that
anybody would be depressed by them?
For years, psychologists wondered what caused clinical depression: a debilitating combination
of profound sadness, loss of interest in formerly pleasurable activities, lack of energy, hopelessness,
feelings of worthlessness, and even thoughts of suicide. Although life events such as death of a
parent, job loss, or stress no doubt cause people to be sad, what causes this devastating condition?
Because some psychologists had noticed that depression ran in families—or at least
in some families—researchers tried to find a genetic mechanism of depression. Consider a
study by Haeffel et al. (2008). They identified a sample of adolescent boys who were ordered
by the courts to attend a residential juvenile delinquent detention facility in the Arkhangelsk
region of northern Russia. The sample was not very diverse—about 98% of the sample was
of Russian ancestry—but perfect for investigating possible genetic causes of depression.
The researchers looked for genetic and environmental differences between the youths who
were depressed and those who were not. The amazing thing is that they found—nothing! That
is, they found no impact of either genes or environment on rates of depression.
But, when they looked closer and divided up the sample depending on which of three
specific gene combinations—called genotypes—a participant had, the results were startling,
as Figure 6.1 shows. If a youth had both a stressful environment (as measured by maternal
rejection in this study) and Genotype 3, there was a good chance that he was depressed.
However, if a youth had any
0.8 of the three genotypes with-
Genotype 1 out maternal rejection or
Genotype 2 maternal rejection with
Proportion Depressed

0.6
Genotype 3 either Genotype 1 or Geno-
type 2 he was not as likely to
0.4 develop clinical depression.
Further, this combination of
0.2
environment (maternal rejec-
tion) and genotype predicted
related outcomes such as
0.0 suicide ideation and depres-
Low Rejection High Rejection sive symptoms but not unre-
lated psychological problems
Figure 6.1 Incidence of clinical depression as a function of
such as an anxiety disorder.
genotype and maternal rejection. Source: From Haeffel et
al. (2008, Figure 1, p. 66), Haeffel, G. J., Getchell, M., Koposov,
This suggests that there is
R. A., Yrigollen, C. M., DeYoung, C. G., af Klinteberg, B., et something magical (perhaps
al. (2008), “Association between polymorphisms in the alarming is a better word)
dopaminetransporter gene and depression,” Psychological about this particular interac-
Science, 19(1), 62–69. Reprinted by permission of Blackwell tion of these genes with this
Publishing. environment.
 Chapter 6 Genetics 141

Like Haeffel et al. (2008), other researchers have found it notoriously difficult to find main
effects of genes on personality traits (Krueger & Johnson, 2008). This highlights an important
theme of this chapter: The interesting question is not whether genes or environment affect
our personalities, for surely both do. The real question is how do genes and environment work
together to make us the kind of people we are? To answer this question we need to explore some
basics of behavioral genetics, which is the study of the genetic and environmental contribu-
tions to individual differences in personality and behavior (DiLalla, 2004). (To get you thinking
about these issues, you may want to try the self-assessment exercise in Table 6.1).
The goal of this chapter is not to present a catalog of personality characteristics that have
a genetic component, for the list would be too long! Neither will we explore the molecular
mechanism of specific genes important for personality development, for the research evidence
is piling up too quickly for a textbook to keep up with. Instead, we will focus on understanding
how genetic principles work in explaining differences in personality. Armed with this broad
understanding as your groundwork, you will be able to understand the genetics behind any per-
sonality characteristic you encounter in this book and to understand the newest breakthroughs
in genetics research that you may hear about in the news.

Table 6.1 How Much Do Genes and Environment Contribute to Personality?

Instructions: Identify four family members or friends who differ in their blood-relation to you and in whether you grew up in the
same environment by using the following descriptions for Person 1, Person 2, and so on and filling in their names at the top of each
of the four columns in the chart.
Person 1 = Genetic parent (of same sex as you, if possible).
Person 2 = Genetic sibling (of same sex as you, if possible). If you are an only child, use a cousin or other relative.
Person 3 = Unrelated person (or less related to you than Person 2) living in your household while you were growing up.
Person 4 = Unrelated person, not living in your household while you were growing up (e.g., best friend, peer, roommate).
If you are unable to identify any of Persons 1 to 3, then use people who lived in your household, even if you were not related to
them, and compare them with unrelated people who did not live in your household while growing up.
Next, rate how similar you are to each of these people using the following scale:
1 2 3 4 5 6
More different More similar Very similar,
Completely different Different than Similar than Different Similar almost the same

Person 1 Person 2 Person 3 Person 4

Name of person:
Characteristic:
1. Height
2. Sense of humor
3. Weight
4. Political views
5. Adventurousness
6. Taste in music
7. Extraversion
8. Anxiousness
9. Individualistic
10. Tech-savy
Based on your responses, can you venture a guess as to which has a greater influence on the development of each characteristic,
genes or environment? Finally, do you think that each characteristic is caused more by genes and environment working separately,
working together, or by influencing each other?
142 Chapter 6 Genetics

“Environmental factors
always contribute to
Nature and Nurture as Allies
individual differences in Imagine that you are taking a standardized test and the following item appears in your test
human behavior. . . . Genes book:
contribute to individual Lemonade is
differences in almost a. lemon juice.
every dimension of human b. water.
behavior that has been c. sugar.
studied thus far.” How would you answer this question? Would you start to panic and wonder if this was a
Carey (2003, pp. 3–4) trick question? After all, everybody knows that lemonade is made up of all of these! In fact, we
might say that lemonade is a compound solution entirely different from its constituent parts.
So, this question, obviously, makes no sense. But consider this equally nonsensical question:
Extraversion is
a. genetic.
b. cultural.
c. familial.
d. due to all your idiosyncratic learning experiences.
When it comes to understanding human behavior, this question makes no sense either.
That is, human behavior—and personality in particular—is an inextricable combination of
both genetics and environment. In fact, taking sides in the nature–nurture debate is a massive
“scientific mistake” (Krueger & Johnson, 2008, p. 287). So, if you are wondering whether genes
determine your personality, stop right there: Personality is lemonade! (This fantastic example
comes from Carey, 2003, pp. 2–3.)
The best characterization of the nature–nurture issue is that nature and nurture trans-
act. That is, genes and environment can work separately, together, or they may influence one
another (Canli, 2008, p. 299). When we talk about heritability and environmentality separately,
we are assuming that genes and environment each have a unique contribution to the whole
personality. That is, genes and environment may operate separately but in parallel (i.e., at the
same time) to influence our personalities. You can think of genes and environment as co-actors
(Cardno & McGuffin, 2002). This is the simplest case, as we shall soon see, and may not, in fact,
be the way most aspects of personality develop.
A more interesting case is that genes and environment may interact with each other,
such that they change aspects of human personality by acting together on a person. You
know that saying the whole is greater than the sum of its parts? Well, it is possible that certain

Genes and environment

as co-actors: Physically and
psychologically, we are the
result of an inextricable
combination of both genetics
and environment.
 Chapter 6 Genetics 143

environments have different effects on people depending on their specific genetic makeup.
We call this combination of nature and nurture a genotype–environment interaction. With
more sophisticated ways of exploring the human genome, especially at the molecular level,
this is the most exciting, and potentially groundbreaking kind of research that personality
researchers are conducting. This is partially what we meant by lemonade in the discussion
that opened this chapter: sugar, lemon, and water, when mixed in the right proportions, com-
bine to make something fundamentally different (and better!) than each separate ingredient.
Yet another possibility is that it may be impossible to separate the effect of genes from
the effect of the environment. What if people change environments and environments change
people, so that we really can’t separate the impact of genes on environment? This is called a
genotype–environment correlation. This is yet another sense in which personality is lemonade:
There is no way to separate out the ingredients, as they are inextricably combined.
In fact, some researchers advocate an even more complicated equation for understand-
ing the manifestation of complex human traits—a concept known as phenotype (Cardno &
McGuffin, 2002, p. 40):

Phenotype = Genotype + Environment + Gene9environment correlation

+ Gene9environment interaction.
We will consider each part of this equation in turn.

Genes and Environment as Co-actors

When we say that a characteristic is due to both genetics and environment, how do we know?
Scientists are able to estimate how much of the differences among people on a given character-
istic are because of their genes. For example, consider the students in your personality class. No
doubt there are wide variations of height, with some taller people and some shorter people and
lots of people of average height. The question is, how much of this observed height difference
among people in your class is due to their differing genetic makeup? In this section we examine
the concepts of heritability and environmentality.

“Everything is heritable.”
Heritability
Turkheimer (2004, p. 161)
Heritability (h2) is the amount of observed individual differences in some characteristic that
can be accounted for by genetic differences (Carey, 2003). Heritability refers to differences
across a group or population of people—not to a specific person. It is impossible to say how
much of your height is due to your genes. But, considering a sample of people, like your per-
sonality class, we can estimate that about 80% of the observed differences in height is due to
differing genetic makeup of your classmates and 20% is due to differing environments your
classmates were raised in, plus some percentage of measurement error (because nothing, espe-
cially not our measurement instruments, is perfect).
THINK ABOUT IT
To illustrate, imagine that you and your friends like to bake (and eat!) chocolate chip
cookies, and each time you make them, they come out slightly different. Why might this be? What environmental factors
Different brands of chocolate chips? Different types of flour? Is it possible that different bakers could account for differ-
ences in height among a
produce different cookies? You can readily see that the differences among batches could be due
group of people?
to differences in any of these factors. But suppose I asked you, which is more important to the
flavor of this particular cookie: the flour or the eggs? Well, obviously we need both in order to
have a good cookie! The question makes no sense. The same principle applies to understanding
heritability: We cannot know what contributes more to the personality of a particular person,
but we can know how much genetics and environment each account for differences in a par-
ticular personality characteristic of this particular sample of people.
Heritability, therefore, refers to the inheritance of a particular trait in a particular popu-
lation at a particular time, so sometimes heritability estimates differ depending on the exact
144 Chapter 6 Genetics

sample and methods used by

researchers (Plomin, DeFries,
McClearn, & McGuffin, 2008,
p. 86). To understand this, let’s
continue discussing height,
a characteristic with a fairly
large genetic component. The
heritability of height is 80%
or higher in the United States
but it is only 65% in China and
western Africa. And in Austra-
lia, one study estimated height
Heritability: Just as the heritability as 87% for men and
variation among batches of 71% for women (Silvetoinen
cookies is due to variations in et al., 2003)! This is because
ingredients, the variation of a
of genetic variations among
particular trait in a particular
population at a particular
ethnic groups and because of
time is due to differences in the distinct environments they
their genetic makeup. face. For example, Americans,
Chinese, and Africans vary in
native climates, lifestyle, and
dietary habits, as do men and women in many cultures (Lai, 2006). This is why heritability is
considered an estimate that refers to a specific population: Estimates vary between samples.

Environmentality
It’s unlikely that genetics account for 100% of the variance in any personality variable, so what
accounts for the rest of the variation? The environment, of course! We use the term environ-
mentality (e 2) for that. Environmentality estimates the extent to which observed individual
differences can be traced in any way to individual differences in environments (Carey, 2003).
Together, heritability, environmentality, and measurement error account for all the differences
we see among people on a given characteristic.
By now, it must be getting clearer to you that environment and genetics work together to
SEE FOR YOURSELF impact human behavior so that it doesn’t make sense to pit nature against nurture. As a gen-
eral rule, the greater the heritability of a characteristic the less the environmentality. And the
Consider your extended
family of great-grandparents, greater the environmentality, the less the heritability. Whereas height does have a large genetic
grandparents, aunts, uncles, component, the environmentality of height is fairly strong too, somewhere in the neighborhood
and cousins. Can you iden- of 20 to 40%. What kinds of environmental factors influence height? The biggest influence is
tify particular environmental childhood nutrition, especially protein, but also calcium, vitamin A, and vitamin D. In particu-
factors that may account for lar, childhood malnutrition is particularly detrimental to adult height. Childhood diseases can
height differences, especially also limit adult height, and by the same token human growth hormones can counteract some
between generations in
of these detrimental effects (Lai, 2006). This is how genetically similar populations may show
your family?
differing heritability estimates: environmentality.
We see higher heritability estimates in equalizing environments (i.e., environments that
are the same for everybody, and lower estimates in more variable environments; Plomin et al.,
2008). This is because when everybody has access to resources in rich environments there is
little variance in the effect the environment can have. For example, there’s a limit to how much
meat will increase height. Once all or nearly all of the people in a society have access to good
health care, high levels of protein, and enriched foods, then we will see a very strong effect of
genetics. Essentially, the only thing left to vary at this point is genetics. This is why heritabil-
ity estimates for height are the greatest in developed countries such as the United States, and
lower in less developed countries. In fact, average height in the United States has plateaued,
meaning that as a nation we’ve gotten about as tall as we’re going to get due to environmental
effects (Lai, 2006).
 Chapter 6 Genetics 145

Shared and Nonshared Environments

Traditionally, environment referred only to any part of the phenotype not accounted for by
genes. However, these days researchers are trying to zero in on, and specifically identify, the
exact aspects of an environment that account for differences in personality among a group of
people. One way of thinking about environmental influences on characteristics such as height
or personality is to identify aspects of the environment that are shared and unshared among
relatives living together in a household.
Shared environment includes aspects of the family environment that are generally the
same for all the children in the household (Krueger & Johnson, 2008) including physical, psy-
chological, and social aspects (Carey, 2003). Physical aspects of a household may be the type of
SEE FOR YOURSELF
dwelling (e.g., apartment vs. house) and its layout, the number of computers or books in the
home, or the presence of a video gaming system. Psychological aspects might include home What are some aspects of
atmosphere, parenting practices, the quality of sibling interactions, or psychopathology (e.g., your physical, psychologi-
alcoholism, drug use, depression) in the home. Social variables include socioeconomic status, cal, and social environment
family structure, educational attainment of the parents, an urban or a rural setting, and religion. shared among you and your
parents or you and your
In the broadest sense, anything not accounted for by genetics that makes relatives similar has
siblings?
been considered part of the shared environment (Carey, 2003).
In contrast, the nonshared environment includes experiences that relatives have which
make them different from one another (Carey, 2003; Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Plomin, Asbury,
& Dunn, 2001). These may include unique experiences within the family (e.g., being the eldest,
being the only boy, spacing of siblings, differential parental treatment), or outside the family
(e.g., peers, teachers, sports, hobbies). When it comes to personality, most of the environmental
influence ends up being of the nonshared variety (Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Plomin & Caspi,
1999; Turkheimer & Waldron, 2000). The big surprise to researchers has been that when family
members resemble one another it is more often due to heredity than to shared environment
SEE FOR YOURSELF
(Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Plomin & Caspi, 1999). That is, children growing up in the same
family are not any more similar to one another than children growing up in different families. What are some aspects of
Even when children experience the same event, like a divorce, it may be experienced differently your physical, psychological,
by each of the children depending on their individual personalities or ages (e.g., a relief, the and social environment not
shared among you and your
end of the world; Hetherington & Clingempeel, 1992). Certainly environment is important;
parents or you and your sib-
however, the important aspects of the environment for personality development do not appear lings that are unique to you?
to be shared by family members.
It may be that family environment makes children different from one another (e.g., “Jerry is
the adventurous one; Tony is the thoughtful one”) or it may be that researchers are looking too
broadly and have not identified specific aspects of the environment that are shared (e.g., sense
of humor, openness to ideas, cultural and aesthetic values). Also, parents may handle children
differently depending on their personality, creating a unique environment for each child. For
all of these reasons, researchers have had a difficult time identifying the precise shared and
nonshared aspects of the child’s environment that, along with genetics, account for differences
in personality.
For example, although we know that teachers and peers have a big impact on children’s
development (e.g., Shaffer, 2009), is this part of the shared or the nonshared environment? In
most behavioral genetic research the effect of schools, neighborhoods, and communities gets
labeled as shared family experiences when they might not even be shared by siblings and they
don’t involve family! To untangle familial experiences from nonfamilial experiences one study
employed an unusual control group.
Richard Rose and colleagues (Rose & Dick, 2004/2005; Rose et al., 2003) studied a sample
of identical twins and nonidentical twins along with kids who were from the same neighbor-
hood, school, and even classroom as each of the twins. The study took place in Finland, which
at the time required parents to send their children to the closest neighborhood school. In this
way, the researchers could estimate the separate effects of genetics (by comparing identical
twins with nonidentical twins), familial environments (comparing twins with their matched
control classmates), nonfamilial environments (comparing control kids from the same classes
146 Chapter 6 Genetics

to one another), and personal environments (comparing kids from different neighborhoods
to one another).
The twins were part of a longitudinal study known as the Finn Twin studies (Rose & Dick,
2004/2005). Only same-sex twins were used, and each member of the twin pair was matched
to a child of the same sex from the same school, and in about 90% of the cases, they were from
the same classroom. In all, there were 333 identical twins, 298 nonidentical twins, and 1,262
matched classmates for a total of 2,524 11- and 12-year-olds (Rose et al., 2003).
The participants were asked a series of yes-or-no questions about their smoking, drinking,
and church activities (Rose & Dick, 2004/2005; Rose et al., 2003). From their responses, the
researchers were able to estimate the amount of variance in the kids’ self-reported behaviors
that was due to genetics, familial environment, school environment, or personal environment.
Which source of variance was the most important? That depended on the behavior. In no
case did genetics explain all of the variance in participants’ self-reports. For some variables,
notably smoking cigarettes, saying prayers, and seeing adults drunk, there was a greater effect
of shared environment (i.e., the household) than shared genes. This makes sense because these
are the kind of behaviors that parents model in front of their children. For alcohol use, both
shared environment and shared genes had an impact.
SEE FOR YOURSELF
When it came to drinking with peers without parents around, the neighborhood was more
important than the household, as you might expect. After all, kids typically engage in these sorts
In what ways are you more of behaviors with their friends and do so far away from parental surveillance.
similar to your friends than Finally, unique, unshared environment—what we might think of as a kid’s personal
to your siblings? Why might environment—was more important for participation in church activities. You can see that
this be?
even though the parents might encourage certain behaviors in the family such as saying
prayers, it appears that kids themselves are choosing to get involved or not in church activi-
ties beyond Sunday services. And, indeed, the influence of family was the largest and genetics
the smallest for having prayers in the home while growing up.
This study illustrates how the relative importance of genetics and environments varies depend-
ing on the question. Research designed to take account of various sources of social influence can
shed light on shared and nonshared environments in accounting for personality and behavior.

Estimating Heritability
By now you must be wondering how
researchers are able to measure heritability.
We estimate the heritability of a character-
istic by seeing if people who have similar
genes show similar characteristics. If a
characteristic has a strong genetic compo-
nent, then we would expect identical twins,
who share 100% of their genes, to be more
similar than strangers in that characteris-
tic. We can see this more clearly in physical
characteristics, but it is harder to see the
effects of genes and environment in per-
sonality, which is why so far in this chapter
we’ve been looking at tangible things such
as height.
Consider twins. As you know, there
are two kinds of twins: identical and fra-
One method of studying ternal. Identical twins, called monozygotic
genetic influence is to
(MZ) twins, are exact genetic duplicates of
compare personality traits
in identical twins and in
each other. This happens when a fertilized
nontwin siblings. egg, the zygote, splits into two (or some-
times more) identical parts that each go on
 Chapter 6 Genetics 147

Identical twins, called

monozygotic (MZ) twins, are
exact genetic duplicates of
each other.

to develop into a fetus. Identical twins are quite rare in the population, occurring just over
32 times in 1,000 births in the United States.
In contrast, fraternal twins occur when two zygotes develop in utero at the same time. We
call these kinds of twins dizygotic (DZ) twins. DZ twins result from the fertilization of two
different eggs by two different sperm cells, hence they are genetically distinct. Essentially fra-
ternal twins are no more alike than ordinary siblings, sharing about 50% of their genes (Carey,
2003). Although twins may look alike, the only way to be sure if they are identical (MZ) or
fraternal (DZ) is to conduct a genetic test (of course, if the twins are of different sexes, then
we know that they must be fraternal twins). Because of increased use of fertility drugs and in
vitro fertilization the incidence of fraternal twins has been steadily increasing since the early
1980s (Plomin et al., 2008).
One measure of heritability, then, is to calculate the correlation (r) between twins on a
given trait and compare the correlation between MZ twins and DZ twins (Plomin et al., 2008).
The exact formula is to double the differ-
ence between these correlations or
h2 = 2(rmz - rdz)
A second way of estimating herita-
bility is to compare identical twins who
have been raised in separate environments
(Plomin et al., 2008). We call these kinds
of twins MZA twins (monozygotic twins
raised apart). If such twins score simi-
larly in a trait such as Extraversion, then
we know that Extraversion has a strong
genetic component. Studies of MZA twins
are particularly powerful in disentangling
the effects of genes and environment
because they have identical genes but dif-
ferent environments. Here is a second for-
mula for estimating heritability:
h2 = rMZA Nonidentical twins, called
dizygotic (DZ) twins, are no
We’ll consider the logic behind
more alike than siblings,
adoption studies and twin studies in the
having about 50% of their
Research Methods Illustrated section, in a genetic makeup in common.
moment. For now, note that both of these
148 Chapter 6 Genetics

estimates of heritability have limitations, and researchers may use more sophisticated formulas
to account for these potential problems. The double-the-difference method assumes that twins
were reared under equal environments (Cardno & McGuffin, 2002; Carey, 2003; DiLalla, 2004;
Plomin et al., 2008). That is, it assumes that people have not treated MZ twins more alike than
DZ twins. Whereas certainly twins are often treated differently than nontwins, the question
is, are identical twins treated more similarly than are fraternal twins? If MZ twins are treated
more alike, then they may score more similarly on a particular trait, artificially inflating the
heritability estimate (you can see this for yourself by looking at our first formula). Essentially,
what is really an environmental effect (similar treatment) gets mislabeled as a genetic effect
(similar personality).
This equal environments assumption applies only to similar treatment that is related
THINK ABOUT IT to the specific characteristic under study. For example, people often dress their twins alike in
identical sailor suits or matching dresses. This probably happens more often to MZ twins than
Do people treat identical
to DZ twins. If we were studying something like fashion sense, then this would violate our equal
twins differently from non-
identical twins? environments assumption. But unless wearing matching outfits affects a specific personality
characteristic like shyness, then this assumption still holds (Carey, 2003).
You’ll see that researchers often test this assumption by asking research participants (or
their parents) to describe how they were treated while growing up. Indeed, such studies have
concluded that for the most part, parents of MZ twins don’t treat their twins any more alike
than parents of DZ twins so that this equal environments assumption is a fair assumption
(Cardno & McGuffin, 2002; Carey, 2003; Plomin et al., 2008).
THINK ABOUT IT The double-the-difference formula also assumes that twins are typical of the population.
We call this the assumption of representativeness (Plomin et al., 2008). For example, twins
Does being a twin affect are often premature and have a lower birthrate than single births. Twins, therefore, may not
one’s personality more so
be representative of the general population on variables that are affected by prematurity or
than having a sibling close
to your own age would? low birth weight. Again, this is something researchers may test for, and for the most part this
assumption holds as well (Carey, 2003; Plomin et al., 2008).
The rMZA method of estimating heritability also has its limitations. Here, researchers assume
that the adopted families of each twin are different from each other. If the identical twins are
placed in similar environments this may increase the similarity between the twins, artificially
inflating our heritability estimate. That is, twins may be more alike on a certain characteristic
due to selective placement during the adoption process and not to their genetics. Selective
placement makes it impossible to see the effect of genetics apart from the effect of environment
because it confounds the two (Plomin, DeFries, & Loehlin, 1977; Plomin et al., 2008).
Adoption studies of MZA twins also assume that families who adopt are the same as families
who do not adopt. Again, if there is something special about adoptive families, then this environ-
mental effect will get improperly labeled as a genetic effect. For example, prospective adoptive
families often go through an interview to rule out extreme poverty, criminal behavior, drug abuse,
and other factors that affect the ability of the family to provide a safe and secure environment for
a child. We might wonder how representative adoptive families are. Although the mean income
of adoptive families and the general population are not much different, there are fewer families in
extreme poverty among adoptive families (Carey, 2003). This suggests a potential problem of range
restriction among adoptive families, making it harder to detect a significant effect of environment.
Again, whereas this might be a problem for some variables (e.g., antisocial behavior) it may not be
a problem when it comes to personality traits (Carey, 2003). Both of these assumptions, selective
placement and representativeness of adoptive families, have been tested by researchers and are not
a problem for most studies (Plomin et al., 1977, 2008).

Research Methods Illustrated: Correlational Designs I:

The Logic of Adoption and Twin Studies

W
hat do we mean when we say that a certain trait “runs in families”? For example, families
often share inside jokes and find the same sorts of things amusing. Does sense of humor
run in families? If so, why might this be? When we say that a trait runs in families, is this
because of shared genetics among family members? Or, is it because family members all live in the
 Chapter 6 Genetics 149

same environment, where they might watch the same TV programs, tell amusing stories around
the dinner table, and laugh at one another’s jokes, for example? The trouble is, under ordinary
conditions we can’t tell the two apart.
Sure, we could design a kind of science-fiction experiment: Imagine a set of MZ twins
who are identical in their genetic makeup. For about 9 months, let’s say they share identical
conditions inside their mother’s womb (although in reality MZ twins grow in their own
subenvironment of the womb). Then we would take these twins, separate them at birth, and
randomly place them in contrasting environments. When they grow to adulthood we see
what kinds of cartoons they think are funny and then see if this is more similar to their birth
family’s sense of humor or to their adopted family’s sense of humor. This would be the way to
design a true experimental test, but obviously such an experiment is completely unethical and
impossible to do.
However, such natural experiments do happen in the world. Babies—both twins and
nontwins—are adopted and raised in families that provide a nurturing environment but no genetic
material. Similarly, twins—both genetically identical and not—are raised in the same environment.
Thus adoption studies and twin studies go a long way to helping researchers understand both the
genetic and environmental impact on human behavior, including personality.
Recall that a true experiment allows a researcher to infer causality between the presence
or absence of a variable and some outcome measure. This is because the researcher is able to
manipulate the independent variable and to randomly assign participants to various levels
of that independent variable. Therefore, any difference in the outcome between the groups
must be due to differences in what the experimenter manipulated. Of course, this assumes
everything else was exactly the same for each and every participant. These two requirements—
experimental control and random assignment to conditions—are the defining qualities of a true
experiment.
However, there are times when one or both of these requirements are impossible. Like in our
little sci-fi experiment, you can’t randomly assign children to parents! That violates the random
assignment to condition requirement. Similarly, you can’t control whether children get raised in
families with a dry sense of humor or into families with a corny sense of humor, violating the control
of the independent variable requirement. So, sometimes it’s unethical to conduct a true experiment
and sometimes it’s just impossible. Often, it’s just impractical or inconvenient, due to limited time or
resources.
As an alternative to a true experiment, researchers turn to correlational designs. In a
correlational design the experimenter doesn’t attempt to manipulate the presence or absence of
the independent variable, but instead measures it along with some outcome measure. Because
the independent variable is not under the experimenter’s control, if we see a difference between
participants in the outcome of the dependent variable, we can’t assume that the independent
variable is what caused the difference. In this case, the best we can say is that the two variables—our
independent variable and our dependent variable—are related.

Although it is very rare to

find identical twins who were
separated at birth, studying
such twins is a good way to
understand the effects of
genetics and environment on
personality. For example, Bob
and Bob first met as adults
and discovered they had
many similarities, including
their name and occupation.
150 Chapter 6 Genetics

Recall that when two variables are related, there are always at least three possible
explanations for the findings. First, it’s possible that one variable causes the other, like being
around the same people all the time causes people to develop a similar sense of humor. Second,
it’s also possible that the second variable causes the first one, like people who have a similar sense
of humor spend more time hanging around each other. Finally, it’s also possible that some third
variable—like genetics—causes people to hang around each other (i.e., family) and to find the
same jokes funny.
The beauty of twin and adoption studies is that they are able to rule out some of these
explanations. For example, if adopted children are more similar to their birth parents than to their
adoptive parents (or adopted siblings, even), then we can assume that the trait in question has
a stronger genetic component. However, if adopted children are more similar to their adoptive
parents than to their birth parents, then the trait in question must have a stronger environmental
component.
An especially strong case for the relative contribution of genetics and environment
may be made if we can study twins who were separated at birth. In these cases, we have two
people with identical genetic makeup who have been exposed to different environments. If
they respond similarly then we can conclude that genetics must have caused the similarity; if
they respond differently then we can conclude that the environment must have caused the
difference.
Take a look at Table 6.2 which shows the correlations between various family members
in Extraversion and Neuroticism. Recall that positive correlations between two variables mean
that the two variables are similar: as one variable increases (or decreases), the other variable
increases (or decreases) too. Where are the correlations the highest? The lowest? As you can see,
the more genetically similar two people are—for example, identical twins—the more similar
they are in both of these characteristics. Being raised apart lessens the similarity, but being raised
together without a genetic predisposition does little to make people similar on these traits. You
can readily see how twin and adoption studies help us sort out the relative effects of genes and
SEE FOR YOURSELF environment.
With all of this background on adoption studies, twin studies, and how to interpret correlations,
Is your sense of humor
more similar to your family’s we can now address our question: Does sense of humor run in families? And if so, why might this
or your friends’? Why might be? Using a sample of MZ and DZ female twin pairs, researchers had each twin rate how funny
this be? they found a series of five Far Side cartoons by Gary Larson (Johnson, Vernon, & Feiler, 2008). The
researchers were careful to have the women rate the cartoons in separate rooms so they couldn’t
hear or see their twin’s reaction.
How similar were the twins in their ratings of the cartoons? Overall, the ratings of each
twin were pretty similar for each of the five cartoons. For one of the cartoons, for example, the
correlation between ratings of one MZ with her twin was .50 and for DZ twins it was .41. This
suggests that there is a medium, positive relationship between humor ratings of this cartoon in
twins.
Take a closer look at these two correlations. Do you think that these correlations are different
enough to suggest a genetic component to sense of humor? The researchers tested this idea using

Table 6.2 Twin, Family, and Adoption Correlations for Neuroticism and Extraversion
Type of Relative Neuroticism Extraversion
Identical twins reared together .43 .52
Fraternal twins reared together .19 .18
Identical twins reared apart .31 .42
Fraternal twins reared apart .23 .08
Nonadoptive parents and offspring .14 .18
Adoptive parents and offspring .05 .06
Nonadoptive siblings .18 .19
Adoptive siblings .12 -.05
Note: Based on a meta-analysis of 145 studies.
Source: From Johnson et al. (2008).
 Chapter 6 Genetics 151

advanced statistical techniques and found that there was no significant impact of genetics on the
ratings of these cartoons. However, they estimated that about 49% of the differences between
twin pairs was due to differences in shared environment whereas 51% was due to nonshared
environment. This suggests that sense of humor, at least for these kind of cerebral off-the-wall
cartoons, is something that is partly learned at home and partly picked up from friends, and other
aspects of a individual’s unique environment.
Note that in this study the researchers did not randomly assign participants to be MZ
twins or DZ twins, nor did they manipulate people to share 50 or 100% of the genes. And yet,
we are able to estimate the relative contribution of genes, shared environment, and unique
environment on people’s sense of humor. Such is the value of correlational designs, adoption
studies, and twin studies.

Heritability of Common Personality “Quantitative genetics is hardly

Characteristics needed any longer merely to

ask whether and how much
A solid finding in the research—one that has been well replicated across many samples and genetic factors influence
for both self-report and other report—is that virtually all individual differences in human behavioral traits because the
behavior including cognitive abilities, personality, social attitudes, psychological interests,
answers are ‘yes’ and ‘a lot,’
and psychopathology are moderately heritable (Bouchard & McGue, 2003). In the words
of one researcher, “some degree of heritability is practically inevitable” (Turkheimer, 2004, respectively, for nearly all
p. 162). traits that have been studied,
The heritability of personality traits ranges from .40 to .60, and is the same for both men including personality and
and women (Carey, 2003; Johnson et al., 2008; Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Plomin & Caspi, 1999; cognitive abilities”
Plomin & Daniels, 1987; Plomin et al., 2008). In fact, one researcher went so far as to say that (Plomin, Happé, & Caspi, 2002,
this is true for all known human differences (Turkheimer, 2000). In addition, shared environ- p. 88).
ment typically accounts for very little variation (Johnson et al., 2008; Krueger & Johnson, 2008;
Turkheimer, 2000), whereas nonshared environment accounts for a great deal (Johnson et al.,
2008; Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Turkheimer, 2000). The variance in personality traits typically
breaks down like this (Krueger & Johnson, 2008):

Observed differences in personality traits = 40% Genetics + 0% Shared environment

+40% Nonshared environment + 20% Error.

So even after we account for the 40 to 60% of variation in most personality traits that comes
from genetics (Plomin et al., 2002), there is still plenty of variance left to be explained
(Turkheimer, 2004)!
To illustrate this model, let’s take a closer look at the heritability of the five-factor model
(FFM) of traits. According to this model, human personality can be described using five broad
SEE FOR YOURSELF
categories of traits: Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness
(McCrae & Costa, 2008) (we learned about these factors in earlier chapters). Table 6.3 presents How similar are you and
a summary of results based on 85,640 pairs of MZ twins, 106,644 pairs of DZ twins, and 46,215 your siblings or parents
nontwin kinships from 145 studies published from 1955 to 2006 (Johnson et al., 2008). As you in how emotional you are
can see, identical twins are very similar in the five-factor traits, even if they are raised apart, (Neuroticism)? In aesthetic
sense such as appreciation
indicating a moderately strong genetic component to these traits. Indeed, the heritability of all for art and classical music
five factors is in the .41 to .50 range, indicating that about 41 to 50% of the variation in these (Openness)?
traits is due to genetic factors.
But look closely: Identical twins who were raised together have the highest correlations
and indeed, even fraternal twins who are raised together look a bit like each other even
though fraternal twins share only about 50% of their genes on average. This suggests that
there is a moderate effect of the environment too. Indeed, the environment—both shared and
nonshared—accounts for about 47 to 53% of the variance in these traits. Finally, the shared
environment accounts for only about 8 to 17% of the variation in these traits. Other research-
ers have found similar results when looking at the individual facet traits that make up each of
the five factors (Jang, McCrae, Angleitner, Riemann, & Livesley, 1998).
152 Chapter 6 Genetics

Table 6.3 Kinship Correlations, Heritability Estimates, and Environmentality Estimates for Traits of the Five-
Factor Model
Type of Relative N E O A C
Identical twins reared together .43 .52 .48 .42 .47
Fraternal twins reared together .19 .18 .24 .23 .22
Identical twins reared apart .31 .42 .34 .19 .33
Fraternal twins reared apart .23 .08 .14 .03 .09
Heritability .41 .50 .46 .43 .49
Environmentality .53 .47 .47 .49 .48
Shared environment .08 .08 .12 .17 .11
Note: Based on a meta-analysis of 145 studies. N = Neuroticism, E = Extraversion, O = Openness, A = Agreeableness,
and C = Conscientiousness.

A similar picture emerges from a study of 660 MZ and 200 DZ twins from Germany and
Poland (Riemann, Angleitner, & Strelau, 1997). Each twin and two friends of that twin filled
out questionnaires to measure the twin’s personality on the five personality factors. The peer’s
ratings correlated .61 with one another and .55 with the twin’s own rating indicating consider-
able agreement among the three raters in what the twin was like.
As you can see in Figure 6.2, although each of the five factors has moderate heritability—
genetics accounted for about 35 to 60% of the variance in self-reported traits—there was
a greater effect of nonshared environment on these traits (Plomin & Caspi, 1999). In fact,
shared environment accounted for the smallest amount of variance in both self-reports and
peer reports.
Here is a puzzle for you to think about. Notice that there is a strong genetic component
to the peer ratings. Does this mean that we “inherit” the opinions of our friends? If not, then
what might cause this correlation? It’s easy to see how our genetic makeup would account for
our own ratings, but why would our genetic makeup correlate with our friends’ ratings? Stay
tuned to find out!

Figure 6.2 Genetic and

environmental influences 100
for self-reports of Big Five 90
Percentage of Variance

personality traits. Source: 80

From Plomin and Caspi (1999, 70
Figure 9.1, p. 252). From 60
L. A. Pervin & O. P. John, eds., 50
Handbook of Personality: Theory
40
and Research (2nd ed.,
30
p. 251–276). New York, NY:
Guilford Press. Copyright © 20
1999 Guilford Press. Reprinted 10
with permission. 0
Self Peer Self Peer Self Peer Self Peer Self Peer
Extraversion Neuroticism Agreeableness Conscienti- Openess to
ousness experience

Nonshared environment Shared environment Genetic

 Chapter 6 Genetics 153

Then and Now: The Science of Genetics “When all the human genes
are truly known, scientists
To think the whole field of genetics started with a simple Augustinian friar named Gregor
will have produced a Periodic
Johann Mendel (1822–1884), who was born and lived in what is now the Czech Republic, is
mind-boggling. The son of a tenant farmer, he worked on the farm and learned about the Table of Life.”
grafting of fruit trees from his father. Mendel and his family recognized that he was too smart Peltonen and McKusick (2001,
to simply follow in his father’s footsteps working land that he could never own, so he joined p. 1224)
the monastery and attended the University of Vienna to earn the credentials he needed to
teach high school science. It was there that this farmboy “began to turn himself into one of the
greatest experimental biologists of all time” (Mawer, 2006, p. 38). The friars of the Abbey of St.
Thomas in Brno were unusual in their desire to practice public ministry, getting involved in
political causes of the day (Mendel may have taken part in protests against the Austrian Empire
as a student) and fostering intellectual pursuits. Although some brothers were philosophers
and others were accomplished composers, the stout, amiable, shy, introverted, sensitive, and
nearsighted Mendel spent his free time conducting experiments in the monastery gardens:
Throughout each spring and summer the man spent hours and hours tending his plants,
pollinating, scoring, labeling, harvesting, drying, putting seeds away for the next year, peer-
ing at the world through his gold-rimmed spectacles, puzzling and pondering, counting,
and tallying, explaining to anyone who would listen what was going on. Visitors were in
the presence of a man inspired—a Beethoven or a Goethe—and all they saw was a dumpy
little friar with a sense of irony introducing them to his “children.” (Mawer, 2006, p. 63).
His children were, of course, pea plants—over 28,000 of them! He studied the variation
in plants and noticed that sometimes characteristics of plants seemed to skip a generation.
He meticulously planted and recorded details of his pea plants and counted their offspring
instead of merely generalizing the results as earlier researchers had done (Plomin et al., 2008).
In particular, the nearly obsessive Mendel followed seven “characters” of plants over succes-
sive generations by crossing one kind of plant with another. These characteristics included
smooth or wrinkled peas, yellow or green seeds, white seed coat with white flowers or gray
seed coat with purple flowers, smooth or constricted peapods, green or yellow peapods,
flowers at the top of the plant or all along the stem, and tall or dwarf plants (Mawer, 2006).
At the time, people believed that inherited characteristics—of people and plants—were
blended. That is, the offspring of a pea plant with wrinkled peas and a plant with smooth peas
would have moderately wrinkled peas. But that is not what Mendel found. Instead, he found that
the next generation was all smooth. What happened to the genetic information for wrinkly peas?
Mendel reasoned that the trait must still be present in the genotype even though it was not expressed
in the phenotype. If this was true, then the genotype ought to be passed on to the next generation.
Indeed, about 75% of the plants in the next generation were smooth and 25% were wrinkled. How
can it be that each generation can seem so different? From such observations, Mendel developed
two hypotheses, part of what we now consider his first law of inheritance (Plomin et al., 2008).
First, each parent plant passes on one form of the gene (Mendel used the word element)
for a given characteristic to its offspring, who get two forms of the gene, one from each parent
(note that different forms of the same gene are called alleles). These two alleles can either be
the same or different. When the alleles are different, one characteristic will be dominant over
the other. However, both alleles will be passed on to the next generation.
For example, say a pea plant with wrinkled peas breeds with a plant that has smooth peas.
The next generation will each get some combination of alleles for smooth and wrinkly peas. If
smoothness is the dominant characteristic, then the peas will look smooth, but the plants will
still carry and pass on the recessive wrinkly pea trait to the next generation (see Figure 6.3).
When a trait is recessive, the trait will appear only when a plant receives two alleles for the reces-
sive trait—in this case wrinkly peas.
This concept of dominance explains the pattern of seeds Mendel observed in successive gen-
erations. In fact, such inheritance patterns where one trait dominates over another is called Men-
delian inheritance and Mendel is now known as the founder of modern genetics (Mawer, 2006).
154 Chapter 6 Genetics

Initial cross

First generation

“Parent” 1

Second generation

“Parent” 2 Offspring

3 yellow
to
Third generation
1 green

Figure 6.3 Summary of Mendel’s experiments with peas. Source: From Mawer (2006, p. 54). Gregor Mendel:
Planting the seeds of genetics. New York, NY: Abrams.

Fast-forward almost 150 years to the present day. Instead of inheritance of smooth or
wrinkled peas, scientists are trying to understand what causes any number of human char-
acteristics: physical diseases, psychological disorders, and even personality traits. Since the
start of the century, a collaborative of international scientists have identified the 20,000 to
25,000 genes that make up the human genome (Mawer, 2006; Venter et al., 2001). Whereas
about 99.9% of the human DNA sequence is the same for each and every one of us, it’s
that .1% that does differ that makes us unique individuals (Plomin, DeFries, Craig, &
McGuffin, 2003).
Have researchers discovered a genetic, yet noninheritable means by which the environ-
ment fundamentally changes human functioning? Apparently so. This exciting new area of
genetics research is called epigenetics. We know that a gene is a sequence of DNA that codes
for a specific trait. Genes are composed of coding regions called exons and noncoding regions
called introns. Of the 3.3 billion base pairs of DNA in the human genome, only about 2 to 3%
are functioning genes. The remainder of the DNA—nearly 2 meters of it—was once thought
to do nothing because it occurs outside genes (Mawer, 2006). This so-called junk DNA is actu-
ally turning out to be more interesting than the coding genes themselves. Some of this “junk”
appears to orchestrate—alter its regulation to underexpress or overexpress—a nearby gene
(Plomin et al., 2003). In fact, some of these noncoding sequences end up changing how the
genes function in direct response to the environment.
What might this look like? Cole et al. (2007) identified a sample of older American adults,
with a median age of 55 years, who scored in the top 15% of the UCLA Loneliness Scale. They
were matched to adults of the same sex, age, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status who scored
in the bottom 15% of the scale.
Previous research had established that people who are socially isolated are vulnerable to
a host of cardiovascular and infectious diseases due to increased levels of the stress hormone
cortisol. In the Cole et al. (2007) study both the lonely group and the socially connected group
 Chapter 6 Genetics 155

Isolated

Integrated

Isolation related transcripts

0 25 50 75 100 125 150

Down-regulated
Difference: p = .0001
Up-regulated

Figure 6.4 Gene expression as a function of loneliness status. The top strip indicates how the genes are
functioning in isolated individuals, the bottom strip in connected individuals. Horizontal location indicates
function of gene: Those on the left increase disease, those on the right prevent disease. Color indicates
activity of genes: Green indicates overexpression (up-regulated) and red indicates underexpression (down-
regulated). Here, the genes that code for disease are overexpressed in lonely people (green cells on the left)
and underexpressed in socially connected people (red cells on the left). However, the genes that code for
disease prevention are underactivated in lonely people (red cells on the right) and overexpressed in socially
connected people (green cells on the right). Lonely individuals have significantly more underexpressed genes
(red) than socially connected people. Source: From Cole et al. (2007, Figure 1, p. R189. 4). Cole, S. W., Hawkley,
L. C., Arevalo, J. M., Sung, C. Y., Rose, R. M., & Cacioppo, J. T. (2007). Social regulation of gene expression in human
leukocytes. Genome Biology, 8, R189 (doi:10.1186/gb-2007-8-9-r189)

gave samples of blood for genetic analysis to identify problems in the coding of glucocorticoid
response genes that regulate how the body responds to stress hormones.
Figure 6.4 vividly shows the differences between these two groups in gene expression as
a function of their feelings of isolation or connection. Significantly more genes that regulate
immune functioning were turned down (not expressed at the same levels) in the lonely group
than in the socially supported group. Specifically, those cells that protect against disease were
turned down (red), whereas genes that increased disease were turned up (green). These results
suggest that loneliness directly impacts immune functioning by regulating the specific genes
that control immune functioning.
This is how epigenetics works for just one human behavior. As we learn more about
genes involved in disorders and about the noncoding sequences of DNA that may turn out
to regulate the genes, researchers may develop amazing new ways of treating diseases, both
physical and psychological, perhaps in your lifetime. Scientists are searching for similar
environmental effects behind diseases including (Carey, 2003) breast cancer, diabetes, high
cholesterol, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and also schizophrenia (Gottesman, 1991)
and bipolar disorder (McGuffin, 2004).
For example, if a disease was inherited, once we have identified the exact gene involved
in a disorder we can diagnose or screen who has the gene. Researchers then will be able to use
this information to replace faulty genetic code with new and improved code that has been
cloned to match as precisely as possible the recipient’s genetics (McGuffin, 2004). This is called
positional cloning.
In the words of one researcher:
It is now possible for behavior genetics to move beyond statistical analyses of differences
between identical and nonidentical twins and identify individual genes that are related
to behavioral outcomes. (Turkheimer, 2000, p. 163).
This is where the cutting-edge research is happening in behavioral genetics and the results are
very exciting. We are finding that often the environment affects people differently depending
on a specific genotype. We’ll talk about some of these genotype–environmental interactions
and the specific genes involved in the next section.
156 Chapter 6 Genetics

Genes and Environment:

A Dialectical Synthesis
So far in this chapter we’ve been looking at the separate effects of genes and environment.
But when it comes to personality, often genes and environment influence each other. We’ve
briefly mentioned two ways this may happen—through genotype–environment interactions
and genotype–environment correlations. Now it’s time for us to take a closer look at these two
processes.
THINK ABOUT IT According to the philosopher Hegel, a dialectic is a way of thinking in which contradictions
are seen to be part of a higher truth. Take the nature–nurture debate. This phrase suggests that
Can you think of another
nature and nurture work in opposition. What happens if we think of “nature” and “nurture” not
example of a dialectic?
as opposing forces, but as forces that can be combined or synthesized in some fashion? What if
genes and environment worked together as allies instead of working against each other as foes?
Recall our formula from the beginning of the chapter in which the amount of variance in
an observed characteristic can be due to genetics, environment, and some combination of the
two (Cardno & McGuffin, 2002, p. 40):
Phenotype = Genotype + Environment + Gene9environment correlation
+ Gene9environment interaction.
Until the 1980s, researchers had been considering genes and environment only as separate
factors influencing phenotype. Plomin et al. (1977) suggested that researchers can increase
the accuracy of their results—and detect new effects—by specifically testing for two ways in
which genes and environment influence each other: a genotype–environment interaction and
a genotype–environment correlation. A genotype–environment interaction occurs when a
genotype responds differently to an environment; a genotype–environment correlation occurs
when a genotype is exposed differently to an environment (Loehlin, 1992). These two effects
are really examples of how nature and nurture work together and lead us to a higher truth. In
this way, nature–nurture is more of a dialectic than a debate.
Two caveats are in order here. First, whereas we may be unable to see the joint effects of
genes and environment in a single individual (remember lemonade?) we can explore only
genotype–environment interactions and genotype–environment correlations within a popula-
tion (Plomin et al., 1977). Although we will illustrate these concepts using individual examples,
in practice we can really only gauge the genotype–environment effects in a group of people in
which we are able to estimate key aspects of their genetic makeup and of their environment.
Second, Plomin et al. (1977) noted that in practice it is sometimes difficult to distinguish
genotype–environment interactions from genotype–environment correlations. Researchers must
be careful to define and measure aspects of both personality and the environment to truly see
which kind of effect is occurring, ideally through a study that looks at these variables over time
(Carey, 2003; Plomin et al., 1977). That is, it often comes down to sophisticated statistical tests
to determine which effect—an interaction or a correlation—accounts for the data. Next we will
define genotype–environment interactions and genotype–environment correlations in more detail
and take a closer look at some interesting research findings that illustrate both kinds of effects.

Genotype–Environment Interactions
One way that genetics and environment work on each other is through a genotype–environment
interaction. This is when people respond differently to the same environment because of their
differing genetic makeup. That is, the environment has a different impact depending on a person’s
genotype (Plomin et al., 1977).
To illustrate how this works, let’s go back to the study that opened the chapter. Recall that in
a sample of juvenile delinquents in Russia even though many of the boys experienced maternal
rejection in their lives (e.g., physical punishment, lack of respect for their point of view, public
criticism), only those with a certain genotype experienced clinical depression (Haeffel et al., 2008).
As you can see now, this is an example of genotype–environment interaction. The same
environment—maternal rejection—led to clinical depression only in boys with one specific
 Chapter 6 Genetics 157

genotype (look back to Figure 6.1). In case you were wondering, maternal rejection was not
correlated with clinical depression, so these really are separate effects.
To identify the specific genotype related to depression, researchers took blood samples
from the participants. They then analyzed the samples to find out if the young men carried
one of the three variations of a gene suspected to be related to depression. This gene (DAT1 or
SLC6A3) is an important regulator of the neurotransmitter dopamine. Evidence suggests that
prolonged exposure to dopamine may lead to depression.
Despite knowing which genes are related to dopamine functioning, scientists have been
unable to prove that these genes cause depression. That is, no genetic difference has been found
between depressed and nondepressed people. Recall that in this study researchers initially found
no effect of genes alone or environment alone on clinical depression. But when they looked
at the combination of a specific genotype with an environment of maternal rejection, that’s
when they found a significant genotype–environment interaction. In this case, genes and envi-
ronment interacted with each other to cause a psychological outcome. We might well wonder
what other genotype–environment interactions researchers may have missed out on by looking
separately at genes and environment!
In fact, remember our earlier discussion of how shared environment effects on the develop-
ment of personality traits have been difficult to find? Well, Lahey (2009) pointed out that shared
environments may impact the personality trait of Neuroticism through genotype–environment
interactions. By not considering interactive effects of environment on genes, researchers may have
accidentally overestimated genetic effects and underestimated the impact of shared environments.
A second potential genetic risk factor for depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders
involves a certain region of the serotonin transporter gene. The thinking here is that depression
may be caused by a lack of the neurotransmitter serotonin in the spaces between the neurons. In
fact, many popular antidepressant drugs, called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs),
work by blocking the cells that process serotonin so that it stays in the system a bit longer. People
actually get two versions of the gene that regulates serotonin one from each parent. This leads to
three different variations of the gene depending on which allele a person gets from his or her par-
ents: ss, sl, and ll. These letters stand for the “short” (s) and “long” (l) versions of the gene. People
with the short version (ss or sl), especially two short alleles (ss), are less efficient at regulating
serotonin so they are at risk for depression, whereas people with two long alleles (ll) may have a
measure of protection from depression.
Early research on the link between the short version of the gene and depression was, in the
words of one group of researchers, “inconclusive” (Caspi, Sugden, et al., 2003, p. 387). These
researchers wondered if there might be an interaction between life stressors and genotype.
Using a longitudinal sample of 1,037 men and women in New Zealand who were studied exten-
sively from ages 3 to 26, they were able to divide the sample into three groups depending on
their genotype of the serotonin transporter promoter gene: ss, sl, and ll. In addition, participants
noted if any of 14 major life events occurred to them between the ages of 21 and 26. These
events included things such as a major change in employment, housing, finances, health, and
relationships. Finally, participants were asked if they experienced any symptoms of depression,
thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts, or a depressive episode in the past year. Interestingly, there
were no differences in number of life stressors among the three genotype groups suggesting
that genes did not cause people to experience more life stressors.
As you can see in Figure 6.5, for all of the outcomes studied, participants with the ss geno-
type were the most at risk whereas participants with the ll genotype were the least at risk for
depression or symptoms of depression (Caspi, Sugden, et al., 2003). Participants with the sl
genotype fell somewhere in between. In all cases, the environment—that is, having more life
stressors—put a person at greater risk for symptoms of depression or a full-blown depressive
episode, but there was little impact of genotype on symptoms or incidence of depression.
However, when a person with a specific genotype—ss—encountered stressful life events, the
person was particularly likely to develop depression or depressive symptoms. Thus the inter-
action between genes and environment was statistically significant in every instance (Caspi,
Sugden, et al., 2003). No wonder early research was inconsistent; apparently it takes both the
environment and a special genotype for a person to experience depression in his or her lifetime
(see Monroe & Reid, 2008, for a review and Munafò & Flint, 2009, for a criticism of this work).
158
Self reported depression Chapter 6 Genetics

12.50 s/s .50 .70

depression episode

depression episode
Probability of major

Probability of major
s/s s/s
10.00 .40 .60
s/l
symptoms

.50 s/l
7.50 .30 s/l
l/l .40
5.00 .20 l/l l/l
.30
2.50 .10 .20
0.00 .00 .00
0 1 2 3 4⫹ 0 1 2 3 4⫹

at ble
t

t
at re
en

en

en
tre e
tre a
tre o
m

m
A Number of stressful life events B Number of stressful life events E

al ev
al ob
al N
at

m S
m Pr
.16 2.00

m
Probability of suicide

s/s s/s

Informant reports
.14 1.75
ideation/attempt

of depression
.12 1.50 s/l
.10 1.25 l/l
.08 s/l 1.00
.06 0.75
.04 l/l 0.50
.02 0.25
.00 0.00
0 1 2 3 4⫹ 0 1 2 3 4⫹
C Number of stressful life events D Number of stressful life events

Figure 6.5 Incidence of clinical depression symptoms as a function of genotype and life stressors. Source: From Caspi, Sugden, et al.
(2003, Figures 1 and 2, p. 388). From Caspi, A., Sugden, K., Moffitt, T. E., Taylor, A., Craig, I. W., Harrington, H., et al. (2003). Influence of life stress
on depression: Moderation by a polymorphism in the 5-HTT gene. Science, 301(5631), 386–389. Reprinted by permission of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science.

THINK ABOUT IT These are just two examples of an increasing trend in personality where researchers look for
genotype–environment interactions. One group of researchers suggested that such interactions
What does it mean to say probably occur more often than we realize, especially for psychopathology (Krueger, Markon,
that there is a genotype– & Bouchard, 2003). Interactions between genes and environment have been found to account
environment interaction
between negative life
for religious upbringing lessening the impulsiveness of high sensation seekers (Boomsma, de
events and Neuroticism? Geus, van Baal, & Koopmans, 1999), parental bonding and family functioning decreasing emo-
What kinds of people are tional instability (Jang, Dick, Wolf, Livesley, & Paris, 2005), a monoamine oxidase A (MAOA)
more vulnerable to negative promoter gene and parental harshness increasing adolescent antisocial behavior (Krueger et al.,
events? 2003), the DRD2 gene and stress increasing alcoholism (Madrid, MacMurray, Lee, Anderson,
& Comings, 2001), and negative life events increasing Neuroticism (Lahey, 2009).

Genotype–Environment Correlations
“We propose that It seems easy enough to think about the effects of genes and environment. However, researchers
development is indeed soon discovered a curious finding: Measures of environments showed evidence of genetic influ-
the result of nature and ence (Plomin et al., 2002). In other words, measures of environmental effects, such as parenting
nurture but that genes
styles on, or peer ratings of, a child, for example, were not strictly environmental. That is, people’s
personalities affected the environments they found themselves in and also how they described
drive experience. Genes are
those environments on questionnaires. This puzzle soon led to a breakthrough in personality
components in a system that research which led to many interesting findings (Plomin et al., 2002). Perhaps you can see now
organizes the organism to how this accounts for the genetic component of peer ratings in the twin study of the five-factor
experience its world.” model of personality study discussed earlier (Riemann et al., 1997). Did you figure it out?
Scarr and McCartney (1983, p. 425) The answer to this puzzle is that people construct their environments. That is, we
select, modify, create, and re-create in our memory (and on questionnaires administered
by researchers!) our experiences (Plomin et al., 2002). When people’s experiences are related
to—that is, are correlated with—their genetic inclinations we call this a genotype–environment
correlation. A genotype–environment correlation occurs when people with a gene for a specific
characteristic find themselves in an environment that fosters—or discourages—the expres-
sion of that characteristic (Carey, 2003). Or, to think of it another way, people with different
genotypes are exposed to different environments depending on that genotype (Plomin et al.,
1977). Because both the genes and the environment occur together, we can’t be sure which
is causing the manifestation of that characteristic.
 Chapter 6 Genetics 159

Table 6.4 Three Types of Genotype–Environment Correlations

Type Description Pertinent Environment
Passive Children are given genotypes linked to their Natural parents and siblings
environment
Reactive Children are reacted to on the basis of their Anybody
genotype
Active Children seek an environment conductive to their Anytime
genotype

Source: From Plomin et al. (1977, Table 1, p. 311). Plomin, R., DeFries, J. C., & Loehlin, J. C. (1977). Genotype-environment interaction
and correlation in the analysis of human behavior. Psychological Bulletin, 84(2), 309–322.

Another way to think about genotype–environment correlations goes back to our defini-
tion of what a correlation is. In this case, a genotype–environment correlation occurs when
people with high “genetic values” (i.e., a strong genetic predisposition for a specific character-
istic) find themselves in environments with high values (i.e., environments that push for that
characteristic; Carey, 2003). Similarly, a genotype–environment correlation also occurs when
people with low genetic values (i.e., no particular inclination for a characteristic) find them-
selves in environments with low values (i.e., environments with no particular demand for that
characteristic). The interesting question is why people with certain genotypes find themselves
in certain environments. There are three possible explanations, which lead to three types of
correlations: passive, reactive, and active (Plomin et al., 1977; see Table 6.4).

Types of Genotype–Environment Correlations. When parents provide both the genes

and an environment that is favorable (or unfavorable) to the development of those genes, SEE FOR YOURSELF
we observe a passive genotype–environment correlation (Plomin et al., 1977). For example, Can you identify a char-
imagine parents who have very high verbal skills—gifted even—who not only pass on these acteristic you may have
fabulous genes to their children but also provide a home filled with books and games and other developed due to a passive
activities that are likely to help their children develop good verbal skills (Plomin et al., 1977). genetic–environment corre-
Because the children did nothing to cause the environment to provide these resources—and in lation between your genes
fact, such resources may have been in place long before children were even on the scene—the and the environment your
parents created for you?
genotype–environment correlation is passive.
But consider the same
highly verbal parents who see
that their baby is babbling
constantly and often seems
as if she is trying to commu-
nicate to them. These parents
may purposely try to engage
the baby in conversation (e.g.,
“Who’s Mama’s precious little
Genotype–environment
baby?”) or encourage the baby correlations occur when
to talk (“Say Dada!”). Because people are exposed to
the parents are responding to different environments
something in the child, we call depending on their genotype.
this kind of relationship a reac- Genotype–environment
tive genotype–environment correlations can be passive,
correlation (Plomin et al., reactive, or active. This
1977). Just as with the passive young boy is already an
genotype–environment corre- accomplished ballet dancer.
Do you think this is an
lation, we can’t be sure if the
example of a passive or active
child’s genetics or environment
genotype–environment
caused him or her to be so ver- correlation?
bal because the two co-occur.
160 Chapter 6 Genetics

Now imagine that this child of highly verbal parents is spending the weekend with
grandparents (with whom the child shares about 25% of her genes, on average). Suppose
the baby babbles to both grandparents, but because Grandma is in the middle of cooking
SEE FOR YOURSELF dinner, Grandpa investigates the noises coming from the crib. “Are you trying to talk, little
Can you identify a char- baby?” he says while laughing. “Go on, tell me all about it.” For the rest of the weekend, the
acteristic you may have baby crawls to Grandpa whereever he is and continues to babble at him. This would be an
developed due to a reactive example of an active genotype–environment correlation. Here, the parents (or grandpar-
genotype–environment cor- ents, in this case) have provided both the genes and the environment. The baby can either
relation between your genes interact with Grandma or Grandpa, but she chooses to “talk” with, and indeed seeks out, the
and the environment your
parents created for you?
more responsive one, Grandpa. Here, her high verbal ability comes from both her genetics
and the environment, but she is the one who specifically seeks out the environment.
Genotype–environment correlations can be either positive or negative. The previous
examples illustrated positive genotype–environment correlations, where conditions were
SEE FOR YOURSELF
favorable for developing a certain characteristic. In this case, verbal behavior was encouraged
Can you identify a char- in the child either by an environment that just happens to encourage verbal ability (passive),
acteristic you may have responded to the child (reactive), or which the child sought out (active). But we could easily
developed due to an active imagine scenarios where verbal behavior was discouraged or where the child found herself in
genotype–environment cor- an environment that was unfavorable for developing verbal ability because the TV was on all
relation between your genes
and the environment your
the time (passive), where there was an older sibling who talked at the baby and interrupted her
parents created for you? babbling (reactive), or where the baby preferred the company of a quiet relative to a talkative
relative (active). These would be examples of negative genotype–environment correlations.
In the case of a negative genotype–environment correlation, people with high genetic val-
ues for a characteristic find themselves in environments with low values for that characteristic.
Often, the result is that the environment discourages the expression of that characteristic. The
inverse is also possible, where people with low genetic values for a characteristic find themselves
in environments with high values for that characteristic. They may end up developing some of
their less pronounced characteristics.
Keep in mind that whether a genotype–environment correlation is positive or negative
does not depend on the ultimate outcome—the development or lack of development of a
SEE FOR YOURSELF
characteristic—but on the relative levels of the genotype and the environment (see Table 6.5).
Can you identify a charac- Often positive genotype–environment correlations encourage a specific characteristic whereas
teristic you may have failed negative genotype–environment correlations discourage a specific characteristic, but this is
to develop due to a passive, not necessarily the case. For example, Scarr and McCartney (1983) described a negative passive
reactive, or active genotype– genotype–environment correlation where parents might be highly skilled readers and have a
environment correlation
child who is not reading so well. They may decide to enhance the environment for this child—
between your genes and
the environment your par- because they are good at reading and not because of anything about the child—more than they
ents created for you? might for a child who is already reading well or more than parents who are not highly skilled
readers would do if they had such a child.
For personality characteristics, Raymond Cattell suggested that negative genotype–
environment correlations were probably more common than positive correlations (Plomin
et al., 1977). For example, a person who is too domineering will probably be put in her place
by her peers, indicating a negative reactive genotype–environment correlation (Plomin et
al., 1977). Although it may seem odd that people would seek out environments that work

Table 6.5 Positive and Negative Genotype–Environment Correlations

Type of Correlation Genotype Environment
Positive High High
Positive Low Low
Negative High Low
Negative Low High
Note: High or low indicates the amount of the characteristic present in the genes or in the environment.
 Chapter 6 Genetics 161

against their natural inclinations, as is the case with negative active genotype–environment
correlations, you could imagine a person who is anxious and easily upset seeking out stable
and reassuring friends to calm him down (Plomin et al., 1977). What would a negative
passive genotype–environment correlation look like? Imagine parents who are emotion-
ally reactive and get angry easily and yet have a child who is similar to them in this regard.
They are very likely to squelch any unseemly reaction in their child (Plomin et al., 1977).
According to Scarr and McCartney (1983):
People seek out environments they find compatible and stimulating. We all select
from the surrounding environment some aspects to which to respond, learn
about, or ignore. Our selections are correlated with motivational, personality,
and intellectual aspects of our genotypes. The active genotype S environment
effect, we argue, is the most powerful connection between people and environ-
ments and the most direct expression of the genotype in experience. (p. 427)
Note that these three types of correlations differ in terms of what constitutes the environ-
ment. For passive, the environment is the child’s immediate environment: parents, siblings,
and other members of the household that he or she is born into. For reactive, the environment
is any person who interacts with or responds to the child. For example, peers may recipro-
cate the affection of a sociable child or teachers may provide an enriched environment for a
student who shows special aptitude. Finally, for active, the environment can be other people
or indeed, the physical environment itself. For example, a musical child can rush to play the
piano at Grandma’s house, gravitate to the music store at the mall, or even bang on pots and
pans in the kitchen to make music. Further, the relative importance of these environments—and
hence the type of genotype–environment correlation that is operating—shifts over the life span.
For example, passive genotype–environment influences may decrease from infancy to adolescence
whereas active genotype–environment influences increase as the child experiences more of the
world away from home.

What’s the Evidence? Researching Genotype–Environment Correlations. What evidence

is there for this idea that social experiences are evoked by one’s genotype? One way to find a
reactive genotype–environment correlation is to look at twin studies over time, where we might
be able to see changes in a child’s behavior and if these changes correlate with changes in the
environment. For example, comparing MZ twins and DZ twins, Narusyte, Andershed, Neider-
hiser, and Lichtenstein (2007) found that childhood aggression was related to parental criticism
that was related, in turn, to self-reported antisocial behavior in adolescence. The researchers
suggested that this is an example of a reactive genotype–environment correlation: Children at
risk for antisocial behavior are indeed more aggressive than children not at risk, and they are
also more likely to elicit negative reactions in their parents.
A similar reactive genotype–environment correlation was found in an adoption study,
where teens’ antisocial behavior was correlated with both their biological parent’s substance
abuse or antisocial personality (genotype) and with the harsh or inconsistent disciplinary prac-
tices of their adoptive mothers and fathers (environment; Ge et al., 1996).
Another way to investigate a reactive genotype–environment correlation is to create one in
the laboratory, something researchers have only begun to explore. Burt conducted an experi-
ment in which undergraduate men were put in a controlled situation to see how they interacted
with others (Burt, 2008, 2009). Would they elicit certain reactions from their peers as a function
of their genotype? If they did, then this would demonstrate a reactive genotype–environment
correlation in an experimental situation.
In this unusual experiment, Burt identified men who had either a G-allele or an A-allele
for a certain serotonin receptor gene (5-HTR2A) and had them interact in small groups on
two tasks. In previous research, the G-allele was associated with an increased response to selec-
tive serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). When normal volunteers are given SSRIs they act
friendlier (indeed, recall that the administration of SSRIs has been shown to reduce clinical
depression). Burt hypothesized that participants with the G-allele would be more likely than
162 Chapter 6 Genetics

Can one person’s gene

code for other people’s
responses? A reactive
genotype–environmental
correlation occurs when our
genes, as expressed in our
personalities, influence the
environment around us.

those with the A-allele to be friendly, smile, and socialize with others, eventually becoming one
of the most popular members of the group.
The groups were charged with two sets of tasks: answering brainteasers and planning two
parties, one with a strict budget and the other with unlimited funds and the instructions to “be
creative and have fun.” Afterward the participants rated how much they liked each person in
their group. The researchers created a composite of group ratings for each participant indicat-
ing how likable each participant was perceived to be by the others in the group. In addition,
observers took note of how often a participant joked, supported, or suggested, that the group
break rules either during the planning of their party or as part of the entertainment at the party.
For example, some participants suggested that they somehow steal money to supplement their
limited budget, or, in the case of the creative second party, provide alcohol (even though all
participants were under the legal drinking age), marijuana, other drugs, or even prostitutes.
An overall composite measure of rule-breaking was created from these observer ratings along
with self-reports. Burt reasoned that among young people, particularly men, rule-breaking is
a way of establishing status and popularity.
As predicted, men with the G-allele were more likely to suggest or encourage rule-breaking
and were, in fact, rated as more popular by their group-mates compared to men with the
A-allele (Burt, 2008, 2009). As Burt explained, the funny thing is that it is biologically impos-
sible for a person’s gene to code for another person’s response. It seems that this particular gene
codes for behaviors like rule-breaking that then lead people to be perceived as more likable.
Burt’s results suggested that genes code for a particular behavior (e.g., rule-breaking) and for
the social consequences of that behavior (e.g., popularity). This is an example of a positive reac-
tive genotype–environment correlation, where genes cause behavior to which the environment,
in this case other people, then responds.
Burt (2009) recognized that rule-breaking is just one aspect of popularity. He suggested
that researchers explore other aspects of personality that are known to affect liking such as
social dominance, extraversion, physical attractiveness, and perceived athletic ability, or specific
gestures that affect first impressions such as eye contact and smiling, to see if these might help
explain the correlation between genotype and popularity.
There are many examples of gene–environment correlations, especially in developmental
psychology. Correlations between genes and environment have been found for adolescents’
perceptions of parental warmth or conflict (Johnson & Krueger, 2006), physical punishment
and misbehavior (Jaffee et al., 2004), parental harshness and antisocial behavior (Krueger et
al., 2003), memories of childhood environment (Krueger et al., 2003), and family bonding and
neuroticism (Jang et al., 2005).
 Chapter 6 Genetics 163

The movie Gattaca portrays

a futuristic world where
parents select the exact
genetic makeup of their
offspring. As individuals and
society we need to decide
what to do with the results of
genetic research.

The Personality of Everyday Life

What can genetics research do for us?

If the concept of cloning or prenatal genetic testing makes you nervous, you are not alone.
Keep in mind that genetics is a tool, not a goal, so that understanding the human genome
is really only the beginning (Carey, 2003). As a tool, genetics is value-neutral. The real
moral question is, what do we do with the findings from genetic research? To make these
kinds of decisions it is imperative that informed citizens understand what genetics can
and can’t do so that we can be involved in the issues and not leave the debate solely to the
scientists or lawmakers. “[I]f you really want to
One way that findings from genetics have been misused in the past includes the engineer your child’s IQ,
eugenics movement, which claimed the moral superiority of one group over another stick to the old ways.
(witness the so-called Final Solution of the Nazis) and even went so far as to control Send them to Eton. And
who gets to reproduce or not (for example, the United States for a time instituted forced
if governments want to
sterilization of people with supposedly lower IQs as part of a eugenics program; Mawer,
2006). Another questionable use of genetics is cloning, although some say human cloning improve the nations’
may be nearly impossible (Smith, 2005). intelligence, the best value
Although gene therapy involving the cloning of the common cold virus has success- for money would be to
fully cured some diseases, such as severe combined immune deficiency syndrome (SCIDS; double teachers’ salaries.”
Smith, 2005), sometimes the risk of this type of therapy is too great (Collins & Vedantam, Geneticist Steve Jones as cited in
1999). The biggest fear may be that genetic testing will be used to modify or even select for Smith (2005, p. 188)
traits that are not disease related such as gender, intelligence, eye color, physical strength,
or sociability—a brave new world indeed!
And yet, the knowledge gleaned from genetics can be used for a world of good. Some
possible goals currently under investigation by geneticists include identification of genetic
risk indicators (Plomin et al., 2008), medical treatments individually tailored to our DNA
(Plomin et al., 2008), the conservation of endangered animal and plant species (Mawer,
2006), a better understanding of evolution (Carey, 2003), identification of our common
ancestors (Mawer, 2006), increased use of forensic evidence (Reilly, 2006), cures for cancers
and other diseases (Reilly, 2006; Smith, 2005), improvement of crop production (Reilly,
2006), prevention of famine (Reilly, 2006), solutions to historical puzzles (Reilly, 2006),
and a better use of the limited resources of our planet (Reilly, 2006).
We must not forget our discussion from the beginning of this chapter: Personality
is lemonade. For personality psychologists, knowing that even when a personality trait
164 Chapter 6 Genetics

is genetic the environment still has a big impact suggests that mental health may be a
public health issue (e.g., Lahey, 2009). Problems such as depression and antisocial behav-
ior (Carey, 2003) may be preventable whereas increasing intelligence, cooperation, and
“There is no gene for the a host of other prosocial traits may be possible. With genes as an early warning system
human spirit.” (Plomin et al., 2003), behavioral and environmental engineering will work with genetic
Tagline from the 1997 movie engineering (Plomin et al., 2008). It all starts with an understanding of the genetic—and
Gattaca, written and directed by environmental—influences on human behavior and personality (e.g., Moffitt, Caspi, &
Andrew Niccol Rutter, 2006).

Chapter Summary
Study and Review
How does genetics make us who we are? Basically, we develop the personalities we do, as a result
of the following:
on mysearchlab.com
Go online for more 1. Inheritance of specific genes (e.g., Gregor Mendel and his pea plants).
resources to help you 2. Genes and environment working together as co-actors (e.g., heritability, environmentality).
review. 3. Genes and environment working together as a dialectic (e.g., genotype–environment inter-
actions, genotype–environment correlations).
4. Environmental toxins, stressors, social situations (both nurturing and neglecting) that
affect the regulation of specific genes (e.g., turning them up or turning them down). Envi-
ronmental effects can not only trigger negative outcomes in a genetically vulnerable per-
son, but can also offset genetic vulnerabilities for maladaptive outcomes.
Researchers often study twins (both MZ twins and DZ twins) to estimate the heritability
of personality traits. Because it would be impossible to conduct a true experiment, research-
ers have relied on correlational designs (e.g., family studies, twin studies, adoption studies) to
study genetics and personality.
We discovered that there are two ways of estimating heritability (double the difference
in correlations between MZ twins and DZ twins; the correlation between MZ twins raised
apart), and that heritability refers to a particular trait in a particular population at a particular
time. Further, a phenotype (the observed manifestation of a gene) is a function of a person’s
genotype, environment (including shared and nonshared aspects), the interaction of both, the
correlation of both, and measurement error.
When it comes to personality, just about every individual difference characteristic you can
“It was a self-evident truth to think of (e.g., Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness) has a
the signers of the American substantial genetic component (about 40% of the variance in a trait is due to genetics) and a
substantial environmental component. Further, the important part of the environment appears
Declaration of Independence
to be the part that is unique to us and not shared with siblings raised in the same environment
that all men are created
(also about 40%).
equal. . . . The founding Where once psychologists who studied the genetics of personality concerned themselves
fathers of America were not with the heritability of personality characteristics, they now think in terms of epigenetics, or
so naïve as to think that all how genes are regulated by events or experiences in the environment. In fact, researchers believe
people are created identical. that most aspects of personality including mental and physical illness are controlled by complex
genetics (e.g., involving many genes, interacting with the environment, and even regulated by
The essence of a democracy
environmental conditions). One day we may be able to treat disorders with drugs or behavioral
is that all people should have
interventions that operate at the level of gene regulation. With the foundation of this chapter
legal equality despite their you will be able to understand both the ethical issues and the implications of research break-
genetic differences.” throughs that will no doubt emerge in your lifetime in this most exciting area of personality
Plomin et al. (2008, p. 91) research. In sum: “This ain’t your parents’ genetics!”
 Chapter 6 Genetics 165

Review Questions
1. If the real question is not whether genes or environment affect personality, what is the right “Genetic diversity is the
question to ask? What does it mean to say that nature and nurture transact? essence of life.”
2. What is heritability? What is environmentality? What is shared environment? What is Plomin et al. (2008, p. 91)
nonshared environment?
3. What are the two common ways of estimating heritability? What assumptions does each
of these formulas depend on?
4. What is the logic behind adoption and twin studies? What makes a correlational design
different from a true experiment? Based on research with twins, does sense of humor run
in families? Why might this be?
5. What can we say about the heritability of the traits of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Open-
ness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness? Which is more important for developing these
traits, shared or nonshared environment?
6. How do noncoding sequences of DNA change how genes function in direct response to
the environment? Explain using the example of loneliness and immune functioning.
7. What does it mean to say that genes and environment are a dialectic? What is a dialectic?
What is a genotype–environment interaction? Describe how genotype and life stressors
interact to cause clinical depression according to research by Caspi, Sugden, et al. (2003).
8. What is a genotype–environment correlation? What is a positive genotype–environment
correlation? What is a negative genotype–environment correlation? What are passive, reac-
tive, and active genotype–environment correlations?
9. What are some uses genetic research may be put to in the near future?

Key Terms
Genotype Assumption of Genotype–environment
Behavioral genetics representativeness correlation
Phenotype Selective placement Passive genotype–
Heritability Alleles environment correlation
Environmentality Mendelian inheritance Reactive genotype–
Shared environment Epigenetics environment correlation
Nonshared environment Genes Active genotype–
Monozygotic (MZ) Exon environment correlation
twins Intron Positive genotype–
Dizygotic (DZ) twins Positional cloning environment correlation
MZA twins Dialectic Negative genotype–
Equal environments Genotype–environment environment correlation
assumption interaction
This page intentionally left blank
CHAPTER
7 THE NEUROSCIENCE
OF PERSONALITY
WHAT IS NEUROSCIENCE AND HOW DO WE STUDY IT?
Bodily Responses
Brain Structure
Brain Activity
Biochemical Activity
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: CORRELATIONAL DESIGNS II: SCATTERPLOTS, CORRELATIONS, AND
THE ALLEGED “VOODOO SCIENCE” OF FMRI STUDIES

NEUROLOGICAL THEORIES OF PERSONALITY

Eysenck’s PEN Model
Overview of Eysenck’s Three Dimensions
Neurology of Extraversion
Neurology of Neuroticism
Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST)
Overview of Three Neurological Systems
Neurology of FFFS, BAS, and BIS
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: PERSONALITY AND THE GUESSING PENALTY
THEN AND NOW: PHRENOLOGY, THE NEW PHRENOLOGY, AND THE FUTURE OF NEUROIMAGING FOR
PERSONALITY AND BEYOND
NEUROLOGICAL CORRELATES OF PERSONALITY
Extraversion and Neuroticism
Brain Structure Differences in the Cortex and the Amygdala
Brain Activity Differences in the Cortex, Left–Right Asymmetry, and the Amygdala
Biochemical Activity
Impulsivity and Sensation Seeking
Bodily Responses
Brain Activity
Read the Chapter on Biochemical Activity
mysearchlab.com CONCLUSION: WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM THE NEUROSCIENCE OF PERSONALITY?
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

167
168 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

W
“As physicists had to learn hat if I told you there was a way that you could be healthier and happier? It’s not a
that they were dealing with drug, it doesn’t involve massive psychotherapy, it’s not painful, and it’s totally free.
a space-time continuum, What is this miracle cure? Believe it or not, it’s meditation!
Although some religious and cultural traditions embrace meditation as a powerful spiritual
psychologists will have
practice, modern medical research has traditionally scoffed at alternative treatments. However,
to learn that they have
Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn, professor of medicine emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medi-
to deal with a mind-body cal School, has changed all this with his brand of Westernized stress reduction using Eastern
continuum—not with principles of meditation. And he and his colleagues have been doing controlled experiments
Cartesian entities entirely to test the effectiveness of these techniques.
separate from each other.” In one study, participants who wanted to learn about meditation as a form of stress reduc-
Eysenck (1997, p. 1224) tion were randomly assigned to either a meditation group or a control group (Davidson et al.,
2003). The meditation group went through an extensive 8-week training in mindfulness-based
stress reduction meditation, whereas people in the control group were put on a wait list for the
SEE FOR YOURSELF
8 weeks to receive the training at a later time. In this way, both groups were essentially equivalent
Take a few minutes to close except for participation in the meditation training.
your eyes, sit still, clear your During the training, participants practiced being in the moment instead of planning,
mind, and focus on your worrying, thinking, or fantasizing about the future, the way most of us do when given a few
breathing. Were you able to
moments to sit still. The meditation group members tuned in to their breathing and practiced
do this? Did you start to feel
more relaxed? regulating their attention to not think about these things—to think about nothing, in fact
(Kabat-Zinn, 1990).
At the end of the training session the two groups were compared on a number of measures.
The researchers found that the group that had learned meditation showed less anxiety. This
would be exciting enough—that people who meditate have less anxiety—but the real news is
that they also showed differences in how their brains responded to emotional stimuli (Davidson
et al., 2003). People who meditated showed greater brain activation on the left prefrontal cortex
of their brains both at rest and in response to positive and negative emotional events. As a spe-
cial bonus, participants in the meditation group also showed better immune functioning than
participants in the control group.
Overall, the data suggest that regular meditation fundamentally changes how our brains
work and that this activation is related both to the emotions we feel and to how we respond to
stressful events. The researchers surmised that meditation makes people more open to expe-
THINK ABOUT IT riencing positive emotions and less reactive to negative emotions with the overall effect of
decreasing their anxiety and improving immune functioning (Davidson et al., 2003)—all of
Does physiology determine this without drugs!
personality or does person-
ality determine physiology?
When it comes to understanding our biological functioning and personality, it’s like the
Can it be both? question of which came first, the chicken or the egg: Does our physiology determine our per-
sonality, or does our personality determine our physiology? We may be born with a certain

Evidence suggests that

the regular practice of
mindfulness meditation
makes people more receptive
to positive emotions,
decreases anxiety, and
bolsters the immune system.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 169

physiology that may cause us to develop certain traits, but the environment can modify aspects
of our personality. Perhaps the best way to think of our physiology is as a package of poten-
tialities for personality traits that may be developed, discouraged, or even modified by our
experiences. However, at the same time research such as the meditation study suggests that
our behavior also affects our physiology. How much so and for which specific aspects of our
personality are still open questions.
In this chapter we briefly review the major physiological systems and discuss two per-
sonality theories that hypothesize that neurological differences cause differences in personal-
ity traits. Then we consider the physiology and neurology behind some common personality
characteristics.

What Is Neuroscience
and How Do We Study It?
Researchers who explore the neuroscience behind personality focus on the brain and the ner- “It is unlikely that you
vous system. A brief overview of the parts of the nervous system will help us better understand would define your
some of the recent findings in this area. personality in terms of
The nervous system is made up of the central nervous system and the peripheral ner-
molecular and cellular brain
vous system. The central nervous system includes the brain and the spinal cord whereas the
peripheral nervous system includes the somatic nervous system, which controls movements of processes. . . . Yet personality
the muscles, and the autonomic nervous system, which regulates smooth muscle (e.g., inner is the product of the brain.”
organs), cardiac muscle, and glands. The autonomic nervous system is further divided into the Corr (2006, p. 519)
sympathetic division and the parasympathetic division. The sympathetic division mobilizes
energy (e.g., for fight or flight), whereas the parasympathetic division supports systems that
replenish the body’s energy stores (e.g., salivation, digestion, etc.; Carlson, 2010).
The brain is protected by a bath of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) that cushions the delicate brain
and also flows through spaces in the brain called ventricles. CSF is similar to blood plasma,
and is continually produced, circulated, and reabsorbed through the brain and the ventricles
(Carlson, 2010).
The brain contains a number of structures and systems that control everything from think-
ing, reasoning, learning, and memory, to breathing, sleeping, and eating, to movement and the
processing of sensory information, to the experience of emotions. Because all of these parts are
crucial for basic functioning, we should not expect to see large differences among people. How-
ever, individuals can vary in all kinds of ways, from how they may respond to stress (e.g., heart
palpitations, sweating) to what they think is happy or sad, to how they respond to hormones and
drugs. Researchers hypothesize that differences in bodily responses, brain structure, brain activity,
and biochemical activity are all related to individual differences in personality (Zuckerman, 2005).
All of the research that has been done on exploring physiological and neurological differences in
personality fits into one of these four categories. These categories and the common physiological
measures of each are summarized in Table 7.1.

Bodily Responses
When our body responds to arousing events in the environment it is the autonomic nervous
system that responds. When aroused, the sympathetic division responds by increasing heart rate,
blood pressure, blood flow to the extremities, respiration, sweating, and muscle activity. Essentially
the body curtails some of its regular maintenance functions to mobilize an immediate response.
Sweating is measured by galvanic skin response (GSR) which is a measure of skin conduc-
tance or how quickly a slight electrical current passes through two points on the skin. The faster
the conductance of the current, the more moisture is present that indicates greater arousal.
Muscle activity is measured by electromyography (EMG) or myoelectric activity, which
estimates the electrical impulses of the muscles during contraction and relaxation. EMG is often
used in biofeedback to train people to perceive muscle contractions so that they can learn to
relax their muscles.
170 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Table 7.1 Common Markers of Neurological and Physiological Differences in Personality

Bodily Responses Brain Structure Brain Activity Biochemical Activity
Cardiovascular Dissection Cortical stimulation Neurotransmitters:
Heart rate Cytology EEG Dopamine,
Blood pressure CT scan Evoked potential Serotonin,
Blood flow MRI PET scan GABA
Respiratory function fMRI Enzymes:
Galvanic skin response Transcranial magnetic stimulation MAO
Electromyography Hormones:
Epinephrine,
Norepinephrine,
Cortisol
Drug responses
Note: See the chapter text for descriptions and explanations of abbreviations.

SEE FOR YOURSELF Brain Structure

Have you ever had a CT Another place that researchers have looked for differences among people is in the relative size
scan, CAT scan, or an MRI? and weight of specific parts of the brain, or even in the kinds and number of cells found in
What information was your various parts of the nervous system. In the past, the only way of studying differences in brain
doctor hoping to find that structure and cells was through dissecting the brain after death. During an autopsy the brain
couldn’t be found through may be removed and sections of tissues preserved for cytological (cell) study.
other methods?
Today, through the advent of more sophisticated techniques we can study the structure
of a living human brain through noninvasive procedures. For example, computerized tomog-
THINK ABOUT IT raphy (CT), called a CT scan, takes a high-resolution x-ray picture of the brain. By looking at
Which of these four markers thin cross sections of the brain—often less than a millimeter!—we can detect abnormalities or
of neurological and physio- differences in brain tissue. (This same technique was once called computer axial tomography
logical activity do you think [CAT], or CAT scan.)
are most promising for A similar technique involves magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Here radio frequency
understanding personality: waves are used instead of x-rays. First, a strong magnetic field causes the nuclei of some atoms
bodily responses, brain to resonate. Then radio frequency waves are used to detect the activity of these atoms. Because
structure, brain activity, or
biochemical activity? Why?

Paper-thin slices of human

brain mounted on slides for
study.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 171

Non-invasive procedures, like

the CT scan shown here, allow
researchers to study brain
structures.

hydrogen atoms are present in all tissues but in varying concentrations, the pattern of resonance
formed by the hydrogen atoms forms a multidimensional picture of the brain.

Brain Activity
Both CT scans and MRIs can detect only static pictures of the brain—that is, pictures of brain
structure at one moment in time. Measures of brain activity are ways of looking for differences
in brain structures while the brain is stimulated. Often, participants are given a mental task to
work on or other stimuli to react to while measures of brain activity are taken.
One early technique of studying brain activity is cortical stimulation. Using either elec-
trodes implanted in the brain or direct electrical stimulation of parts of the brain, the patient
is awake and can report on sensations as various parts of the brain are being stimulated. Today,
we are able to use less invasive procedures. For instance, in an electroencephalogram (EEG)
electrodes are placed on the scalp to monitor electrical activity of the brain. When electrical
activity of the brain or other part of the nervous system is measured in response to a specific
stimulus, this is called an evoked potential (EP). Both EEGs and EPs indicate amount of brain
activity in response to a stimulus. However, newer techniques identify the exact location of
brain activity.
172 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Electrodes are attached to

this woman’s head to measure
brain activity.

In positron emission tomography (PET), called a PET scan, a slightly radioactive glucose-
like substance with a very short half-life (rate of breakdown) is injected into the brain and the
person is placed in a scanner similar to a CT scanner. Active regions of the brain use up more
glucose than inactive regions and, with the aid of computer enhancement, scans of these regions
appear in different colors related to their activity level.
The most detailed view of brain activity at a cellular level comes from functional magnetic
resonance imaging (fMRI). This works the same as the traditional MRI except that brain activ-
ity levels are monitored over time by tracing blood oxygen levels in the brain. The more active
areas use up more oxygen and this activity is translated into different color scans of the brain.
Often images are taken while the participant is engaged in some cognitive activity or viewing
stimuli, so that the researcher takes a series of these functional images over time.
Though the use of fMRI for personality research is on the rise, there are some notable
problems with fMRI research. One problem is timing of response. When viewing a stimulus,
our thoughts react within milliseconds whereas blood flow takes about 2 seconds. This makes
it difficult to pinpoint the precise area that fired at the exact moment of a thought or reac-
tion. Another problem is that the procedure is time-intensive and the equipment expensive
so that often experiments use only a small number of participants. Small sample sizes make
it difficult to find a reliable and significant effect (Yarkoni, 2009). A third problem, called
the nonindependence error, is that researchers may unintentionally bias their results by not
independently selecting which brain areas to correlate with, say, personality characteristics or
other variables (Vul, Harris, Winkielman, & Pashler, 2009a). We’ll talk more about this error
and the controversy surrounding fMRI studies in the Research Methods Illustrated section.

These fMRI images of a

woman’s brain show areas of
her brain that are active while
she is engaged in a cognitive
task.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 173

Finally, confounds such as time of day and nervousness of participants can also affect the
results of neuroimaging studies (Dumit, 2004; Uttal, 2001).
One of the newest techniques for studying brain activity is transcranial magnetic stimula-
tion (TMS). With TMS a brief electrical current passes through a coil placed on the head. The
magnetic field disrupts the regular activity of the neurons, sometimes impairing and some-
times enhancing function (Schutter, 2009). By carefully mapping parts of the brain that are
stimulated and noting what kind of functioning is disrupted, researchers are able to pinpoint
with greater accuracy than cortical stimulation or EP the exact area affected. Essentially TMS
mimics a brain lesion, which allows researchers to draw inferences about cause and effect. This
is a huge improvement over earlier techniques that only suggested a correlational relationship
between brain activity and behavior (Walsh & Cowey, 2000). Although this technique has been
used to treat various disorders including depression and anxiety (George & Bellmaker, 2000)
and the pain of fibromyalgia (Sampson, 2006), we do not know yet how useful TMS will be for
the study of personality.
This imaging research is very exciting, but there is one major problem with interpreting the
results of brain scan research: What exactly does it mean when an area reacts in response to certain
stimuli? According to critics of brain localization techniques, it could mean a number of things
(Dumit, 2004; Uttal, 2001; Wade, 2006). First, it could mean that the area in question is indeed the
center for that characteristic or response. But there could also be other areas that are less active but
of equal or even greater importance that may have disinhibited the more active area. Also, when
an area responds to stimulation we know that the area is necessary, but we don’t know if it is a
sufficient cause of the characteristic or response that we have observed. Maybe it’s sufficient only
if other parts of the brain are also involved. Finally, when a PET scan finds an area of increased
glucose use, it may indicate activity or it may also indicate a neuron that is working less efficiently
needing more glucose. However, by using fMRI, PET scans, and other neuroimaging techniques
in the context of a controlled experiment we can figure out what brain activity really means.

Biochemical Activity
Finally, physiological differences may appear as differences in how the brain and body process
various chemicals including neurotransmitters, hormones, and drugs. Depending on how and
where these chemicals function, we might analyze cerebrospinal fluid, saliva, blood, or urine
to monitor levels of these chemical substances.
Neurotransmitters are chemicals released by neurons to inhibit or excite the next neuron
into action. In this way, neurotransmitters do just that: help transmit signals through the ner-
vous system. Some important neurotransmitters are norepinephrine, epinephrine, dopamine,
and serotonin. These all have a similar molecular structure, so that drugs that affect one tend
to affect all of them. Norepinephrine (noradrenaline) and epinephrine (adrenaline) are also
considered stress hormones. They help the body deal with threat by increasing blood flow to
the muscles which increases heart rate and blood pressure. Dopamine is related to feelings of
pleasure, and helps regulate movement, learning, attention, and rewards. Serotonin is involved
with mood regulation, arousal, the control of sleeping and eating, and pain regulation. Depres-
sion, anxiety, and other mood disorders are related to how the body processes serotonin. The
enzyme monoamine oxidase (MAO) regulates, to some degree, the availability of dopamine,
norepinephrine, and epinephrine in the system.
Norepinephrine and serotonin may also be related to symptoms of depression (Thorn &
Lokken, 2006). Some antidepressants, for example, work by blocking the reuptake of norepi-
nephrine, serotonin or both, so that they stay in the spaces between the neurons a bit longer
(Thorn & Lokken, 2006). Antianxiety drugs work by mimicking another neurotransmitter,
gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), an inhibitory neurotransmitter (Thorn & Lokken, 2006).
Researchers may study neurotransmitters and the systems that process them by having
participants engage in a task or activity and monitor the fluctuations in these chemicals. When
it is impossible to directly measure the level of neurotransmitters—as with norepinephrine, for
example—researchers indirectly monitor how the neurotransmitter is being used by measur-
ing known byproducts of neurotransmitter metabolism. Another way is through a challenge
test in which researchers administer a drug that is known to either increase or decrease a
174 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

neurotransmitter’s functioning and monitor the impact of this new substance on reactions
presumed to be related to the neurotransmitter.

Research Methods Illustrated: Correlational Designs II: Scatterplots,

Correlations, and the Alleged “Voodoo Science” of fMRI Studies

A
re fMRI studies “voodoo science”? Are pretty scatterplots misleading? Oh, say it isn’t so! In
March 2009 the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science published a series of invited
papers and made overt a debate that had been brewing on the Internet for some time
(Diener, 2009). It seems that a small group of researchers noted that some fMRI studies of emotion,
social cognition, and personality reported, in the words of one overzealous researcher, “insanely
strong” correlations (Vul, Harris, Winkielman, & Pashler, 2009b, p. 320). The group suspected that
these correlations were too good to be true. What they found set off a whole controversy (Vul et al.,
2009a; see also Diener, 2010).
To understand all the fuss, we need to start with the concept of correlation. Recall that
correlation is a measure of the relationship between two variables. If two variables increase or
decrease at the same time—such as age and height—they are positively correlated. If one variable
decreases (or increases) while the second variable increases (or decreases)—such as practice and
typing errors—then the variables are negatively correlated. You can vividly see the relationship
between two variables by graphing them against each other on the same graph.
Consider the graphs in Figure 7.1. The graph on the left shows Neuroticism scores on the
x-axis plotted against thickness of a section of the orbital frontal cortex (OFC) on the y-axis. The
graph on the right shows a similar graph for Extraversion scores. These are called scatterplots or
scattergrams because they show the scatter, or spread, of the data. Many brain-imaging studies
will use scatterplots to illustrate their results. Each point represents a participant in the study. In this
graph, the blue circles represent females and the red squares represent males (ignore for a moment
the diagonal lines drawn through the dots).
Notice how the cloud of data points on the left graph seems to slope downward. That tells us
that as Neuroticism scores increase, thickness of this region of the OFC decreases. That suggests
a negative correlation. Now look at the width of the cloud. Is it thinner or thicker? The thinner
a cloud, the more closely related the two variables are and the stronger the correlation will be.
The scatterplot on the left shows us that there is a moderately negative correlation between
Neuroticism and thickness of the OFC. Indeed, the correlation of these data is -.65 (Wright et al.,
2006). The line through the cloud of points is called a linear regression line and it estimates our best
guess of how we can predict y-values from x-values.
What do you think about the correlation between Extraversion and thickness of the OFC as
illustrated in the graph on the right? Here, the dots seem to be more scattered, making more of a
circle than an oval. This tells us that there is not much of a correlation between the two variables, .18
in fact (Wright et al., 2006).
As you can see, a scatterplot is a very useful graphic. It can tell us at least three things about a
set of data. First, it can alert us to outliers, or participants who score extremely high or low in one or

Female Male
2.7 2.7
thickness (mm)

2.5 2.5
L OFC

2.3 2.3

r = ⫺0.648 r = 0.180
2.1 P < 0.0001 2.1 P = 0.362

30 35 40 45 50 55 35 45 55 65 75
B Neuroticism T-score C Extraversion T-score

Figure 7.1 Scatterplots showing the relationship between cortical thickness and Neuroticism (left)
and Extraversion (right) in the orbitofrontal cortex. Source: Adapted from Wright et al. (2006, Figure 3,
p. 1814). From Wright, C. I., Williams, D., Feczko, E., Barrett, L. F., Dickerson, B. C., Schwartz, C. E., et al. (2006),
“Neuroanatomical correlates of extraversion and neuroticism,” Cerebral Cortex, 16(12), 1809–1819. Reprinted
by permission of Oxford University Press.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 175

both of our variables. There doesn’t seem to be any outliers in the Wright et al. (2006) data, except
for maybe the male who is very low in Extraversion in the graph on the right. Second, a scatterplot
can tell us the direction of the correlation: whether it’s positive (the cloud of dots points upward)
or negative (the cloud points downward). Third, the thickness of the cloud or scatter of the dots
tells us the strength of the correlation. The more the scatterplot looks like a circle, the less the two
variables are related. The more the scatterplot looks like an oval, the more strongly the two variables
are related. A perfect correlation will look like a straight line, whereas a zero correlation will look
like random dots spread out around the graph. Check out the graphs in Figure 7.2 and try to guess
whether the correlations are positive or negative, and high, medium, or close to zero.
Wright et al. (2006) also correlated cortical thickness in key areas with participants’ scores on
Extraversion, Neuroticism, Openness, Conscientiousness, and Agreeableness. Can you think of why
they did this? They wanted to show specifically that Neuroticism was related to the thickness in
some areas of the brain whereas Extraversion (and the other personality traits) was not. Because
Neuroticism and Extraversion correlate with thickness in some areas and not in others, and only
these two traits and not all five factors correlate with these areas of the brain, we have more
confidence that the researchers have found a true result and not a significant result by chance alone.
Notice that Wright et al. (2006) cross-checked an area of the cortex that they thought was
related to positive and negative emotions (Extraversion and Neuroticism, respectively) but was not
related to other traits (Openness, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness). Other researchers are not so
careful to cross-validate their findings. Instead, they selected which areas to study based on how
well signals from that area correlated with their dependent variable (e.g., personality) and then
calculated correlations based on this narrower range of values. That is, the same sample was used to
decide what ought to be correlated and for the calculation of the actual correlation itself.

Figure 7.2 Scatterplots

illustrating various correlations
in hypothetical data. The
correlations are (left to right):
0, - .3, .5, -.7, .90, - .99.
176 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Technically, these two decisions should be made based on separate samples. It would be like
deciding to have a state championship by choosing the best athletes in a specific sport—the sport
you know your school excels in—instead of choosing a sport at random. Because the criterion
and the outcome were determined within the same sample and not independent samples, the
researchers made the nonindependence error (Vul et al., 2009a). This error caused artificially large
correlations that made it seem like all kinds of social behaviors could be located in the brain. These
“puzzlingly” large correlations led to accusations of fraudulence and claims that the researchers
were conducting “voodoo science” and inflating their correlations on purpose (Vul et al., 2009b).
Many of the researchers so accused defended the logic of their studies and claimed that Vul et al.
(2009a) were exaggerating and that, in fact, the methods used by the authors to judge the studies
in question were themselves flawed (Lazar, 2009; Lieberman, Berkman, & Wager, 2009; Lindquist &
Gelman, 2009; Nichols & Poline, 2009).
The good news is that both sides agree that the methodology of fMRI studies correlating
blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) effect to personality are not perfect and can be improved.
The problems that Vul et al. (2009a) identified, though not unique to fMRI studies, can be readily
fixed, sometimes without collecting new data (Barrett, 2009; Vul et al., 2009a, 2009b; Yarkoni, 2009).
The whole scientific community is now committed to understanding the debate—ceasing with
the name-calling—and coming to a thoughtful resolution that will no doubt improve both our
methods and our findings in behavioral neuroscience.
This brings us to a familiar caution: Our results are only as good as our measures. Think of
it this way: Imagine beachcombing. You walk along a beach looking for interesting things that
people may have lost. Part of your success comes from knowing where to look, like going to
popular beaches or searching under the boardwalk where people may have dropped change
from the food stands above. But part of your success comes from having the right equipment:
your eyes versus a rake versus a metal detector. With a metal detector—especially a very powerful
one—you are more likely to find coins, jewelry, watches, and other valuables buried inches under
the sand. However, you may also find things such as old bottle caps, broken toys, and rusty nails. As
researchers, we want to find good, significant effects, but we also want to minimize the “junk” we
find along the way.

Neurological Theories of Personality

“Biological differences In the 1998 revision to his 1947 classic book Dimensions of Personality, Hans Eysenck noted
are innate and form the that even as we recognize that a substantial portion of our personality is inherited “there must
foundation upon which
be biological intermediaries between DNA and personality, and these intermediaries should be
specified by theory and investigated” (Eysenck, 1998, p. xii). These biological intermediaries, what
mature personality
Eysenck’s technology was not sufficiently advanced in 1947 to detect, are physiological differences.
develops.” Although Eysenck and others would like to be able to identify specific aspects of our
Clark and Watson physiology—be it bodily responses, brain structures, brain activity, or biochemical activity—
(2008, p. 266) that can account for differences in personality, this “holy grail” of personality research eludes
us. Despite bigger and better and less invasive techniques and even with the ability to decode
the smallest gene, protein, and neurotransmitter, scientists are not able to find consistent
physiological differences that relate in a clear way to differences in personality characteris-
THINK ABOUT IT tics (e.g., Eysenck, 1990). It may be that our techniques are not up to the task or it may be
that aspects of the human nervous system interact in complicated ways that we have yet to
Are infants a blank slate at
birth or are they born with a untangle. Even when we are able to identify such differences, we still have a long way to go to
personality? prove that these differences actually cause us to develop the personalities that we have consid-
ering that our personalities have developed over a lifetime of interactions with other people.
We can’t be sure that differences in physiology cause us to develop different full-blown
personalities, but perhaps we are expecting too much. Maybe biology has the biggest impact
at a broader, more general level of personality, called temperament. What is temperament?
Temperament is a set of personality characteristics that are (Zuckerman, 2005)
1. Relatively stable across the life span
2. Expressed through general energy level
3. Present from early childhood
4. Similar in other species of animals
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 177

Eysenck believed that

temperament, determined
by genes and passed on from
parents to children, is the
intermediary between DNA
and personality.

5. Present at birth, at least in a general way

6. Determined by genetic factors
7. Changeable with maturation and experience
In their search for the biological basis of personality nearly all major personality typologies
converge on three primary temperaments (Zuckerman, 2005), or clusters of related personality
traits:
■ Extraversion: Positive emotion, reward sensitivity, social rewards, sociability, approach.
■ Neuroticism: Negative emotion, anxiety, punishment sensitivity, withdrawal.
■ Impulsivity: Psychoticism, lack of constraint, sensation seeking, novelty seeking, lack of
conscientiousness, lack of agreeableness.
Indeed, there has been striking similarity in the various models that researchers have pro-
posed. For example, Eysenck’s Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism model (PEN model;
Eysenck, 1990), the five-factor model (FFM; Costa & McCrae, 1992; John, 1990; John et al.,
2008), the Big Five (Goldberg, 1990; Norman, 1963), Gray’s RST (Corr, 2008b), and Cloninger
(1998) all posit at least two of these three dimensions as part of their theories. However, both
the FFM and the Big Five split Eysenck’s Psychoticism factor into Agreeableness and Consci-
entiousness (Digman, 1996). Other researchers write about an approach temperament (i.e.,
Extraversion) and an avoidance temperament (Neuroticism; Elliot & Thrash, 2008) or positive
emotionality (Extraversion) and negative emotionality (Neuroticism; Depue, Luciano, Arbisi,
Collins, & Leon, 1994).
Table 7.2 summarizes some of these relationships. Despite various names for the factors—and
great debate about the “right” number of factors, something we investigated more closely in Chap-
ter 2 on traits—when it comes to identifying basic physiological temperaments, the evidence from
many theoretical backgrounds and different kinds of research methods converges on these three.

Table 7.2 Correspondences Among Three Personality Clusters and Major Trait Theories
Cluster
Theory Extraversion Neuroticism Impulsivity
Eysenck Extraversion Neuroticism Psychoticism
Gray Behavioral Behavioral Inhibition
Approach System System
Five Factors Extraversion Neuroticism Low Conscientiousness
Cloninger Reward Dependence Harm Avoidance Novelty Seeking
Note: The Openness factor of the five-factor model, the Intellect factor of the Big Five, and Gray’s fight-flight-freeze system do
not appear to correspond to any of the three primary traits identified by Zuckerman (2005).
178 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

To understand both the logic and the evidence supporting this assertion, let’s take a close
look at two important biological theories of personality: Hans Eysenck’s PEN model and Jeffrey
Gray’s reinforcement sensitivity theory. Afterward, we’ll look at the biological basis of the three
temperaments of positive emotion, negative emotion, and impulsivity.

Eysenck’s PEN Model

When Eysenck first started working in the 1940s, he was unusual in his desire to build a person-
ality theory based on experimental findings (Eysenck, 1998). Further, he believed that a com-
prehensive theory should explain how people developed their personalities as well as predict
consequences and outcomes of various personalities. While studying normal and psychiatric
patients he developed his theory and identified two factors of personality, Extraversion and
Neuroticism (Eysenck, 1998), and later he added Psychoticism, the third dimension. Together
these three dimensions—Psychoticism, Extraversion, and Neuroticism—form the PEN model
(Eysenck, 1952). This model is used to describe personality. People can be high or low on each
of the three factors.

Overview of Eysenck’s Three Dimensions. The first of Eysenck’s factors is Extraversion.

People who are high in this factor, extroverts, tend to be sociable, popular, optimistic, and
somewhat unreliable. Those low in Extraversion—introverts—tend to be quiet, introspective,
reserved, and reliable, and to have a few close friends. Essentially, Extraversion refers to how
outgoing people are, to both the social and the physical environments.
Eysenck’s second factor is Neuroticism, which we might contrast with emotional stabil-
ity. People high in this factor tend to be distressed, insecure, and upset in many areas of life.
They are chronically worried, nervous, and moody, hold a low opinion of themselves, and
find it difficult to get back on an even keel after an upsetting experience. In contrast, emo-
tionally stable people are even-tempered, calm, relaxed, carefree, unworried, and somewhat
unemotional, and return to their natural state quickly after an emotional experience (Eysenck
& Eysenck, 1975).
Eysenck called the third factor Psychoticism. We might think of Psychoticism as being
SEE FOR YOURSELF
antisocial and contrast it with ego control. People high in Psychoticism tend to be loners, ego-
Can you think of people you centric, troublesome, manipulative, impulsive, uncooperative, hostile, and withdrawn, and do
know or characters from not fit in anywhere (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985).
movies, books, or TV who In contrast, people low in Psychoticism tend to be altruistic, socialized, empathetic, and
exemplify Eysenck’s three
conventional. They care about others and are able to control their impulses to a greater extent
factors?
than those high in Psychoticism.
Eysenck and Eysenck suggested that the pathological labels of Psychoticism and Neuroti-
cism be dropped in favor of tough-mindedness and emotionality to emphasize that this is a
theory of normal, nonpathological behavior and to eliminate the negative connotations of these
labels (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1975, p. 3).
Eysenck drew on at least three pieces of evidence to support his view that these differences
in personality are genetic and biological. First, cross-cultural universality in traits implies a
strong biological component (Eysenck, 1990). After all, we would expect that large differences
in culture and environment would produce different kinds of personality factors. However, this
is not the case, as one study of personality in 25 diverse countries including Uganda, Nigeria,
Japan, Mainland China, the United States, the Soviet Union, Hungary, Bulgaria, and the former
Yugoslavia suggested (Barrett & Eysenck, 1984). The fact that three factors of Psychoticism,
Extraversion, and Neuroticism occur in such diverse cultures suggests a biological, rather than
cultural, explanation.
Second, people show tremendous consistency in these three traits over time, despite chang-
ing environments. Responses and habits might change over time and situations, but traits do
not. This consistency suggests a strong biological component to these traits (Eysenck, 1990).
The third piece of evidence is the robust finding that Extraversion, Neuroticism, and
Psychoticism each have moderate heritability (Eaves, Eysenck, & Martin, 1989). As Eysenck
(1990) stated, “Genetic factors cannot directly influence behavior or cognitions, of course,
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 179

and the intervening variables must inevitably be physiological, neurological, biochemical, or

hormonal in nature” (p. 247).
Although Eysenck suspected that arousal and attention were involved with all three of
his factors, he admitted that the research evidence did not suggest a clear hypothesis for a
biological explanation of psychoticism (Eysenck, 1990; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1976). We now
turn to a discussion of the physiological explanations Eysenck proposed for Extraversion and
Neuroticism.

Neurology of Extraversion. Eysenck thought that the main difference between introverts SEE FOR YOURSELF
and extraverts had to do with arousal, and on that score he was right (Eysenck, 1990). He con-
sidered two possibilities: that introverts and extraverts differed in arousal level or in arousability Think of people you know
(Eysenck, 1967). who are extraverted and
introverted. Is there a differ-
Eysenck thought that introverts had greater cortical arousal than extraverts, particularly
ence in where they prefer to
in the ascending reticular activating system (ARAS), a pathway transmitting signals from the study? Why might this be?
limbic system and hypothalamus to the cortex (Eysenck, 1967; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). The
ARAS processes the more cerebral aspects of arousal or emotion (e.g., thinking about a dif-
ficult calculus problem). Activation in the ARAS can make a person alert and mentally sharp
or sluggish and mentally dull.
Because of their hypothesized overaroused baseline condition, introverts act more
restrained and inhibited. That is, they avoid conditions that would aggravate their already
overstimulated condition, preferring to stay to themselves and engaging in more quiet activi-
ties. In contrast, the system of extraverts, Eysenck reasoned, lets in too little stimulation so that
their underaroused condition leads them toward more stimulating and unrestrained behaviors.
Basically, extraverts are more outgoing and engaged with the world to raise their naturally low
level of arousal. In this way, both extraverts and introverts attempt to regulate their own arousal
striving to find their comfort zone: an optimal level of arousal (e.g., Hebb, 1955).
This sounds like a nice hypothesis, but is this true? Consider this: If there is a natural differ-
ence in arousal level between introverts and extraverts then we ought to see a difference between
them even if they are sleeping or resting. Turns out we can readily test this hypothesis because
arousal produced by the ARAS can be seen using EEG, whereas the arousal in the limbic system
can be seen in the GSR and EMG (Eysenck, 1967).
Alas, using these traditional measures of arousal and even the newer methods (e.g., PET
scans, cortical EPs) this is not the case. Indeed, over 1,000 studies have been conducted testing
Eysenck’s theory of arousal with no success (Geen, 1997). There is only a tiny, if any, difference
in arousal level between extraverts and intraverts at rest. However, there is a significant differ-
ence in how extraverts and introverts respond to moderate stimulation, suggesting that the
key difference between them is in their arousability or sensory reactivity (De Pascalis, 2004;
Stelmack & Rammsayer, 2008; Zuckerman, 2005).

Is choice of study area related to personality? Which kind of study area do you think introverts and extraverts would prefer?
180 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Given these differences in arousability, we would expect introverts and extraverts to differ
in their choice of situations: noisy versus quiet. One study found that people studying in the
quiet study spaces of their college library—spaces with individual carrels, small tables—tended
THINK ABOUT IT to be introverted. Where did the extraverts prefer to study? In the noisy but highly sociable
How else might extraverts areas of the library: big rooms with open spaces and large tables (Campbell & Hawley, 1982).
and introverts regulate their But here’s a question: Who performed better on their exams? Does noise level really matter
arousability? Might they when it comes to learning and performance? It sure does! Introverts and extraverts volunteered
differ in preferences for for a study in which they had to perform a moderately difficult cognitive reasoning task (Geen,
caffeinated beverages for
example? Favorite kinds of
1984). Participants were given two words, one that fit a rule and the other that didn’t. By observ-
music? ing a number of such pairs, participants had to figure out the rule. For example, the rule might
be animal words or words that start with vowels.
While participants were viewing the words and trying to figure out the rule, they were
bombarded with random bursts of white noise. Participants were randomly assigned to one of
three conditions. In the choice condition, they were told that although they couldn’t turn off
the noise, they could select the volume that was “Just right for you.” In the second and third
conditions, participants were unable to control the volume. Instead, they were assigned the level
of volume that matched what a participant in the first condition chose. In the assigned-same
condition their volume was matched to the volume chosen by a personality just like them, either
introverted or extraverted. However, in the assigned-different condition they were subjected
to the volume chosen by a person different from them: an introvert, if they themselves were
extraverted, or an extravert if they were introverted.
Who do you think chose the lower volume? Introverts in the choice condition chose a lower
volume than extraverts in the choice condition. The difference was about that between a private
office and a noisy group office. Second, who do you think experienced greater arousal as mea-
sured by heart rate and skin conductance? Well, it depended on which level of noise they were
faced with. Both extraverts and introverts with noise levels at their optimum level of arousal—in
SEE FOR YOURSELF either the choice condition or the assigned same condition—had similar levels of arousal as
measured by heart rate and skin conductance. However, when faced with a level of noise not to
Based on these results,
where should you study for
their liking, introverts showed greater arousal and extraverts showed lower arousal. Essentially,
optimum performance? introverts were overaroused by the loud “extraverted” level of noise whereas extraverts were
underaroused by the soft, boring “introverted” level of noise.
Finally, how well did participants perform? By now you get the drill: It depended on
if they were working at their optimum level of noise. Introverts assigned to the extravert’s
noise level performed the worst, needing more trials to learn the rule. Next came extraverts
assigned to the introvert’s noise level. The choice and assigned-same conditions performed
best, learning the rule in the fewest number of trials. As you can see in Figure 7.3, what’s
just right for introverts—leading to their optimum performance—is too little for extraverts

Figure 7.3 Performance as

function of noise intensity
Average number of trials to learn rule

condition and personality.

Higher numbers indicate
more trials were needed (9.1) Introverts
to learn the rule. Note:
Red line = Introverts, (7.3)
Blue line = Extraverts,
Green dots = Assigned same
condition. Source: From Geen
(1984).
(5.8) (5.4) Extroverts

Introvert Extrovert
Choice Choice
Noise Intensity
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 181

and what’s just right for extraverts is too much for introverts. People’s noise preferences
and performance outcomes depend on their optimal level of arousal as determined by their
personality (Geen, 1984). Keep this study in mind the next time you are trying to decide
where to study!

Neurology of Neuroticism. Eysenck hypothesized that physiological arousal could also

account for individual differences in Neuroticism. In contrast to Extraversion, which was related
to activation of the ARAS, he thought that Neuroticism had to do with stability or instability
of the sympathetic nervous system (i.e., those parts of the brain that are involved in emotional
regulation such as the hippocampus, amygdala, cingulum, septum and hypothalamus; Eysenck, THINK ABOUT IT
1967, 1990). Basically, the vulnerability of people high in Neuroticism to negative emotions
such as fear and anxiety was due to an extrasensitive emotional or drive system (Eysenck, 1967, If extraverts are more sensi-
1990). Whereas postulating separate physiological processes to account for Extraversion and tive to positive emotions
are they more vulnerable to
Neuroticism, Eysenck acknowledged that the cortical and sympathetic systems were intercon- happiness?
nected (Eysenck, 1967, 1990).
A vivid metaphor for how this might work is to think of Neuroticism as a smoke detec-
tor (Nettle, 2007). A good smoke detector alerts a building’s occupants to a fire, but it doesn’t
go off for harmless events like someone burning the toast one morning. For the person high
in Neuroticism, it’s as if they are living in a house with an overly sensitive smoke detector
that sends out a warning under the kinds of conditions that people low in Neuroticism
would readily dismiss as safe. (If you’re still thinking about how safe toast-burning is, then
you are probably high in Neuroticism!) Extraversion and Neuroticism are similar in that
both involve arousal; however, the big difference is in the valence or quality of that arousal.
Extraversion is marked by positive arousal such as excitement and energy, whereas Neu-
roticism is marked by negative arousal such as fear and anxiety (Knutson & Bhanji, 2006;
Zuckerman, 2005).
How did Eysenck’s theory about Neuroticism fare in the face of research evidence? Well, it
appears that Eysenck was on the right track. Simple measures of sympathetic nervous system
activation (e.g., heart rate, skin conductance), both at rest and during stressful situations do not
THINK ABOUT IT
show any relationship with Neuroticism, but people who are high in Neuroticism do show an
increase in heart rate in response to an intense stimulus (Zuckerman, 2005). So do introverts! If people high in Neuroti-
However, people high in Neuroticism, but not introverts, show greater startle response to fearful cism are more sensitive to
pictures (Zuckerman, 2005). Together, these findings suggest that people high in Neuroticism negative emotions, are
they more vulnerable to
may be more sensitive to negative emotions in particular, and not to arousing situations in depression?
general, the way that introverts are.
If it is true that the defining feature of Neuroticism is sensitivity to negative emotions,
then it would be particularly difficult for researchers to identify specific physiological differ-
ences between people high and low in Neuroticism. This is because people vary greatly in their
sympathetic responses (e.g., heart rate, skin conductance, breathing, blood flow, etc.; Eysenck,
1990). All in all, there is no support for Eysenck’s hypothesis that Neuroticism is related to
activation in the sympathetic nervous system (Strelau, 1998).

Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST)

An alternative theory was proposed by Jeffrey Gray. For Gray, personality is the variation in the
functioning of brain systems. Indeed, the very essence of what makes people unique is differ-
ences in their responses to stimuli in the world (Corr, 2008b). Gray's idea was to (1) identify
brain-behavior systems that accounted for important differences among individuals and (2) link
these systems to standard measures of personality (Corr, 2008b). At first, he hypothesized two
behavioral systems and linked these behavioral systems to Extraversion and Neuroticism in
Eysenck’s PEN theory (Gray, 1970, 1976, 1982). But now, after some 40 years of research and
refinement, evidence suggests that there are three important behavioral systems that do not
exactly map onto any existing measure of personality (Corr, 2004, 2008b; Gray & McNaughton,
2000; McNaughton & Corr, 2004, 2008; Pickering & Corr, 2008).
182 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Overview of Three Neurological Systems. According to reinforcement sensitivity theory

(RST) there are three hypothetical brain-behavior systems. These systems are presumed to exist
based on evidence from neurology, physiology, behavior, and personality. Together they form
a framework through which we can infer neural activity. Rather than identify isolated parts of
the brain working separately, we can look for interconnected areas that function similarly and
work together in accord with one of these hypothesized systems. Gray’s great contribution was
in recognizing that everything in the brain is interconnected. The conception of these three
systems is his way of studying these interconnections. We may think of these systems as a kind
of shorthand for a whole set of neural networks.
The first is called the fight-flight-freeze system (FFFS). This system is associated with the
emotion of fear and is responsible for orchestrating our reactions to aversive stimuli. We may opt
to confront or fight the stimulus, avoid or escape it, or to remain frozen in place hoping the danger
passes (Corr, 2004). The personality factor that matches this biological system is fearfulness and
avoidance, which, if extreme, may lead to phobias and panic disorders (Corr, 2008b).
The second system, the behavioral approach system (BAS) organizes reactions to
“appetitive stimuli,” that is, stimuli that are enticing, pleasurable, and rewarding (Corr,
2004, p. 324). BAS makes a person more sensitive to reward. The related personality factor
is optimism, impulsiveness, and the emotion of “anticipatory pleasure” (Corr, 2008b, p. 10).
In the extreme, this system may lead to addictive behaviors, high-risk impulsive behaviors,
and mania.
The third system, the behavioral inhibition system (BIS), once thought to control the
inhibition of behavior, is now hypothesized to resolve conflicts (Corr, 2004). These may be
conflicts between two really good things, like deciding which movie to watch with friends, or
between two distasteful things, like deciding which to open first, the electricity bill or the phone
bill. Or between two options that have both upsides and downsides to them, such as whether
or not to go to a party where you will see people you like as well as a few people whom you’d
rather not hang out with. BIS also is activated when there is a conflict within one of the other
systems (e.g., FFFS–FFFS or BAS–BAS conflicts; Corr, 2008b). Until the conflict is resolved, we

The fight-flight-freeze system

(FFFS) regulates our reactions
to aversive stimuli including
fears, phobias, and panic
disorders.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 183

may experience anxiety, worry, rumination, risk assessment, vigilance for bad things, or a sense
of possible danger or loss. Clinically, this system may lead to obsessive-compulsive disorder or
generalized anxiety disorder (Corr, 2008b).
People may feel anxiety from BIS to a greater or a lesser degree depending on the spe-
cific rewards or punishments that are potentially in conflict. When BIS is activated, people
become more sensitive to punishment (Corr, 2004) and often more cautious (Corr, 2008b).
Further, there is an optimal level of BIS arousal. Too little leads to risk proneness, similar to
Eysenck’s notion of Psychoticism. Too much leads to risk aversion and generalized anxiety
disorder (Corr, 2008b). RST suggests that choice—even between two rewarding options—has
a negative component. Corr (2008b) wondered if having too many good things to choose from
(e.g., Caribbean? Europe? Sports car? SUV?) may be a cause of discontent and depression in
our affluent society.
BAS is very similar to Extraversion and BIS is very similar to Neuroticism. Current evidence
suggests that they are quite similar but not identical (Smits & Boeck, 2006). The dimensions
of FFFS/BIS and BAS are about 30 degrees off from Eysenck’s dimensions of Neuroticism and
Extraversion. Think of BAS as “2 parts Extraversion to 1 part Neuroticism” and BIS as “2 parts
Neuroticism to 1 part Extraversion” (Smillie, Pickering, & Jackson, 2006, p. 323). Specifically,
punishment sensitivity is manifested as neurotic-introversion and reward sensitivity is mani-
fested as neurotic-extraversion. Sensitivity to punishment and sensitivity to rewards are the
biological systems that together are hypothesized to develop into the traits of Extraversion and
Neuroticism (Corr, 2004). Table 7.3 lists sample items from an early measure of BIS and BAS
based on the original version of RST (Carver & White, 1994).
Think of it like this: Extraversion reflects the trade-off of rewards and punishments,
whereas Neuroticism reflects the combination of rewards and punishments. For example, SEE FOR YOURSELF
punishment makes a person less willing to take action—unless of course that action is to
flee the situation—whereas the possibility of a reward increases the action. If the situation is Are you more willing
clearly punishing or rewarding, then everybody will go for the reward or avoid the punishment. to risk a punishment
to gain a reward or to
However, the situations that define and challenge us are ones that are not clearly rewarding
forego a reward to avoid a
or punishing. That is, the real question of character is: What will you choose when rewards and punishment?
punishments are both present? Because these situations involve some degree of conflict, BIS will

Table 7.3 Sample Items From the BIS/BAS Scale

BAS Drive
1. When I want something I usually go all-out to get it.
2. If I see a chance to get something I want I move on it right away.
BAS Fun Seeking
1. I’m always willing to try something new if I think it will be fun.
2. I crave excitement and new sensations.

BAS Reward Responsiveness

1. When I’m doing well at something I love to keep at it.
2. When I get something I want, I feel excited and energized.

BIS
1. Criticism or scolding hurts me quite a bit.
2. If I think something unpleasant is going to happen I usually get pretty “worked up.”
Note: Responses are indicated on a 4-point scale labeled Very true for me, Somewhat true for me, Somewhat false for me,
and Very false for me.
Source: Adapted from C. S. Carver and White (1994, Table 1, p. 323). Carver, C. S., & White, T. L. (1994). Behavioral inhibition, behav-
ioral activation, and affective respones to impending reward and punishment: The BIS/BAS scales. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 67(2), 319–333. Copyright American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.
184 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

be activated and this will become manifested as Neuroticism. If rewards are more salient than
punishments, then we will get a person who is willing to venture out into the world: a neurotic
extravert. But if the punishment is more salient than the reward, or if the conflict is more salient
than either the reward or the punishment, then we will get a person who would rather stay to
himself or herself: a neurotic introvert. Who gets to decide if the rewards and punishments are
in conflict? That’s where Neuroticism comes in. Somebody who is low in Neuroticism would
not experience conflict over the same situation that might cause consternation in somebody
who was high in Neuroticism.
You can see that Gray suggested two things: our inherent behavioral systems—FFFS,
If we could look through BAS, and BIS—predispose us to respond to punishments, rewards, and conflicts in a certain
the skull into the brain of a way. Then, a lifetime of experiences refine our personalities (neurotic, emotionally stable,
consciously thinking person, extraverted, introverted). In addition, RST suggests that the difference between healthy
personality and psychopathology is one of degree: The underlying biological systems are
and if the place of optimal
essentially the same, differing only in their strength (See Table 7.4 for a summary of these
excitability were luminous, three systems).
then we should see playing
over the cerebral surface, a Neurology of FFFS, BAS, and BIS. What evidence is there for these three systems? The
bright spot with fantastic, short answer: Quite a lot! Although much of the research has been done on animals, RST
waving borders constantly appears to be a good general theory of emotion, motivation, and learning in humans too
(Pickering & Corr, 2008; Smillie, 2008; Smillie et al., 2006). However, the long answer is that
fluctuating in size and form,
researchers are struggling with how to operationalize and test some of the propositions of
surrounded by a darkness RST (see Corr, 2001; Pickering et al., 1997; Smillie, 2008; Smillie et al., 2006; Torrubia, Ávila,
more or less deep, covering Moltó, & Caseras, 2001 for reviews), especially the implications of RST for trait theory (Smillie
the rest of the hemisphere. et al., 2006). The biggest issue is that we cannot tell if there is a problem with Gray’s theory or
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov a problem with the scales designed to measure the personality traits exhibited by these brain
(1928, p. 222) systems. As a sign of just how lively the debate is, recently The European Journal of Personality

Table 7.4 Summary of Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory Systems

FFFS BAS BIS
Input: Punishment Reward Conflict
Punishment (?)*
Response: Avoidance Approach Passive avoidance
Freezing Exploration Risk assessment
Defensive attack Active avoidance Information processing
Arousal
Emotion: Panic Anticipatory pleasure Rumination
Phobia Hope
Rage
Fearfulness
Trait: Psychoticism Extraversion Neuroticism
Neurotic-introversion Neurotic-extraversion Anxiety
Pathology: Phobias Addictive behaviors Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Panic disorders Mania Generalized anxiety disorder
Motto: “Escape!” “Go for it!” “Be careful!”
*There is disagreement among researchers about whether some kinds of punishments (e.g., conditioned) are still under BIS control in the revised RST (cf. Corr, 2002).
Note: See the chapter text for descriptions and explanations of abbreviations.
Sources: Adapted from Corr and McNaughton (2008, Table 5.2, p. 182) and Smillie (2008, p. 362). Corr, P. J., & McNaughton, N. (2008). Reinforcement sensitivity theory and personality. In
P. J. Corr (Ed.), The reinforcement sensitivity theory of personality (p. 155–187). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 185

The behavioral approach

system (BAS) regulates our
reaction to things that are
enticing, pleasurable, and
rewarding.

dedicated an entire special issue to personality and RST (Ávila & Torrubia, 2008; Carver, 2008;
Chavanon, Stemmler, & Wacker, 2008; Cloninger, 2008; Corr, 2008a; Johnson & Deary, 2008;
Matthews, 2008; McNaughton, 2008; Reuter & Montag, 2008; Revelle & Wilt, 2008; Smillie,
2008).
The theory does, however, suggest a number of important and intriguing hypotheses for
understanding human personality. To give you a sense of the evidence that led to the formu-
lation of RST and the biology behind it, let’s review research on two key predictions of RST:
individual differences in reward sensitivity and learning.
Consider one very important class of rewards for most people: Food. Given that BAS
is related to how sensitive people are to rewards, we might wonder if people high and low
in strength of BAS would have different reactions to images of food. But we’re not talking
about taste for food. RST suggests that the brains of people high and low in BAS will respond
differently to food.
There are at least five parts of the brain that are related to responding to visual food cues:
the ventral (underside) part of the striatum, the amygdala, the orbitofrontal cortex, the ventral
(underside) part of the pallidum and the midbrain regions that are associated with increased
dopamine activity (Beaver et al., 2006). Participants looked at color photos of appetizing food
(e.g., chocolate cake, an ice cream sundae), disgusting food (rotten meat, moldy bread), bland
food (e.g., uncooked rice, potatoes), and nonfood items (e.g., an iron, a videocassette). While
viewing these photos, their brains were scanned using fMRI.
Researchers found that BAS drive significantly accounted for differences in signals to SEE FOR YOURSELF
appetizing food and disgusting food compared to bland foods in all five of these regions
related to reward. Further, these responses were not related to a BAS measure of fun seek- Which statement do you
agree with more: “Nothing
ing so that they were unique to BAS drive. Participants with a strong appetitive drive as
ventured, nothing gained”
measured by BAS scores showed stronger reactions to photos of appetizing and disgusting or “Better safe than sorry”?
foods in these parts of the brain that are known to be related to food regulation (Beaver
et al., 2006). This is an example of how neural differences may be related to BAS, BIS, and
FFFS functioning.
An important individual difference, according to RST, is how quickly people learn from
rewards and punishments. This reinforcement sensitivity is the whole premise on which the
theory rests. People with a strong BAS are more sensitive to reward, meaning that they will
condition—or learn responses—more quickly by responding than by withholding a response.
However, people with a strong BIS are more sensitive to punishment, meaning that they will
condition more quickly by withholding a response than by responding (Gray, 1970, 1976). Think
about it: Would you learn better by concentrating on not doing things wrong and avoiding a
punishment, or by doing things right and gaining a reward?
186 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

This question was explored in an

experiment in which participants had
to learn the right response to a com-
puter task—either press the “3” key
or do nothing—when presented with
random two-digit numbers (Zinbarg
& Mohlman, 1998). The participants
had to learn which numbers required a
response and which numbers required
that they withhold a response. Every
trial was different, so that participants
had to figure out all over again which
numbers to respond to (e.g., hit the “3”
key) or to withhold a response from
(e.g., do nothing).
The behavioral inhibition To let participants know whether
system (BIS) regulates our they were correct or not, they received
reactions to conflicts between rewards and punishments depending
the fight-flight-freeze system on their responses. But instead of being
and the behavioral approach rewarded every time they were cor-
system such as worry, rect (“You won 25 cents”) or punished
rumination, vigilance, and every time they were wrong (“You lost 25
obsessive-compulsiveness. cents”), there was a twist. On some trials
taking action was associated with gain-
ing a reward. On other trials, not taking
action would avoid a punishment (see Figure 7.4). This pattern of feedback gave participants
enough information to master the task. However, there is a big difference between learning by
doing and learning by not doing. The question is, do some people learn better by taking actions
or by withholding actions?
As it turned out, just as RST predicts, people with a reactive BAS learned the correct
responses faster from reacting than from withholding their responses. However, people with
high scores on a mixed FFFS/BIS scale learned faster from withholding than from reacting.
In addition, people who scored high on an anxiety scale also learned faster from withhold-
ing than from reacting (Zinbarg & Mohlman, 1998). This experiment shows differences in
learning from rewards and punishments in humans as a function of BAS and BIS/FFFS (See
The Personality of Everyday Life for an application of RST theory to test-taking). This study
is the human equivalent of the many studies of rats and other animals that led to the original
statement of RST.

Figure 7.4 Schematic

Correct Answer
of participant feedback in the
Zinbarg and Mohlman (1998) Respond Do Nothing
study.

Participant’s
Respond Do nothing Respond Do nothing
Response:

Answer: Right Wrong Wrong Right

Outcome: Win 25 cents (nothing) Lose 25 cents (nothing)

Reward Trials Punishment Trials

 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 187

The Personality of Everyday Life

Personality and the guessing penalty
Have you ever taken a test where you were faced with the dilemma of guessing or leaving
a question blank? Some standardized tests such as the SAT or the ACT have what is com-
monly called a guessing penalty. Test takers get one point for a correct answer, but lose
one-fourth point for a wrong answer. This scoring is meant to discourage a person from
randomly guessing on a multiple-choice test with four choices. Is there an effective way
to deal with these exams?
That depends on the relative strength of your BAS and BIS (Ávila & Torrubia, 2004). The
participants in this study regularly faced exams in which they not only needed to know the
material, but they had to decide whether they should respond to a question they were unsure
of or to leave the question blank because there was a guessing penalty built into the exam.
How did participants deal with this conflict? Participants who scored high in sen-
sitivity to reward made more incorrect responses and left fewer questions blank than
participants who scored low in sensitivity to reward (see Table 7.5). Essentially, people
who are sensitive to reward are more likely to go for it, but then they are also more likely
to pay for it, compared to people who are less sensitive to reward (see Figure 7.5).
However, participants who scored high in sensitivity to punishment left more ques-
tions blank but gave more correct answers than participants who scored low in sensitivity
to punishment. Participants who were sensitive to punishment seemed to go by the rule
“when in doubt, leave it out.”
Alas, Ávila and Torrubia (2004) did not report if there was a difference in grades
as a function of high and low sensitivity to reward or punishment. However, an earlier
study did (Torrubia, Ávila, Moltó, & Grande, 1995). Despite these differences in incorrect
responses and omissions, there was no difference in overall exam scores between partici-
pants who were high in sensitivity to punishment or sensitivity to reward. This suggests
that the contrasting strategies work equally well.
People who are more sensitive to reward—such as extraverts—seem to go though
life with the philosophy “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” In contrast, people who are
more sensitive to punishment—such as people high in anxiety and/or fear—would rather
be safe than sorry. The good news is, both strategies can be effective.

Table 7.5 Sample Items From the Sensitivity to Punishment and Sensitivity to Reward Question-
naire (SPSRQ)
Sensitivity to Punishment Questions
1. Are you often afraid of new or unexpected situations?
2. Is it difficult for you to telephone someone you do not know?
3. As a child, were you troubled by punishments at home or in school?
Sensitivity to Reward Questions
1. Do you often do things to be praised?
2. Do you like being the center of attention at a party or a social meeting?
3. Do you spend a lot of your time on obtaining a good image?

Source: Adapted from Torrubia et al. (2001, Table 2, p. 846). Reprinted with permission from Torrubia, R., Ávila, C., Moltó,
J., & Caseras, X. (2001), “The sensitivity to punishment and sensitivity to reward questionnaire (SPSRQ) as a measure of
Gray’s anxiety and impulsivity dimensions,” Personality and Individual Differences, 29, 837–862. Permission conveyed
through the Copyright Clearance Center.
188 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

30

25

20

15

10

0
SP SR

Correct Incorrect Blank

Figure 7.5 A schematic showing differences in number of questions

correct, incorrect, and left blank as a function of sensitivity to punishment
(SP) and sensitivity to reward (SR). Source: Based on data from Torrubia,
et al. (1995).

“There is not the slightest Then and Now: Phrenology, the New Phrenology, and the Future of
resemblance between Neuroimaging for Personality and Beyond
the phrenologist’s
Ever since ancient times, we humans have wondered, what makes us who we are? The ancient
localization of function
Greek philosopher Aristotle debated whether the heart or the brain was the seat of the soul or
that we find in psyche, what we think of today as personality (Cowey, 2001). Since that time, others have won-
physiological psychology.” dered about the relationship between specific parts of the brain and personality. But it was the
Review of Charles H. Olin’s 1910 physician and anatomist Franz Joseph Gall in the 1790s who turned it into a science: phrenology.
book Phrenology as cited in Gall reasoned—well ahead of his time—that certain functions of the brain were localized in parts
Seashore (1912, p. 227) of the cerebral cortex. That much, he had right. However, he also believed that the size of the cor-
tex, as indicated by the size, shape, and in particular the location and size of bumps on the scalp,
was related to particular mental or personality characteristics.
We know today that this system is completely without merit, “absolutely absurd,” and “pre-
posterous nonsense” according to the reviewer of a 1910 book on phrenology (Seashore, 1912,
p. 227). However, Gall inspired a later phrenologist, George Combe, who made two interesting
observations in 1836. Combe discovered that by pressing his thumb on parts of the exposed cortex
of patients who had serious head injuries, he was able to change their behavior. He also noticed that
some areas of brain tissue became filled with blood when the patient was thinking, dreaming, or
talking (Cowey, 2001). The detection of blood-flow fluctuation eventually led to the development
of fMRI, which one researcher viewed as the greatest single influence in neurological research in
over 2,000 years (Cowey, 2001).
Then in 1884 William Wundt, a doctor, psychologist, and physiologist, viewed by many
as the founder of experimental psychology, gave a lecture with the provocative title “Old and
New Phrenology” (1894). In it he was critical of both phrenology and brain localization.
Ironically, brain localization turned out to be the beginning of an important branch of psy-
chology, as Combe’s observations attested to, but at the same time Wundt was eerily on target
when he cautioned that the “hypothesis of [localization] gives no account of the manifold
forms of ideational and sensational connexion.” (Wundt, 1894, p. 447). Indeed, his critique
of brain localization was echoed 90 years later by a neuropsychologist who called neuropsy-
chology “the currently fashionable name for phrenology” (Marshall, 1984, p. 210). The prob-
lem is that theories of localization fail to account for the connectivity of ideas in the mind,
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 189

according to Wundt (1894),

and the complex interaction
of brain systems, according to
Marshall (1984).
In the last decade or so,
researchers came to realize
that the various parts and sys-
tems of the brain, especially
in humans, work in concert
to impact behavior (Knight,
2007). Especially when it
comes to understanding
something as complicated as
personality, we need to look at
how systems within the brain
work together (Uttal, 2001).
Today, diffusion tensor imag-
ing (DTI), a special type of
fMRI that traces the diffusion
of water in cells, is giving even
more detailed pictures of the
brain. But more importantly,
DTI can highlight connections
between cortical and subcor-
tical regions (Cowey, 2001). Are theories linking parts of
DTI moves beyond localiza- the brain with differences in
tion and has the potential to personality as simplistic and
enable researchers to study outdated as phrenology?
systems and functions as a
whole rather than piecemeal.
What might this new technology reveal? For one, we may be able to locate and study Gray’s
hypothetical BAS, BIS, and FFFS. For example, Whittle, Allen, Lubman, and Yücel (2006) sug-
gested that the prefrontal cortex and limbic structures (including the amygdala) are associated with
the three temperaments we have been discussing in this chapter: Extraversion, Neuroticism, and
Impulsivity. Their model (see Figure 7.6) is based on neural circuitry that past research has sug- Visualization of a DTI
gested may be related to personality and psychopathology. Direct evidence for their model comes measurement of a human
brain. Coloured 3-dimensional
from imaging studies using fMRI, DTI, and even newer and more powerful technology still being
magnetic resonance imaging
(MRI) scan of the white
matter pathways of the brain,
side view. White matter is
composed of myelin-coated
nerve cell fibres that carry
information between nerve
cells in the cerebrum of the
brain (top half of image) and
the brain stem (bottom centre).
This image was created by an
MRI scanner sensitised to the
movement of water around the
brain. Blue represents neural
pathways from the top to the
bottom of the brain, green
represents pathways from the
front (left) to the back (right),
and red shows pathways
between the right and left
hemispheres of the brain.
190 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Figure 7.6 Structures

proposed to comprise the
neural circuits underlying
the three temperaments:
(a) Neuroticism (negative Dorsal ACC
affect) (b) Extraversion
(positive affect) and (3) low
DLPFC Hippocampus
Impulsivity (high constraint).
Note: NAcc = nucleus ac-
cumbens; OFC= orbitofrontal Amygdala
cortex; ACC = anterior
cingulate cortex; DLPFC
= dorsolateral prefrontal Ventral
ACC
cortex. Solid colors indicate
structures, shaded colors indi-
A
cate resting state activity, red
indicates positive correlation
(more activity), blue indicates
negative correlation (less Dorsal ACC
activity). Source: From Whittle
et al. (2006, Figure 1, p. 520).
Amygdala
Whittle, S., Allen, N. B., Lub-
man, D. I., & Yücel, M. (2006),
“The neurobiological basis of
temperament: Towards a bet- DLPFC
ter understanding of psycho-
pathology,” Neuroscience and
the Biobehavioral Reviews, NAcc
30, 511–525. Permission con-
veyed through the Copyright
Clearance Center.
B

Dorsal ACC

Amygdala
DLPFC

NAcc

OFC

developed. Whittle et al. (2006) proposed to use these techniques to study the neural networks of
young people who may be at risk for depression, anxiety disorders, or delinquency based on their
temperament. By studying preteens whose brains are still growing and forming connections even
as they are developing their own unique personalities, Whittle et al. (2006) hoped to relate changes
in neural networks with behavior and psychopathology over time (Whittle et al., 2008).
Researchers in the Digital Media program at Drexel University have used Combe’s obser-
vation of the change in cerebral blood flow caused by mental activity to design video games in
which the gamer controls the character’s actions just by thinking! There is no remote, joy stick,
mouse, or other control in this game. Instead, infrared sensors, placed on a specially designed
headband worn by the player, measure changes in blood oxygen levels in the frontal cortex.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 191

Blood flow, as Combe discovered, increases with concentration. The computer monitors these
fluctuations and allows the gamer to interact in a virtual world (CBS3 News, 2008). In a joint
endeavor between video game designers and medical scientists, the research team has designed
a game that is fun, engaging, and that studies brain function at the same time (Drexel University
Replay Lab, 2009). Researchers hope that the game and associated technology can one day be
used to help people with ADHD focus better or to enable people with severe disabilities to
communicate through their computer (CBS3 News, 2008).

Neurological Correlates of Personality

If RST and Eysenck’s PEN theory are beginning to blur in your mind, take heart: there’s a good
reason for that. Both theories make predictions for the three personality clusters, or tempera-
ments, we identified earlier: Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Impulsivity.
A consistent finding is that a key difference between Extraversion and Neuroticism is in “When we deal with brain
how emotions are experienced. Both extraverts and people high in Neuroticism have more science, we are dealing with
positive emotions and negative emotions, respectively, and they also react more strongly to their the organ that makes us
positive or negative emotions than do introverts or emotionally stable people (Gross, Sutton, unique individuals, that gives
& Ketelaar, 1998; Larsen & Ketelaar, 1989, 1991). That is, extraverts experience more positive
us our personality, memories,
emotions and react to them more strongly than introverts, whereas people high in Neuroticism
emotions, dreams, creative
experience more negative emotions and react to them more strongly compared to people low in
Neuroticism. In addition, extraverts experience more positive emotions but less negative emo- abilities, and at times our
tions than people high in Neuroticism. Indeed, much of the day-to-day anxiety and moodiness sinister selves.”
experienced by people high in Neuroticism is due to their reactivity compared to people low in Ruth Fischbach and Gerald Fisch-
Neuroticism (Bolger & Schilling, 1991). bach as cited in Ackerman (2006)
Keep in mind that positive emotions (a marker of Extraversion) and negative emotions
(a marker of Neuroticism) are not opposites but rather two separate dimensions (Diener & THINK ABOUT IT
Emmons, 1984). That is, people can have a lot of both kinds of emotions or a little of both.
Being high in one does not imply being low in the other. Indeed, the lack of positive emotion is How would impulsive
not negative emotion, but a state called anhedonia, which is the loss of or inability to experi- behavior such as gam-
bling relate to BAS and BIS
ence pleasure that may or may not be accompanied by the presence of negative emotions. In functioning?
fact, extraverts report experiencing more happiness, positive emotions, and life satisfaction than
introverts, whereas people who are high
in Neuroticism experience more negative
emotions, unhappiness, and dissatisfaction
with life compared to more emotionally
stable individuals (Costa & McCrae, 1980).
Impulsivity, the third temperament,
involves a lack of constraint or a state of
being undercontrolled (Clark & Watson,
2008). Although this sounds very similar to
Eysenck’s third factor of Psychoticism, they
are not the same. Eysenck maintained that
his concept of psychoticism was a “more gen-
eral higher-order concept” involving antiso-
cial aspects of behavior than just impulsivity
(Eysenck, 1990, p. 269). Impulsivity is related
to a broader cluster of characteristics includ-
ing sensation seeking, novelty seeking, or
venturesomeness (Pickering & Gray, 1999).
The early work on RST proposed that People high in extraversion
Impulsivity was controlled by BAS. With show increased activity in
parts of the brain to positive
the revised RST, there is consensus among
photos like these compared
researchers that BAS sensitivity is related to to when they viewed
Extraversion (i.e., surgency: seeking incen- negative pictures.
tives in the world) where impulsivity is
192 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

caused by the failure of BIS to inhibit behavior, especially around novel or exciting stimuli
(Smillie et al., 2006). As a result, there may be two very different motivations behind a seemingly
impulsive behavior such as excessive alcohol use. People may drink frequently or excessively as a
means of gaining a reward (strong BAS) or because they are incapable of inhibiting a response
(weak BIS; Pardo, Aguilar, Molinuevo, & Torrubia, 2007).
At some level, all of these terms are related and define a temperament of a person who seeks
novelty and excitement and who sometimes acts without thinking about the consequences.
There are similar physiological processes involved in Extraversion and Neuroticism, but Impul-
sivity seems to have a very different underlying physiology. Let us take a closer look at the
neurological correlates behind Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Impulsivity.

Extraversion and Neuroticism

Because people who are high in Extraversion or high in Neuroticism differ in their experience of
emotions, it should come as no surprise that they also differ in the neurological structures and
systems that are involved in the experience and regulation of emotion. We experience emotions
as a result of complex systems that coordinate form and function across brain structures, brain
activity, and biochemical processes. These differences in sensitivity to positive or negative emo-
tion, although not reflected in heightened bodily responses, are reflected in differences in brain
structures that control emotion, brain activity in response to emotional stimuli, and biochemi-
cal activity that regulates emotions. We’ll review some of this evidence, focusing on this general
picture of personality differences more so than the neuroscience of emotional regulation.

Brain Structure Differences in the Cortex and the Amygdala. Two main areas of the
brain show differences in size depending on personality differences in Extraversion and Neu-
roticism: the cortex and the amygdala.

The Cortex. One area that is important for the experience of emotion is the prefrontal
cortex; and introverts and extraverts show differences in the size of their cortexes. In one study,
the brains of normal, healthy volunteers were scanned using MRI while at rest (Wright et al.,
2006). Introversion was correlated with thickness of three sections of the right, but not the left,
cortex. That is, introverts appeared to have more gray matter in these right hemisphere areas
than extraverts (see Figures 7.7 and 7.8; Wright et al., 2006).
Wright et al. (2006) suggested that the relative thinning of these areas may be a neurological
symptom of the lessened social inhibition found in extraverts. However, they also cautioned
that smaller size doesn’t necessarily indicate diminished function. We know that one way the
nervous system works is to start out with a lot of neurons and connections that gradually get
abandoned or cut back as connections become more refined. It’s possible that neurons in these
areas may have been pruned back during development, leading to greater efficiency in the
system rather than reduced function.
In contrast, Neuroticism scores were negatively correlated with parts of the left, but not the
right, cortex (Wright et al., 2006). That is, people high in Neuroticism had less gray matter in
these left hemisphere areas compared to people low in Neuroticism (see Figure 7.9). This effect

Figure 7.7 Significant

correlations of cortical
thickness and Extraversion in
the lateral prefrontal cortex.
The areas highlighted in red-
yellow are thicker in extroverts.
The areas highlighted in
blue-green are thicker in
introverts. Source: From Wright
et al. (2006, Figure 1, p. 1812).
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 193

Figure 7.8 Significant correlations of cortical thickness and

Extraversion in the right fusiform cortex. The areas highlighted in
red-yellow are thicker in extroverts. The areas highlighted in blue-
green are thicker in introverts. Source: From Wright et al. (2006,
Figure 2, p. 1813).

was stronger in males than in females. These results confirm an earlier study that found that
people high in Neuroticism, especially in anxiety and self-consciousness, had lower brain volume
and that brain volume was not related to Extraversion nor to other traits (Knutson, Momenan,
Rawlings, Fong, & Hommer, 2001).

The Amygdala. Extraversion and Neuroticism are also related to structural differences in
the amygdala. Extraverts had a higher concentration of gray matter in the left amygdala as
measured by MRI than introverts, and people high in Neuroticism had a lower concentration of
gray matter in the right amygdala than people scoring low in Neuroticism (Omura, Constable,
& Canli, 2005). Other studies have found that depressed people also have less gray matter in
the amygdala. Because of its association with Neuroticism, Omura et al. (2005) stated that this
reduction in the mass of the amygdala is not a result of depression, but instead, occurs before
the depression hits.

Brain Activity Differences in the Cortex, Left–Right Asymmetry, and the Amygdala. In
addition to differences in brain structures, there are differences in how the brains of people high
in Extraversion or high in Neuroticism function. These are reflected in brain activity differences
in the cortex, including left–right asymmetry, and in the amygdala.

The Cortex. Extraversion and Neuroticism are each correlated with activity in the THINK ABOUT IT
temporal and frontal parts of the cortex, areas that control consciousness (frontal) and
emotions (both temporal and frontal), but in different ways: Extraversion is correlated Why would individual dif-
with activity for positive emotions and Neuroticism is correlated with activity for nega- ferences in positive but not
negative emotions evolve?
tive emotions (Canli et al., 2001).
To illustrate, consider the following experiment. Women participants saw 20 positive and
20 negative pictures while their brains were being scanned using fMRI (Canli et al., 2001). The
positive pictures included a happy couple, sunsets, and pictures of appetizing foods such as ice

Figure 7.9 Significant correlations of cortical thickness and

Neuroticism in the orbitofrontal cortex. The areas highlighted
in red-yellow are thicker in people who are high in Neuroticism.
The areas highlighted in blue-green are thicker in people low in
Neuroticism. Source: From Wright et al. (2006, Figure 3, p. 1814).
194 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

cream and brownies. The negative pictures

included images of people crying, spiders,
and a cemetery. While looking at the positive
pictures, extraverts showed more activity in
the temporal and frontal parts of the cortex
compared to when they saw the negative
pictures. However, people high in Neuroti-
cism showed greater activity in the temporal
and frontal parts of the cortex when look-
ing at negative pictures than when look-
ing at positive pictures. Further, one study
identified an amazing 15 different cortical
and subcortical regions of the brain where
extraverts responded with greater brain acti-
vation to positive stimuli compared to nega-
tive stimuli (Canli et al., 2001).

Left–Right Asymmetry. Although the

People high in Neuroticism
show increased activity two hemispheres of the brain are special-
in parts of the brain to ized for different processes (e.g., linguistic
negative photos like these processes in the left hemisphere among
compared to when they right-handers), there are individual differ-
viewed positive pictures. ences in how the cortex of the brain reacts
to specific emotional stimuli as shown by
EEG brain wave response or fMRI. Specifically, the right frontal and prefrontal cortexes are
more active than the left during negative emotions, whereas the left portion of these regions are
more active than the right portion during positive emotions (Davidson, 1992, 2004). But more
importantly, people differ in how large these relative differences are in responding to positive
and negative emotions. Further, these differences are present as early as the first year of life. We
call these differences left–right asymmetries.
Some people show more left asymmetry: their left cortex responds to positive emotion
more than their right cortex responds to negative emotion. Other people show more right
asymmetry: their right cortex responds to negative emotions more than their left cortex
responds to positive emotion. People with greater left asymmetry report more positive emo-
tion to film clips than people with right asymmetry; people with greater right asymmetry
report more negative emotion to film clips than people with left asymmetry (Davidson,
1992).
What kind of people are likely to show left or right asymmetry? Shy, inhibited children
THINK ABOUT IT
and depressed adults show greater right asymmetry, as do people who are high in Neuroticism,
If meditation changes left– both at rest and in response to emotional stimuli (Davidson, 1992). People who experience
right asymmetry and if left– positive emotion, like those high in extraversion, show greater left asymmetry both at rest and
right asymmetry shows
in response to positive emotion (Tomarken, Davidson, Wheeler, & Doss, 1992).
consistent differences
among people, does medi- Do you recall the meditation study that opened this chapter? One of the results was that
tation change personality? people in the meditation condition showed greater left brain asymmetry both at rest and
in response to positive and negative emotional events (Davidson et al., 2003). Psychologist
Richard Davidson actually conducted an fMRI of a Tibetan monk with over 10,000 hours of
training in meditation (Savory, 2004). This monk turned out to have the most extreme left
asymmetry that Davidson had ever seen! We can see now that meditation reduces reactions
in the right brain to stress and increases reactions in the left brain to positive emotions. The
net result is that little stressors don’t bother people as much and they get more joy out of the
small pleasures in life.
Of course we must be cautious, as these results may hold for only the kind of people who
seek out and voluntarily invest the time and energy to learn and practice meditation. We can’t be
sure if there is something special about these people, compared to people who are uninterested
in meditation, or if it is the meditation per se that causes these changes. It is possible that yoga,
spirituality, or any form of relaxation can lead to similar results.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 195

Richard J. Davidson
meeting the Dalai Lama, the
supreme leader of Tibetan
Buddhism. The Dalai Lama
visited Davidson’s lab at the
University of Wisconsin–
Madison in May 2001 to
discuss ways science could
study meditation to promote
human happiness.

The Amygdala. Extraversion is also related to activity in the amygdala, a brain region involved
in the processing and memory of emotions (Canli, Sievers, Whitfield, Gotlib, & Gabrieli, 2002).
While viewing happy faces, extraverts showed more activity in the amygdala than did introverts
(see Figure 7.10). Other research confirms these results (see Gross, 2008, for a review).
However, there was no relationship between Extraversion and amygdala response to nega-
tive faces nor was there any relationship between amygdala activation and Neuroticism in
response to any of the other emotional faces used (e.g., angry, fearful, happy, sad, or neutral).
The researchers believed that response to threatening faces—at least at this gut emotional
level—is an important survival mechanism and so is unrelated to individual differences in
personality (Canli et al., 2002).

Biochemical Activity. Given that Extraversion and Neuroticism are associated with differ-
ences in brain structure and brain activity, it follows that there are biochemical differences as
well. For Extraversion, these differences involve the dopamine system, whereas for people high
in Neuroticism, serotonin seems to be key.

Dopamine and Extraversion. You know how introverts have greater sensitivity to sensory
stimulation—that is, arousability—than extraverts? It turns out that introverts are also more
sensitive to fluctuations in the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain as a result of sensory

Figure 7.10 Response of the

amygdala to emotional faces.
The left fMRI images show
significant activation to fearful
(top) but not happy faces
(bottom) across all participants.
The right images show areas
where greater activation
to emotional images was
significantly correlated with
higher scores in Extraversion
for happy (bottom) but not for
fearful faces (top). Redder areas
show greater activation. Source:
From Canli et al. (2002, Figure 1,
p. 2191).
196 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

input. This may explain their preference for quiet and solitude (Stelmack & Rammsayer, 2008).
However, extraverts have greater dopamine activity than introverts in general. This may be due to
either more extensive dopamine pathways in the brains of extraverts or a greater responsiveness
to dopamine in general (Depue & Collins, 1999; Depue et al., 1994). This makes sense because
the dopamine system connects with the amygdala, which is more responsive in extraverts, as we
just saw (Gross, 2008; Knutson & Bhanji, 2006).

Serotonin and Neuroticism. For people high in Neuroticism, the neurotransmitter sero-
tonin and the serotonin receptors in the brain may be more important than dopamine and the
dopamine system. Serotonin and parts of the brain sensitive to serotonin such as the cortex
and amygdala but also the hippocampus, septum, and hypothalamus are involved with mood
regulation, depression, and anxiety disorders (Canli, 2006). Therefore it’s likely for these to be
related to Neuroticism as well.
There is evidence that extreme levels of anxiety and depression, as found in clinical depres-
sion, posttraumatic stress disorder, chronic anxiety, and other kinds of pathology, may be
related to low serotonin levels (Stelmack & Rammsayer, 2008; Zuckerman, 2005). Given that
anxiety and depression are aspects of Neuroticism, this suggests that serotonin may also be
related to individual differences in Neuroticism.
SEE FOR YOURSELF We know from the previous chapter on genetics that Neuroticism has a strong genetic com-
ponent. People high in Neuroticism are more likely than emotionally stable people to have the
Do you learn better through short allele of a serotonin transporter that people low in Neuroticism lack (Lesch et al., 1996).
rewards or punishments? People with this variation of the gene have less serotonin in their system and are therefore at
Is this related to how extra-
increased risk for mood and anxiety disorders (Canli & Lesch, 2007; Lesch, 2007).
verted or neurotic you are?
Recall that Neuroticism is associated with increased neural activity, as measured by fMRI,
in the amygdala especially during negative emotions such as fear (Hooker, Verosky, Miyakawa,
Knight, & D’Esposito, 2008). Additional research finds that people with a genetic variation in
a serotonin transporter, which causes lower levels of serotonin in the system, showed greater
amygdala reactivity to fearful faces, especially for people who were higher in BIS threat sensitivity
(Cools et al., 2005). These studies suggest that people high in Neuroticism may have stronger and
longer-lasting learned associations, especially to punishment (Hooker et al., 2008). This would
account for the earlier findings from reinforcement sensitivity theory that extroverts are more
“To me, one of the deepest sensitive to reward whereas people high in Neuroticism are more sensitive to punishment.
motivations in the human
spirit is to lead an interesting, Impulsivity and Sensation Seeking
exciting and thrilling life. It’s
Sensation seeking is the “seeking of varied novel, complex, and intense sensations and experi-
not for everybody, but I think ences, and the willingness to take physical, social, legal, and financial risks for the sake of such
it’s a powerful force.” experiences” (Zuckerman, 1994, p. 27). Sensation seekers are not so much into the danger of
Frank Farley as cited in Munsey such behaviors—like risking all their money on a big bet; they are more into the fun part—like
(2009, p. 40) spending an entire evening at a casino.
Marvin Zuckerman first identified this personality trait while he was engaged in sensory-
deprivation and social isolation research in the 1960s (e.g., Zuckerman, Persky, Link, & Basu,
1968). He and his colleagues found that many of their volunteers—people who were willing
to go into physical isolation, alone in a dark, sound-proofed room, with heavy gloves cover-
ing their hands—were high in sensation seeking. Paradoxically, these high sensation seeking
volunteers sought sensory deprivation in the hopes of having unusual sensory experiences like
hallucinations as a result of the extreme deprivation in the experiments (Zuckerman, 2008).
Low sensation seekers found such experiments particularly anxiety-provoking (Zuckerman
et al., 1968). This led Zuckerman and his colleagues to realize that sensation seeking involved
a desire for novel mental, internal sensations as well as exciting activities (Zuckerman, 2008).
Sensation seekers were more likely to volunteer for studies involving unusual experiences such
as hypnosis, ESP, meditation, encounter groups, or viewing pornography, but nor for more
run-of-the-mill experiments in learning or social psychology (Zuckerman, 2008).
Sensation seeking is typically measured by the Sensation Seeking Scale which is divided into
four subscales, each measuring a different aspect of sensation seeking (Zuckerman, 1971). Expe-
rience seeking measures the desire for moderate arousal through different kinds of experiences
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 197

involving both the mind and the senses, perhaps through music, travel, or an unconventional
lifestyle (Zuckerman, 1971, 2008). It is very similar to the concept of Openness from the five-factor
model (McCrae & Costa, 1997a). Boredom susceptibility taps the need for change and variety and
an aversion to routine and sameness (Zuckerman, 1971). Thrill and adventure seeking measures
arousal seeking through physical sensations produced by speed, height, falling, danger, and unique
experiences such as exploring an underwater world by scuba-diving (Zuckerman, 1971, 2008).
Many extreme sports athletes are no doubt high in thrill and adventure seeking! Disinhibition is
the extent to which people have lowered social inhibitions and enjoy letting loose in the company
of others, without a thought about decorum, proper behavior, or social norms. Disinhibition often
takes the form of alcohol use, partying, and sex (Zuckerman, 2008). Table 7.6 contains sample
items of the Brief Sensation Seeking Scale (Hoyle, Stephenson, Palmgreen, Lorch, & Donohew,
2002) so you can see for yourself what these four dimensions look like.
Sensation seeking shows a consistent gender difference and an age difference, with men
scoring higher than women and young people scoring higher than older people, on average
(Zuckerman & Neeb, 1980). Sensation seeking peaks in the late teens and early 20s.
High sensation seekers differ from low sensation seekers in some interesting ways. High
sensation seekers are more likely to be younger at the age of first intercourse, and to have more
“Bones heal, chicks dig scars,
sexual partners, more varied sexual experiences, and risky sex, defined as sex with strangers or
under the influence of alcohol or other drugs (Hoyle, Fejfar, & Miller, 2000; Zuckerman, 2007). pain is temporary, glory is
High sensation seekers are also more likely to smoke cigarettes than low sensation seekers, a forever.”
finding that has remained consistent over some 30-plus years of research and across many coun- Evel Knievel, American daredevil
tries including Switzerland, Norway, the Netherlands, Israel, and the United States (Zuckerman, and entertainer
2008). Sensation seeking also correlates with drug and alcohol use including stimulants such as
cocaine, amphetamine, marijuana and LSD, and depressants such as heroin (Zuckerman, 1979).
Among people who use drugs, high sensation seeking is associated with the range of different
kinds of drugs used, more so than with any one drug (Kaestner, Rosen, & Apel, 1977).
From the discussion so far, you might think that “sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll” somehow go
together. Well, at least when it comes to the tastes of the high sensation seeker, they do! These SEE FOR YOURSELF
are new and, to some extent depending on the generation, unusual and antisocial experiences.
How much of a sensation
High sensation seekers prefer rock, heavy metal, and punk music over movie soundtracks and
seeker are you? Why do you
religious music (Litle & Zuckerman, 1986). They also enjoy alternative, rap, and electronic say this?
dance music more so than people low in sensation seeking (McNamara & Ballard, 1999).

Table 7.6 The Brief Sensation Seeking Scale

Experience Seeking
1. I would like to explore strange places.
5. I would like to take off on a trip with no preplanned routes or timetables.
Boredom Susceptibility
2. I get restless when I spend too much time at home.
6. I prefer friends who are excitingly unpredictable.
Thrill and Adventure Seeking
3. I like to do frightening things.
7. I would like to try bungee jumping.
Disinhibition
4. I like wild parties.
8. I would love to have new and exciting experiences, even if they are illegal.
Note: To what extent do you agree or disagree? Answer using a 5-point scale from Strongly disagree (1), Disagree (2), Neither
disagree nor agree (3), Agree (4), and Strongly agree (5). In a sample of 8th to 11th graders, females averaged 3.68 and males 3.54.
Source: Adapted from Hoyle et al. (2002, p. 405). Reprinted with permission from Hoyle, R. H., Stephenson, M. T., Palmgreen, P.,
Lorch, E. P., & Donohew, R. L. (2002),“Reliability and validity of a brief measure of sensation reliability and validity of a brief mea-
sure of sensation seeking,” Personality and Individual Differences, 32, pg. 401–414. Permission conveyed through the Copyright
Clearance Center.
198 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

High and low sensation seekers also

differ in the kinds of careers they enjoy.
Whereas sensation seekers are not drawn
more to the military or to law enforce-
ment than low sensation seekers, they are
more likely to volunteer for riskier assign-
ments in both careers (Zuckerman, 2008).
Speeders and reckless drivers—and the
officers who engage in high-speed criminal
chases—are more likely to be high sensa-
tion seekers (Zuckerman, 2008). People
who deal with risk on a daily basis such as
air traffic controllers and rape counselors,
or physicians, nurses, psychologists, and
paraprofessionals who voluntarily work in
an emergency room are all higher in sensa-
tion seeking than people working in more
traditional settings (Zuckerman, 2008).
What might it be like to be in a close
relationship with a high sensation seeker?
It depends: People have greater marital
Ice climbing is an example satisfaction when their partners are simi-
of an extreme sport that lar to them on this trait (Schroth, 1991).
involves inherent danger. However, couples are less likely to divorce
if both partners are low in sensation seek-
ing (Zuckerman & Neeb, 1980).
It isn’t all fun and games for a high sensation seeker. Tragically, sometimes high sensation
seekers behave a little too riskily or impulsively for their own good. Casual observations in the
past had noted that spinal cord injuries often happen due to poor judgment and impulsivity
(Mawson, Jacobs, Winchester, & Biundo, 1988). Might personality (i.e., sensation seeking) be
related to type of injury? An interesting study was conducted in which 140 men with spinal
cord injuries were matched with control subjects who were of the same age, gender, educational
attainment, and lived in the same zip code (Mawson et al., 1988). Through phone interviews,
both injured and control participants filled out the Sensation Seeking Scale (Zuckerman, 1971)
and answered questions about their lives.
Sure enough, the spinal cord injured participants scored higher than the matched control
participants on boredom susceptibility and disinhibition. Even more interesting, when the
researchers selected the injured participants who scored in the top and bottom 10% of the
Sensation Seeking Scale (i.e., the highest and lowest sensation seekers, respectively) the highest
sensation seekers were significantly more likely than the lowest sensation seekers to have an
arrest record, be younger at the time of their injury (26.1 vs. 41.5 years of age), and to have been
using alcohol or taking drugs at the time of their injury (Mawson et al., 1988).
Recently, Zuckerman has refined the concept of sensation seeking to the more specific
impulsive sensation seeking (Zuckerman, 1993a, 2002). Impulsive sensation seeking is very
close to Eysenck’s concept of Psychoticism. In contrast to high scorers, low scorers show
restraint, responsibility, and inhibition (Zuckerman, 2008). Impulsive Sensation seeking is
part of an alternative five-factor measure of personality that includes Impulsive Sensation
Seeking, Neuroticism-Anxiety, Aggression-Hostility, Sociability, and Activity (Zuckerman,
SEE FOR YOURSELF 1993a, 2005).

When you hear a strange Bodily Responses. Why are some people high in sensation seeking and impulsiveness and
noise or see something others not? Zuckerman once thought that high sensation seekers were merely trying to increase
unusual, are you more likely
their arousal to some optimum level of arousal, much like Eysenck thought extraverts and
to show a startle reflex or an
orienting reflex? introverts do (Zuckerman, 1969). However, experimental tests failed to support this idea (Geen,
1997). More recently, evidence suggests that the key difference may be in orienting—or how
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 199

people react to a novel stimuli—which may involve the reactivity of the nervous system, which
is regulated by neurotransmitters (Geen, 1997).
Physiological reactions to novel stimuli, as measured by GSR, heart rate, and cortical activ-
ity (e.g., EPs), suggest that what is viewed as a potential threat by the low sensation seeker may
be of keen interest to the high sensation seeker. That is, high and low sensation seekers differ
in how they react to a novel stimulus. High sensation seekers are more likely to react with a
physiological pattern of responses that are more similar to an orientating reflex, indicative of
interest and a desire to approach. In contrast, low sensation seekers are more likely to react with
a defensive startle reflex, indicative of danger and a readiness for action (Geen, 1997; Zucker-
man, 2005, 2008). For example, at the onset of a moderate noise, both high and low sensation
seekers react with a spike in heart rate. As the noise continues, high sensation seekers will
quickly habituate to the noise and their heart rate will rapidly decrease. In contrast, the heart
rate of low sensation seekers will continue to increase, indicating a readiness to fight, flight, or
freeze. Eventually, they too will habituate to the noise, but at a rate slower than high sensation
seekers (Zuckerman, Simons, & Como, 1988).
Other evidence suggests that high sensation seekers have greater pain tolerance, higher
Extraversion, less hypochondriasis, and higher sensory thresholds compared to low sensa-
tion seekers (Goldman, Kohn, & Hunt, 1983; Kohn, Hunt, & Hoffman, 1982). This sug-
gests that high sensation seekers are not trying to maintain an optimal level of arousal, but
that they are able to handle and even enjoy more intense sensory stimulation (Stelmack &
Rammsayer, 2008).

Brain Activity. There are remarkably few studies done looking at brain imaging and sensa- THINK ABOUT IT
tion seeking. One of these few compared fMRI scans of high and low sensation seekers while
they viewed positive and negative emotional images (Joseph, Liu, Jiang, Lynam, & Kelly, 2009). Why were high sensation
seekers more sensitive to
Some of the images were highly arousing, depicting things such as violence, extreme sports,
the arousal than to the con-
and erotica. Other images, such as pictures of objects, people, or food, were not as arousing. tent in this study?
High sensation seekers, compared to low sensation seekers, had stronger reactions in parts
of the brain related to arousal and reinforcement while viewing the highly arousing pictures,
regardless of whether they were positive or negative (Joseph et al., 2009). In contrast, low
sensation seekers showed faster and stronger activation in regions related to emotional regu-
lation and decision making. Overall, high sensation seekers were more reactive to the arousal
level of the pictures and were less sensitive to their positive or negative content compared to
low sensation seekers.

Biochemical Activity. Do you recall the important neurotransmitters dopamine, norepineph-

rine and epinephrine, and how they are all broken down by the enzyme MAO? All of these—
dopamine, norepinephrine, epinephrine, MAO—show correlations with sensation seeking and
impulsivity (Carver, 2005; Rawlings & Dawe, 2008; Ruchkin, Koposov, af Klinteberg, Oreland, &
Grigorenko, 2005; Zuckerman, 1984, 1994, 1995, 2007, 2008). Zuckerman’s (2008) latest model
suggests that high sensation seeking comes from an interaction of these three systems: dopamine
reactivity (which increases exploration of novel stimuli), low serotonin (which fails to inhibit
behavior) and low norepinephrine/noradrenaline (which lessens the stress response to novel
stimuli and the threat of punishment).
Much evidence suggests that high sensation seekers either have higher levels of dopamine
or a more reactive dopamine system than low sensation seekers (Pickering & Gray, 1999; Stel-
mack & Rammsayer, 2008; Zuckerman, 1993b, 2008). And, indeed, high sensation seekers have
lower levels of serotonin than low sensation seekers (Rawlings & Dawe, 2008; Zuckerman,
2007). Because MAO regulates dopamine and norepinephrine we would expect differences in
MAO between high and low sensation seekers (Geen, 1997). Some have compared the action
of MAO to the braking system of a car: less braking power (e.g., less MAO) means more for-
ward motion (e.g., more dopamine, serotonin, or norepinephrine). Though researchers have
hypothesized that high sensation seekers have lower levels of MAO (e.g., Zuckerman, 1995),
until recently, the results have been inconsistent (Geen, 1997).
200 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Conclusion: What Have We Learned From

the Neuroscience of Personality?
Putting together a [physiological approach] to personality is like assembling
the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle or fitting words into a crossword puzzle. In the
crossword puzzle, horizontal words (relationships between traits and behaviors)
require vertical words (between traits and behaviors and underlying biological
traits) to confirm them. The puzzle . . . is beginning to form some semblance
of a theoretical model, although many pieces are missing and many words are
disconnected.(Zuckerman, 2006, p. 51)
Although Zuckerman wrote these words referring to sensation seeking, this statement could apply
to any personality characteristic. We know that about 40% of the variance in a personality trait is
due to genetics (Krueger & Johnson, 2008; Turkheimer, 2000) and, as Eysenck suggested, genet-
ics must work through physiology and neurology. There are a few theoretical models, notably
Eysenck’s PEN model and Gray’s RST, that try to account for personality in terms of genetics and
neurological differences. But even this equation leaves us with the question of where the other
60% of the variance in personality traits comes from. Generally we say the environment, but really
the answer is more complicated, as we know that experiences, including thoughts and behaviors,
can affect our physiology. Think about the experiment that opened this chapter showing that
meditation caused changes in brain functioning (Davidson et al., 2003).
Ultimately, even if we were to find a “Neuroticism” area of the brain, does this mean that
neurology causes us to develop a certain personality? Does it mean that a lifetime of acting
anxious causes our brains to develop a certain way? Maybe having a rough life filled with many
unfortunate events makes one neurotic and changes our brains. No matter how good our imag-
ing techniques are, we are unable to determine the answer to this fundamental causal question
without conducting a true experiment.
What might such an experiment look like? Right now, a standard treatment for patients
with severe tremors in their hands or other limbs is to implant a tiny electrode. When switched
on, a slight electrical current inhibits the tremor and the person is able to function without
shaking. Could you imagine such a device implanted in an area of the brain that is related to
Extraversion? Would turning on the electrode make a person want to be with other people?
Would turning off the electrode make a person want to sit quietly and read a book?
“As the Dalai Lama himself Or, what if we randomly gave some people a drug that artificially lowers their levels of
said in his book The Art serotonin? Would they become more anxious? It is this random assignment to condition or a
of Happiness, we have the treatment that is the only way of determining causality. This serotonin study was actually con-
capacity to change ourselves
ducted. What did they find? The result depended on the level of the participant’s BIS. Partici-
pants with high BIS were more sensitive to negative stimuli as measured by BOLD levels in the
because of the very nature,
amygdala (Cools et al., 2005). That is, serotonin level alone is not enough to cause a difference
of the very structure and in brain functioning. This study highlights two important lessons from this chapter. First, we
function of our brain.” need to think of personality in terms of brain systems and not just localized areas of the brain.
Richard J. Davidson as cited in Second, we need to move beyond correlational methods if we hope to figure out how much of
Savory (2004) our personalities is due to our physiology and neurology.

Chapter Summary
Study and Review How does our neurology and physiology make us who we are? The answer to this chicken-and-
on mysearchlab.com egg question is still a bit murky. Let’s start with what we do know:
Go online for more 1. The field of neuropersonality studies the relationship between neurology and personal-
resources to help you ity by studying bodily responses, brain structure, brain activity, and biochemical activity
review. related to personality and personality functioning.
 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality 201

2. There appear to be broad, inborn, biological differences among individuals, called tem-
peraments, that develop into personality characteristics over a lifetime of interacting with
the social environment.
3. Three broad temperaments or clusters of personality traits are Extraversion, Neuroticism,
and Impulsivity (e.g., sensation seeking).
4. These three traits are related to physiological and neurological differences in dopamine
and dopaminergic systems, emotion systems, and serotonin and serotonergic systems.
5. Just as phrenology, the science of determining personality from bumps on the head, is
outdated, looking for correlates of personality in specific areas of the brain is outdated as
well. Neuroscientists now think in terms of brain systems.
We learned how Hans Eysenck’s Psychoticism–Extraversion–Neuroticism model and
Jeffrey Gray’s reinforcement sensitivity theory are models of personality grounded in physi-
ological and neurological differences and refined and revised in light of research evidence.
These two theories are good examples of the questions—and answers—pursued by personality
psychologists.
We discovered that high sensation seekers are driven toward excitement and novelty. Evi-
dence suggests that they have different reflexes or gut-level reactions to unusual stimuli. Sensa-
tion seekers appear to thrive on levels of excitement that would make low sensation seekers’
heads spin. This is a personality trait with a strong physiological correlate.
Now for what we don’t know. When it comes to neurology and personality, researchers
often rely on correlational designs using neuroimaging techniques such as fMRI. These tech-
niques and designs, though imperfect, can tell us which part of the brain is active in which kinds
of people on which kinds of tasks. Although it might be tempting to conclude that the brains of
extraverts are this way whereas the brains of introverts are that way, we ultimately don’t know
why the brains and physiologies of people differ. The techniques used by neurologists cannot
tell us the ultimate answer, of whether our physiology causes us to develop certain personali-
ties or whether certain personalities develop certain neurology or whether certain experiences
alter both our brains and our personalities. The answer will have to wait for more sophisticated
methods and methodologies.

Review Questions
1. What are the four types of common markers of neurological and physiological differences
in personality? What are some examples of each?
2. What is a correlational design? How does it compare to a true experiment? What are scat-
terplots? Why are some fMRI studies suspect?
3. What is Eysenck’s PEN model? What is the main physiological difference between intro-
verts and extraverts?
4. What are the three main systems of Gray’s reinforcement sensitivity theory? What kind of
people learn better from rewards? What kind of people learn better from punishments?
5. What is phrenology? What is brain localization? In contrast to these methods, what do
researchers today focus on? What are some preliminary findings from these cutting-edge
methods in personality neuroscience?
6. How do extraverts and people high in Neuroticism respond to emotion? What differences
in brain structure, brain activity, and biochemical activity are related to Extraversion and
Neuroticism?
7. What is sensation seeking? How do high and low sensation seekers differ from one another?
What three systems appear to be related to sensation seeking?
202 Chapter 7 The Neuroscience of Personality

Key Terms
Central nervous system Positron Emission Tomogra- Reinforcement Sensitivity
Peripheral nervous system phy (PET) Theory (RST)
Somatic nervous system Functional Magnetic Reso- Fight-Flight-Freeze System
Autonomic nervous system nance Imaging (fMRI) (FFFS)
Sympathetic division Nonindependence error Behavioral Approach System
Parasympathetic division Transcranial Magnetic Stim- (BAS)
Galvanic Skin Response ulation (TMS) Behavioral Inhibition System
(GSR) Neurotransmitters (BIS)
Electromyography (EMG) Challenge test Phrenology
Computerized Tomography Scatterplots or scattergrams Anhedonia
(CT) Temperament Left–right asymmetries
Computer Axial Tomography Extraversion Sensation seeking
(CAT) Neuroticism Experience seeking
Magnetic Resonance Imaging Psychoticism Boredom susceptibility
(MRI) Ascending Reticular Activat- Thrill and adventure seeking
Electroencephalogram (EEG) ing System (ARAS) Disinhibition
Evoked Potential (EP) Arousability
CHAPTER
8 INTRAPSYCHIC
FOUNDATIONS
OF PERSONALITY
SIGMUND FREUD AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
Background
Instincts: The Connection Between Mind and Body
Uncovering the Unconscious
THEN AND NOW: THE WORD ASSOCIATION TEST AND THE IMPLICIT ATTITUDES TEST
Freud’s View of Personality: The Structural and Topographic Models
The Structural Model of Personality: Id, Ego, and Superego
The Topographic Model of Personality: Conscious, Preconscious, Unconscious
Anxiety and the Defense Mechanisms
Reaction Formation
Isolation
Denial
Undoing
Projection
Displacement
Sublimation
Repression
Rationalization
Psychosexual Stages
Oral Stage
Anal Stage
Phallic Stage
Latency Stage
Genital Stage
Problems With Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Read the Chapter on RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: CASE STUDY AND PSYCHOBIOGRAPHY
mysearchlab.com PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORY SINCE FREUD
ATTACHMENT THEORY
Brief History
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: TAKING THE TRAUMA OUT OF A HOSPITAL STAY
Attachment Patterns for Life?
Attachment Styles in Adulthood
Attachment and Adult Personality Functioning
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

203
204 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

D
“Probably the sexiest woman o you believe in love at first sight, the sense that there is something so powerful, so
I know is my mother. She’s attractive in another person that your realize that he or she is THE ONE? Imagine
an ethereal angel. Nobody that you are perusing the personal ads hoping to find the Love of Your Life—or at
least an interesting person to date! You read two different descriptions and imagine what it
looks like that woman. If I
would be like to date each of them. Though they both seem nice enough, you seem to feel an
could meet my mother and
inexplicable bond with one of them and, despite some slight nervousness, you could definitely
marry her, I would. I would picture yourself dating this person.
be with my mother now, if This was the exact task faced by participants in an interesting study (Brumbaugh & Fraley,
she weren’t my mother, as 2006). Undergraduate men and women read the personal ads of two potential dates. Unbe-
sick as that sounds.” knownst to them, the two profiles were designed so that one resembled their most significant
Actor Shia LaBeouf, in an past romantic relationship whereas the other resembled the past love of another participant.
interview June 2009 Participants read both descriptions and rated whether each person seemed like someone they
could date and to describe what it would be like to be in a relationship with each of them.
Participants imagined relationships with their potential dates in ways that were eerily
similar to the kinds of relationships that they described having with their past love, especially
SEE FOR YOURSELF when the potential date resembled their past love. Participants felt a greater degree of closeness
and intimacy, were more interested in dating, and yet felt more susceptible to rejection with
Have you ever felt an inex- potential dates who resembled a former partner than potential dates who resembled another
plicable bond with a person
you just met?
participant’s former partner. In particular, people were especially likely to feel anxious when
contemplating dating a person who resembled their very first love (Brumbaugh & Fraley, 2006).
Why does this happen? According to attachment theory (Ainsworth, Bell, & Stayton, 1974;
Bowlby, 1969), we form emotional bonds with our caregivers, which become mental represen-
tations, called internal working models, of all future intimate relationships. Researchers in this
“We sometimes encounter
area would say that our feelings from past significant relationships, including our early love
people, even perfect relationships with parents and caregivers, become transferred onto future potential partners,
strangers, who begin to especially if they resemble these significant people in terms of personality characteristics and
interest us at first sight, typical behaviors (e.g., Geher, 2000).
somehow suddenly, all at Are we, like actor LaBeouf in the quote that opened this chapter, destined to fall in love
once, before a word has been
with our parent of the other sex, or at least with somebody who resembles him or her? These
ideas of relationship styles and of transference come from—you guessed it—the work of Sig-
spoken.”
mund Freud (1856–1939). Freud defined psychoanalysis as a theory of personality, a method
Fydor Dostoevsky
for investigating unconscious processes, and a technique of treatment (Freud, 1923/1961). A
key premise of psychoanalytic psychology, the branch of psychology based on Freud’s theories
and methods of psychoanalysis, is that we form mental representations of ourselves, others, and
our relationships from early experiences (Westen, 1998a). However, the field of psychoanalysis
today is undergoing a revolution, becoming more empirical and more open to findings from
other areas of psychology (Westen, Gabbard, & Ortigo, 2008). Ironically, this change is occur-
ring even as the theories, methods, and findings of the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund
Freud, are being discounted.
In this chapter we consider intrapsychic aspects of personality through a brief review of the
controversy surrounding Sigmund Freud and his theory of personality, empirical evidence for
key aspects of his theory, and other psychoanalytic approaches, including the research-based
attachment theory.

Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalysis

“Freud, like Elvis, has been A huge controversy has been brewing in psychology, made public by a 1993 cover of Time
dead for a number of years magazine that asked, “Is Freud dead?” Critics lined up on either side of the debate claiming
but continues to be cited that if he wasn’t dead, his outdated, discredited, and at times misogynistic theories ought to be
laid to rest (see, for example, Azar, 1997; Crews, 1996, 1998; Macmillan, 1991; Webster, 1995).
with some regularity.”
At one extreme, a critic noted “there is literally nothing to be said, scientifically or thera-
Psychologist Drew Westen
peutically, to the advantage of the entire Freudian system or any of its component dogmas”
(1998a, p. 333)
(Crews, 1996, p. 63). Others pointed out that empirical data do not support this view (Westen,
1998a; see also Azar, 1997; Damasio, 1999; Fisher & Greenberg, 1996; Guterl, 2002; Muris,
2006; Weinberger & Westen, 2001; Westen, 1998b). Regardless of which side is correct, we have
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 205

got to marvel at a theorist who manages to stir up such controversy—not to mention make THINK ABOUT IT
the cover of a major magazine—some 53 years after his death, even as his major works are at
least 100 years old! Which Freudian theory
Perhaps Drew Westen had it right when he compared Sigmund Freud to Elvis Presley should we debate, Freud’s
original formulations or the
(Westen, 1998a). Just as it would be impossible to imagine rock ’n’ roll music without its current reformulations of
founder, it would be difficult to imagine psychoanalysis today without its founder. Similarly, others?
just as you wouldn’t hear Presley’s music on today’s pop or top 40 radio stations—his music
is relegated to oldies stations nowadays—you wouldn’t see Freud’s theories appear in the top
research journals of the field today exactly as he posited them. Yet the impact of Freudian
thought on current research in personality, clinical, and developmental psychology—and even
areas outside psychology including sociology, political science, cultural studies, literary studies,
and especially religion—is indelible, just as Presley’s impact is on rock music today.
Rather than ask “Is Freud Dead?”, maybe we should ask, “Why is Freudian theory still
alive?” (Horgan, 1996, p. 106). One reason may be that it provides a “compelling framework
within which to ponder our mysterious selves” (Horgan, 1996, p. 106; Malcolm, 1994; Vaillant,
1995b). As mentioned in Chapter 5, Freud’s claim that the unique but hidden self is revealed
in our unconscious behavior subverted the Victorian repressiveness of the day. Another rea-
son that Freud’s ideas captured the fancy of both American scholars and the popular culture
may be because they suggested that personality can change, which resonated with the sense
of opportunity and possibility in America at the turn of the 20th century and still does even
today (Horgan, 1996). Finally, no other paradigm has emerged to conquer Freudian thought.
So, why study Freud? For better or for worse, Freud’s ideas and terminology are an impor-
tant part of the history of psychology as well as the greater culture (Dunn & Dougherty, 2005).
Further, his theories greatly influenced personality psychology and clinical psychology (Dunn
& Dougherty, 2005). No doubt, a review of a major icon of Western thought will be fun, chal-
lenging, and perhaps even surprising (Anderegg, 2004). But don’t take my word for it: In this
chapter, you will learn about Freud’s theories and decide for yourself if they contribute to a
science of personality.

Background
Instincts: The Connection Between
Mind and Body. Freud was very
much influenced by scientists and phi-
losophers of his day, including Charles
Darwin (Gay, 1988). He believed that
he had an answer to the mind–body
problem: instincts. Just as the body used
energy to carry out its bodily functions
of breathing, blood circulation, muscu-
lar and glandular activity, he reasoned
that there had to be a similar source
of energy for the mind. He called this
energy psychic energy and believed that
psychic energy fueled the functions of
the mind including thinking, imagining,
and remembering. According to the law
of conservation in physics, Freud rea-
soned that energy within the mind–
body system must also be conserved,
that is, neither created nor destroyed.
He hypothesized that body energy and
psychic energy could be turned into Sigmund Freud, the famous
each other through an instinct, a “men- Viennese neurologist and
founder of psychoanalysis,
tal representation of a physical or bodily
lived from 1856 to 1939.
need” (Freud, 1915/1957, p. 122).
206 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

THINK ABOUT IT Freud’s original German word for what we call instincts was trieb, but the English word
impulse really comes closer to capturing the concept Freud was trying to describe. We can think
Can you see a relationship of an instinct or impulse like a tension, or an excitation originating from within the body. There
between these ways of are as many impulses as there are bodily needs. We first feel an impulse in the body that, like an
handling impulses and
certain personality traits?
itch, must somehow be satisfied. Impulses are always present in the body, therefore we always
feel a certain amount of tension. There are many ways a particular impulse may be satisfied in
the body or in the mind. The habitual ways we choose to deal with our impulses by gratifying
them, inhibiting them, turning them into something more acceptable, or denying their very
existence, form our personality.
According to Freud, there are two broad categories of instincts: life instincts, which he
called Eros, and the death instincts, which he called Thanatos (Freud, 1914/1957). The life
instincts are concerned with survival of the individual and the species, and include the needs
for food, water, air, and sex. The psychic energy of the life instincts is called libido. The most
important of the life instincts, according to Freud, is sex. Today, most contemporary psychody-
namic psychologists would deemphasize sex and instead emphasize the needs for relationships
and self-esteem as important life instincts (Westen, 1998a).
Freud noted that all living things decay and die, and reasoned that death and destruction
must be inborn instincts as well (Freud, 1920/1955). His discussion of Thanatos was not as
fully developed as his discussion of Eros, and he discussed only one death instinct: aggression.
Today, the death instinct is one aspect of Freudian theory that is rejected by most psychologists
as false, being evolutionarily unsound (Westen, 1998a).
Taken together—the death instinct, and aggression in particular, and the life instincts, with
an emphasis on sex—you can see why many people believe that all of Freudian theory reduces
to sex and aggression. Though tempting to conclude, this would be an oversimplification of
Freudian theory.
Here is a puzzle: If these two instincts provide the energy and direction for personality, then
we should be able to see these sexual and aggressive instincts bubble to the surface demanding
that we immediately gratify them. Why do we not spend more of our time engaged in sexual or
aggressive acts? Freud reasoned that we have been socialized to consciously hide our sexual and
aggressive impulses and to express them only in socially acceptable ways (Freud, 1929/1989).
What happens to these ungratified instincts? Going back to the law of conservation of energy,
libido cannot be destroyed. Instead, instincts become expressed in unconscious ways.
THINK ABOUT IT
Uncovering the Unconscious. How does Freud propose we get at this unconscious mate-
Can unconscious thoughts
affect our everyday behav-
rial? Unacceptable urges are likely to leak into our everyday behavior when our normally vigi-
ior? In what ways? lant consciousness is relaxed. This may happen in any number of ways, including hypnosis, free
association, dreams, Freudian slips, humor, and symbolic behavior.

Free Association. Freud’s famous talk therapy, psychoanalysis, started when a colleague
of his realized that people revealed their private thoughts and desires while under hypnosis.
Freud started using hypnosis with his patients, and soon discovered that they needn’t be in
an altered state, but just very relaxed (Freud, 1955). This is why, even today, psychoanalysis
is often conducted with the patient lying down on a couch, with the therapist sitting slightly
behind and out of sight of the patient. In this way the patient relaxes and says whatever
comes to mind without consciously trying to control, monitor, or censor what he or she says.
This free association of one thought to the next may lead the patient to reveal unconscious
thoughts.
To illustrate how free association might work, let’s consider an incident from Freud’s own
life. One day, when he left his office in a hurry to catch a train on his way to meet a new patient,
he grabbed the wrong implement from his desk (Freud, 1901/1960). In trying to figure out why
he took the tuning fork instead of the reflex hammer, he followed his associations to both tools.
Of course, he might just have been in a hurry, but might there have been a deeper meaning to
this mistake?
First, he recalled that the last person who touched the tuning fork was a slow-witted child
who played with the tuning fork while Freud conducted his examination. Freud then wondered
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 207

if he, himself, was an idiot for taking the wrong tool. He confirmed this passing thought in the
very next moment by his realization that the Hebrew word for “hammer” was Chamer or “ass.”
But why was Freud moved to censure himself with such harsh language? He immediately
remembered that the train station he was running to was the location of an earlier and par-
ticularly embarrassing misdiagnosis he had made. Freud suddenly realized that he had better
be careful at his upcoming consultation to not repeat this mistake. By not taking the hammer,
he was avoiding being an ass! Thus the ultimate meaning of picking up the wrong implement
was a self-reproach:
You idiot! You ass! Pull yourself together this time, and see that you don’t diag-
nose hysteria again where there’s an incurable illness, as you did years ago.
(Freud, 1901/1960, pp. 165–166)
Tuning fork, child, hammer, Chammer, ass, idiot, train station, hysterical woman, and a
misdiagnosis—as disconnected as these may seem to us—make sense in Freud’s unconscious SEE FOR YOURSELF
as revealed through his thoughts of free association. Make a point of remember-
ing or writing down your
Dream Analysis. Free association was particularly useful for patients describing their dreams for a few nights.
dreams. Freud believed that “the interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of How might Freud interpret
the unconscious activities of the mind” (Freud, 1900/1953, p. 608). He used dream analysis, your dreams? Do you think
the detailed examination of the content and symbolism of dreams in order to decipher their the symbolism of your
dreams springs from your
hidden, unconscious meaning. When we are asleep, it is the perfect time for our unconscious
unconscious or from read-
thoughts, dreams, and wishes to make themselves known. Freud believed that dreaming acted ing about Freud’s theories?
as a safety value allowing a controlled release of unconscious tension built up by our instincts.
Because it would still be unsafe to directly express the dark urges of our instincts, our
instinctual urges reveal themselves through the symbolism of dreams. Dreams allow wish ful-
fillment and gratification of our instincts in a safe, symbolic form. On waking, many people
are able to describe in great detail what they saw in their dreams, called the manifest content.
For Freud, both the dream symbolism and our reactions to the dream, expressed through free
association under the guidance of a therapist, are important for understanding the latent con-
tent or true meaning of the dream.
There is some evidence that Freud was partially correct that suppressed thoughts are likely
to reveal themselves in dreams. This was tested in an experiment in which undergraduate
students were instructed to suppress thoughts of a specific person, right before falling asleep
(Wegner, Wenzlaff, & Kozak, 2004). Would this suppression force the unexpressed thoughts to
appear in participants’ dreams?
First, participants either thought about a crush (“a person you have never been in a roman-
tic relationship with—but whom you have thought about in a romantic way”) or a noncrush
(“a person you feel fondly about, but to whom you are not attracted”).

This painting, The Dream by

Henri Rousseau, was inspired
by a poem about a young
woman who dreams of
hearing enchanted music in
a lush green jungle under a
moonlit sky that mesmerizes
all who hear it, human and
animal.
208 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Then participants were randomly assigned to one of three presleep thought conditions. In
the suppression condition, participants were instructed to not think about their target person.
In the expression condition, participants specifically thought about and focused on their target
person. In the final, mention condition participants were not to specifically think about or avoid
thinking about their target person, but to note if thoughts of the target person nonetheless came
to mind. Participants spent 5 minutes before going to bed writing a stream of consciousness
of whatever thoughts came into their heads. On waking, participants noted if they dreamed
during the night and what they dreamed about.
As you can see in Figure 8.1, participants in the suppression condition, who were instructed
to not think about their target person, actually ended up dreaming more about that person than
participants in either the mention condition or the expression condition. However, it made little
difference if the person participants were trying not to think about was a crush or a noncrush:
Both kinds of targets appeared later in their dreams as measured by self-rated dreaming and
the number of times the target person appeared in their dream reports.
This suggests that whereas Freud had the process correct—that suppressed thoughts will
appear later in our dreams—he was incorrect that this had anything to do with our hidden
desires or wishes. Instead, researchers believe that this is an example of cognitive ironic processes
of mental control, rather than unconscious motivation from our instincts (Wegner, 1994).

Parapraxes: Mistakes in Speaking and Acting. Another way that our unconscious urges
can reveal themselves is through mistakes in thought or deed. For Freud, nothing is ever done by
accident. He believed that slips-of-the-tongue, bungled actions (such as the incident described

Figure 8.1 Dreaming about 3.00

the target and nontarget
persons as a function of 2.75
presleep thought instruction:
mean self-ratings (on a scale
2.50
from 1 to 5) of whether the
Self-Rated Dreaming

person appeared in the

previous night’s dreams (a) 2.25
and mean number of coded
mentions of the target person 2.00
in dream reports (b). Error bars
show standard error. Source: 1.75
From Wegner et al. (2004,
Figure 1, p. 234). Wegner, 1.50
D. M., Wenzlaff, R. M., & Kozak,
M. (2004), “Dream rebound: The A Target Nontarget
return of suppressed thoughts
in dreams,” Psychological
Science, 15(4), 232–236. 1.20
Copyright © 2004 by Sage 1.10
Occurrences in Dream Reports

Publications. Reprinted with 1.00

permission of Sage Publications.
0.90
0.80
0.70
0.60
0.50
0.40
0.30
0.20
Mention Expression Suppression
B Presleep Thought Instruction
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 209

previously where Freud picked up the tuning fork instead of the hammer), mistakes and errors, THINK ABOUT IT
forgotten names and words, lost and mislaid objects, misreadings, slips of the pen and mis-
prints, and other chance actions all reveal our hidden desires. Freud called mistakes caused Are all slips of the tongue or
by unconscious desires parapraxes (plural; parapraxis, singular). Freud collected examples of accidents expressions of our
unconscious desires?
parapraxes and wrote about the many ways we reveal our hidden, and often unacceptable, urges
in his classic book The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (Freud, 1901/1960).
One type of parapraxis is a Freudian slip, or a mistake in speech. One of Freud’s examples
came from the president of the Lower House of the Austrian Parliament at the time, who
opened a session by saying (in German, of course), “Gentlemen: I take notice that a full quorum
of members is present and herewith declare the sitting closed!” (Freud, 1901/1960, p. 59). Could
he have been expressing his deepest wish that the session were already over?
Despite many vivid examples, research suggests that not all slips are Freudian. People are
likely to make verbal errors as a result of priming from whatever is on their mind, not necessar-
ily from forbidden id impulses (Motley & Baars, 1979). In particular, such slips may be caused
by cognitive indecision over word choice (Motley, 1985).
Another type of parapraxis is an accident or a mistaken action. Consider a woman I knew,
SEE FOR YOURSELF
who had a terrific case of prewedding jitters. In the week leading up to the momentous event,
her fiancé slammed the car door on her fresh-from-the-boutique gown and bridal veil, caus- Have you ever had an acci-
ing a slight tear in the delicate material of the veil. When she and her sister tried to repair it, dent that may have been
they made it worse, and had to cut a few inches off the veil to hide their mistake. Then, while the result of an unconscious
wish?
cleaning her apartment in preparation for the wedding night, a small bookcase collapsed as
she was trying to move it, breaking her food processor and nearly breaking her own foot! The
final “accident” came while she was washing a drinking glass that broke into pieces in her hands
cutting her thumb. Would it surprise you to find out the couple divorced a few short—and very
sad—years later?

Humor. Even jokes, especially spur of the moment quips and comebacks and spontaneous
reactions, can be analyzed, much like dreams, to uncover the unacceptable desires they satisfy
(Freud, 1905/1960). Jokes give us a socially acceptable means of expressing aggression and
sexual desires through laughter. Many people who would not ordinarily express these impulses
find sexual jokes, bathroom humor, and jokes playing on unflattering stereotypes about gender,
height, hair color, religion, ethnicity, or profession quite funny. Somehow these normally taboo
thoughts are socially acceptable in jokes. Though consciously we might be thinking “I was only
kidding” the impulses expressed are quite real to our unconscious.

Symbolic Behavior. Another way in which we may express our hidden instincts is through
actions that seem innocent enough on the surface, but that actually represent deeper motives.
These symbolic behaviors allow us to safely express our id impulses under the guise of a benign
behavior. For example, no doubt you’ve heard of people with an oral fixation, a personality type
we will discuss shortly, who gratify their urges through smoking, eating, or even biting sarcasm.
These oral behaviors symbolize or stand in as more acceptable ways of getting sexual (smoking,
eating), or aggressive (sarcasm) gratification.

Then and Now: The Word Association Test and the Implicit
Attitudes Test THINK ABOUT IT
Over 100 years ago, an important historical event took place: Sigmund Freud and his disciple at Have you ever heard of an
the time, Carl Jung, came to America to speak at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. Oedipus complex? What
does the word complex sug-
Freud spoke about psychoanalysis, infantile sexuality, and dream interpretation. Jung also gave
gest in this phrase?
three lectures, two introducing his audience to the word association method (Benjamin, 2009).
The word association method was used by many psychologists of the day to identify the
connections people made between words. Jung, however, took it to a new level by using the test
to identify unconscious complexes, or important concerns for a person that he or she may not
even be aware of. Complexes, what we call a schema today, are patterns of thoughts, memories,
and perceptions organized about a theme (Jung, 1934/1960).
210 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Carl Jung and Sigmund

Freud at Clark University
in September 1909. The
organizer of the conference,
G. Stanley Hall is in the center
of the front row with Freud
on his left, both holding hats;
Jung is standing next to Freud
in the front row, third from
right.

In the word association test, Jung would slowly read 100 words out loud to subjects who
were instructed to “Answer as quickly as possible the first word that comes to mind” after
hearing each word. Jung would record not just the response, but also the reaction time and
physiological responses. He maintained that the test assessed not just verbal fluency, but also
whether there were some emotional connotations to the words that interfered with responding
and caused the person to respond slower or with an unusual response (Jung, 1910).
For example, sometimes there might be too many ways of answering so that a subject might
give more than one word. Sometimes a subject might be moved to give an explanation for his
or her idiosyncratic answers. Other times, a subject might repeat the stimulus word, repeat
the same answer to multiple stimulus words, stammer, exhibit a slip of the tongue, or just give
up responding at all (Jung, 1910). All of these behaviors indicated that the stimulus word was
provoking an emotional reaction in the person.
Jung would also calculate average reaction times and see which words elicited a faster or a
slower response. These, too, could indicate a complex or a hidden problem. Consider the chart
in Figure 8.2. These are the results of a 30-year-old woman, married for 3 years, who claimed
to be happily married. From the pattern of slower reaction times and unusual responses, Jung
deduced that she was not as happy in the marriage as she first claimed: She disliked that her
husband was Protestant whereas she was Catholic; she often thought about being untrue to her
husband and leaving the marriage; and she was afraid, either of her husband or of the future.
When Jung revealed all this to her, she denied it at first, but then admitted her true feelings and
told him even more about her unhappy life.

36

30

24

20
15
10
5
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 910 15 20 24 28 32 36 40 44 48 52 56 60 64 68 72 76 80 84 88 92 96 100
yellow

to pray

to separate

to marry

to quarrel

old

family

happiness

to fear
false
kiss
pure

contented

Figure 8.2 Reaction times for the word association test of a young woman who reported being happily married.
Height of the bars indicates reaction time (unit = 0.2 second). Selected stimulus words appear under the bars. Blue
bars = no answer; green bars = repetition of stimulus word; yellow bars = mistakes or multiple word responses;
black bars = average responses. Based on these results, do you think she is as happy as she claims? Source: Jung
(1910, color plate following p. 238).
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 211

Even today, researchers and clinicians use variations of the word association test to THINK ABOUT IT
assess verbal fluency and semantic memory (Ross et al., 2007), personality (Stacy, Leigh, &
Weingardt, 1997), brain injury (Silverberg, Hanks, Buchanan, Fichtenberg, & Mills, 2008), Why might the IAT reveal
and more. hidden or unconscious
thoughts better than a
The idea that our reaction times can reveal our hidden thoughts and feelings is also behind questionnaire?
a more modern assessment technique: the Implicit Association Test, or IAT (Greenwald,
McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998). When it comes to self-reports, people may be reluctant to give
their true responses, especially on sensitive subjects. They might also try to fake their responses,
or present themselves in a positive light. Might our unconscious responses, like our reaction
times, reveal our true attitudes?
The IAT uses reaction times to measure the strength of associations between concepts
(Greenwald, Nosek, & Banaji, 2003; Greenwald, Poehlman, Uhlmann, & Banaji, 2009; Nosek,
Greenwald, & Banaji, 2005). The more related two concepts are, the easier it will be to sort them
on a computer task if they require the same response than if they require different responses.
Because people will react faster to related concepts than to unrelated concepts, we can present
participants with various pairings of concepts and infer their attitude based on when they
respond the fastest. For example, people respond faster when liked items and positive words
require the same response (e.g., hit the space bar) than when unliked items and positive words
require the same response. We can pair photos, say, with positive or negative words and judge
if people feel positive or negative to the objects or people in the photos based on their relative
reaction times.
To illustrate how the IAT works, let’s take a look at an experiment using German under-
graduate students to compare self-reported anxiety with IAT-measured anxiety (Egloff &
Schmukle, 2002). For the IAT measure of anxiety, participants had to categorize words reflect-
ing the self (I, self, my, me, own) and other (they, them, your, you, others) along with anxiety-
related words (nervous, afraid, fearful, anxious, uncertain) and calmness related words (relaxed,
balanced, at ease, calm, restful).
Participants who scored higher on a questionnaire measure of anxiety found it easier to
classify the self words with the anxiety words than with the calmness words. This suggests more
of an association in their minds between self and anxiety than between self and calmness. Fur-
ther, participants’ scores on the IAT predicted poor performance after failure and an increase Figure 8.3 This is how
in nervous behaviors such as mouth movements, speech errors, and hand movements under Freud imagined the
stress better than their self-reported anxiety did. relationship between
Although it is more difficult to lie or fake your way through an IAT (Greenwald et al., 2009), the topographical
does this mean that the IAT is a better measure of our true attitudes and beliefs? Not neces- model of the mind and
sarily. IAT and self-report measures are actually different evaluations of the same object and the structural model of
personality. Note that
each predict slightly different outcomes (Greenwald et al., 2009). The key difference between
pcpt-cs stood for the
self-report and IAT measures of attitudes appears to be depth of processing or how conscious
perceptual consciousness,
we are of our beliefs. Perhaps our true attitudes and beliefs, like our true motivations, lurk deep Freud’s early term for
in our unconscious just as Freud and Jung hypothesized. the conscious. He placed
it to illustrate how
thoughts bubble up from
Freud’s View of Personality: The Structural the preconscious. Note
and Topographic Models how the unconscious,
preconscious, and
Freud described personality using a structural model, which outlined the parts of personality,
conscious blend into one
and a topographic model, which described the regions in our mind where the parts of person- another, illustrating Freud’s
ality resided. He even drew a graphic to illustrate the relationship between both models (see view of the continuity of
Figure 8.3). mental life. Source: From
Freud (1933/1990, p. 98).
Freud, S. (1933/1990). The
The Structural Model of Personality: Id, Ego, and Superego. The structural model of
anatomy of the mental
personality, which is indeed what we think of when we think of the self today, is made up of personality (Lecture 31). In
three parts: the id, the ego, and the superego (Freud, 1923/1961). In German, Freud referred New introductory lectures
to the id as das es or “the it” to emphasize that the id contains pure instinctual energy and is on psychoanalysis. New
a bundle of reflexes and urges. The id operates through primary process thinking meaning York, NY: Norton. (Original
that it makes decisions without logical rules and conscious thought (Freud, 1923/1961). The work published 1933).
212 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

id is completely out of our control, being housed completely in the unconscious. This is why
we are apt to see the workings of the id in unconscious behaviors like dreams and parapraxes.
The id operates according to the pleasure principle (Freud, 1923/1961), wanting what it wants
when it wants it, and demanding immediate gratification as in the phrase “It [id] just came
over me” (Westen et al., 2008).
There are two ways of satisfying an id instinct: reflex action and wish fulfillment. In keep-
SEE FOR YOURSELF ing with Freud’s attempt at reconciling the mind–body problem, one way involves the body
and the other involves the mind. A reflex action is when the id seeks gratification through
Suppose you are in a class immediate physical action. If it is not possible or not practical to carry out a reflex action, then
right before lunch and the id may try wish fulfillment. Here the id seeks gratification by imagining what it wants
become very hungry. What
(Freud, 1911/1958). For the id, fantasy can be just as satisfying as reality, at least temporar-
do you do to deal with
these feelings? ily. In this way, for example, dreams can serve as wish fulfillment for the impulses of the id
(Freud, 1923/1961).
What part of personality decides whether the id will be satisfied or not? That’s up to the
ego or das ich in German. The “I” or ego must try to match the wishes of the id with objects
and events in the real world through a process called identification (Freud, 1923/1961). To
identify with an object means that the object fulfills a wish of the id. The ego, therefore, must
operate according to the reality principle where it tries to satisfy the id within the constraints
of social and physical reality (Freud, 1923/1961). That is, the ego must figure out how to get
the most amount of pleasure for the id with the least amount of negative consequences from
both reality and from the superego. The ego operates using secondary process thinking, what
we might think of as logical thinking, weighing the costs and rewards of possible courses of
action (Freud, 1923/1961).
What is this superego that can reward or punish the ego for making a wrong decision in
THINK ABOUT IT satisfying id impulses? Das über ich, the “over I” or the “above me,” contains moral standards
for thinking and acting, standing like a harsh judge looking down over everything we do ready
Where do the conscience
to inflict punishment on the ego for allowing id impulses to escape. The superego strives for
and ego ideal get their
moral standards from? perfection, and is just as unrealistic as the id. The superego contains society’s standards of
behavior that we have learned from our parents while growing up.
The superego has two parts: the conscience and the ego ideal. The conscience (not to be
confused with the conscious mind) contains knowledge of what we should not do. This is where
we have internalized, or accepted as our own, actions from our past for which we have been
punished. The conscience punishes us when we do something wrong with feelings of guilt,
shame and embarrassment (Freud, 1923/1961).
The ego ideal contains knowledge of what we should do. This is where we have internalized
experiences for which we have been rewarded. The ego ideal rewards us with feelings of pride
when we have done the right thing (Freud, 1923/1961).
Do you remember how we said earlier that fantasizing about expressing id impulses—wish
fulfillment—was a good way of satisfying the id within the constraints of reality? Well, you
can see how this may also satisfy the superego, since the person is not actually doing anything
wrong. A 5-year-old patient of Freud’s summed it up succinctly when describing his desire to
masturbate: “wanting’s not doing, and doing’s not wanting” (Freud, 1909a/1955, p. 31; see the
THINK ABOUT IT Research Methods Illustrated feature for more about Little Hans). However, a person with a
Though Freud talks of the very strong superego, indicating very high moral standards, would not buy this argument and
id, ego, and superego as instead would believe that thinking is just as bad as doing (“I lusted in my heart”).
structures, are they truly In sum, the human personality is made up of id impulses that demand instant gratification.
parts of our brain or more
However, the superego, as the arbiter of moral standards, won’t let the id directly express itself.
like hypothetical concepts
or metaphors? Instead, the ego must think of a way to gratify the id within the bounds of decency demanded
by the superego, all the while taking into account the constraints of reality. As Freud tells it:
The ego’s relation to the id might be compared with that of a rider to his horse.
The horse supplies the locomotive energy, while the rider has the privilege of
deciding on the goal and of guiding the powerful animal’s movement. But only
too often there arises between the ego and the id the not precisely ideal situation
of the rider being obliged to guide the horse along the path by which it itself
wants to go. (Freud, 1933/1990, p. 96)
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 213

How well does the structural model hold up to empirical support? Alas, critics, even psy-
choanalytic psychologists, suggest that we abandon Freud’s structural model of personality
(Brenner, 2003; Westen et al., 2008). There is no evidence that our personalities or our minds
are divided into parts that are more or less logical than other parts (Brenner, 2003). However,
the idea of conflict inherent in this model, and the idea that behavior represents a compromise
among forces of desire, conscience, reality, and social acceptability, remain important and do
influence our thoughts, behaviors, and personality (Westen et al., 2008).

The Topographic Model of Personality: Conscious, Preconscious, Unconscious. The

topographic model of personality consists of the conscious mind, the preconscious mind, and
unconscious mind. The conscious mind contains the thoughts and sensations that we are cur-
rently aware of. The preconscious mind contains thoughts that are just outside of our awareness,
thoughts that are easily accessible and that we could readily summon into our consciousness
(Freud, 1923/1961).
The unconscious mind contains urges, thoughts, wishes, desires, and memories that we are
unable to know about “in itself and without more ado” (Freud, 1923/1961, p. 15). That is, we
are unable to retrieve thoughts from the unconscious by our own efforts except under the spe-
cial circumstances discussed earlier (e.g., through dreams, free association, symbolic behavior,
parapraxes, etc.) (Freud, 1923/1961).
Although we may be able to move from topic to topic in our consciousness, pull out
observations at will from our preconscious, or push thoughts into our unconscious, we cannot
consciously retrieve thoughts directly from our unconscious. The unconscious can produce
particular thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and defenses in us related to our impulses and for this
reason is often called the motivated unconscious (Westen et al., 2008).
Keep in mind that the terminology of conscious, preconscious, and unconscious suggests
three separate parts of the mind, when really Freud believed in the continuity of mental life.
That is, thoughts or memories became conscious—or unconscious for that matter—not as if
they were passing through a curtain to a separate room, but more like how a camera lens makes
a picture come in and out of focus.
How does Freud’s model of mind and memory compare to what we know about the mind
today? Freud was eerily close to what modern cognitive psychology is just now finding out
about how the mind works, albeit with some notable exceptions.
First, Freud was correct in realizing that there is really more of a continuum between
conscious and unconscious rather than a clear cut line between the two states (Erdelyi, 2006b).
You can see this in Freud’s original drawing as a dotted line between the conscious and the
unconscious in Figure 8.3. Also, we can have multiple levels of awareness even for thoughts in
our unconscious (Glaser & Kihlstrom, 2005; Hilgard, 1977). Perhaps we should not talk about
the unconscious as a location; instead we should talk about unconscious processes (Westen,
THINK ABOUT IT
1998b). The important question becomes—especially for therapy (Westen, 1998b)—to what
extent are people aware of their defenses and motives, not what part of the mind is involved. How does Freud’s notion of
Second, Freud was also correct in suggesting that the unconscious influences our conscious the unconscious compare
to automatic thinking from
experiences, including our thoughts and actions (Westen, 1998a, 1998b). However, Freud believed
cognitive psychology?
the unconscious operated in service of our drives; we know today that this view is too simplistic.
Third, current research suggests that the cognitive unconscious is motivated and goal-
driven, as Freud hypothesized, but not quite in the way that he thought. The unconscious is not
preoccupied with the satisfaction of id impulses, nor is it concerned with infiltrating our con-
sciousness with its darker motives, or in betraying our true motives. Instead, the unconscious
mind, much like the conscious mind, can help regulate our thoughts, emotions, motivations,
goals, and even intentions, without all the “conflict and drama” of the psychoanalytic uncon-
sciousness (Uleman, 2005, p. 6). The unconscious is more like a helpful and efficient Jeeves-like
butler and less like a conniving and controlling dark force.

Anxiety and the Defense Mechanisms

Recall that in Freud’s model of personality the ego must satisfy the id impulses in a socially
acceptable way so as not to upset the superego, but must also take into account reality.
214 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Sometimes this balancing of id, superego,

and reality is too much for the ego and
causes anxiety. This anxiety may come out
in—and here’s that mind–body dualism
again—a physical symptom (what Freud
called a conversion reaction) or a psycho-
logical symptom (e.g., anxiety, a neurosis,
a phobia). However, the ego can take mea-
sures to defend itself from the anxiety. One
way the ego can prevent or lessen anxiety
and achieve a balance among desire (id),
morality (superego), and reality is to use a
defense mechanism. Defense mechanisms
are the ego’s way of handling a threaten-
ing thought or an unacceptable impulse
to protect itself and minimize anxiety and
distress.
Today, psychoanalysts have aban-
doned the idea that sexual and aggres-
sive impulses are the most threatening
Anna and Sigmund Freud on for people (Westen, 1998a). Instead, we
holiday in the Dolomites, Italy, are more concerned with threats to our
1913. self-esteem rather than to our egos (Bau-
meister, Dale, & Sommer, 1998). Perhaps
in Freud’s day, acknowledging that one
had sexual and aggressive impulses was particularly threatening to a person’s self-esteem
(Baumeister et al., 1998).
In truth, most of the so-called Freudian defense mechanisms were interpreted and
described in detail by Anna Freud, Sigmund Freud’s daughter and psychoanalyst in her own
right. Anna identified 10 defense mechanisms in her father’s work (A. Freud, 1937/1966).
Others have identified additional defenses (e.g., Vaillant, 1995b) including some 50 or more
since that time (Clark, 1998)!
We will focus on the basic defense mechanisms, first identified by Freud, that are not
indicative of serious pathology, and which have inspired later work in personality (Baumeister
et al., 1998). Do not be surprised if you recognize seeing these in yourself or in people around
you! Defense mechanisms can be useful, short-term ways of handling stress and anxiety.

Reaction Formation. In a reaction formation, instead of expressing a threatening id

impulse, people express the opposite id impulse. A good clue to a reaction formation is that the
reaction is out of proportion to the actual event, either more extreme or more intense than
usual. For example, have you ever noticed that when a dating couple suddenly breaks up they
immediately hate each other? How can love so quickly turn to hate? Sometimes, the circumstances
may warrant the extreme reaction, but I wonder if anxiety over the thought of a love lost doesn’t
make it easier for some people to express the opposite emotion—hate—as a way of coping.
An example of a reaction formation comes from an elderly friend of mine who had just
gotten cable television. Instead of being entertained by the range of choices now available to her,
she expressed her shock and outrage at an R-rated movie shown on one of the movie channels.
She took a good 10 minutes explaining to me, in minute and embarrassing detail, the various
love scenes and how angry watching each scene made her. When I asked her why she didn’t
“The lady doth protest too just change the channel, she exclaimed, “Well, I had to see how it all ended!” Obviously, it was
much, methinks.” too threatening for a usually prim and proper little old lady to admit that she was enjoying, or
Hamlet, Act 3, scene ii, 222–230 being aroused by, the love scenes so she expressed the opposite emotion, disgust.
Reaction formation may be one of the most often used defenses, especially when we fear
others may be judging us badly. One review of the research found that we respond with extreme
and opposite feelings when we are in danger of showing undesirable sexual feelings, prejudiced
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 215

attitudes, or incompetence, for example (Baumeister et al., 1998). It’s as if we are trying to
prove these accusations wrong, by publicly demonstrating the opposite feeling. The evidence
for reaction formation is strong; however, it remains to be determined just how conscious or
unconscious some of our reactions may be.

Isolation. Isolation occurs when we mentally isolate a threatening thought by keeping it

separate from other thoughts and feelings. One way of doing this, as Freud observed in his
patients, is to create a pause or gap between one train of thought and another.
One form of isolation is intellectualization, when we isolate the emotion so that we can
experience thoughts or memories without the disturbing feelings. For example, people may use
intellectualization to logically understand a traumatic event. Also, intellectualization may allow
people to relate horrible stories without being overwhelmed by their emotions.
Isolation is easily understood within a cognitive model. Our thoughts are associated in
our minds and memories so that a negative thought can trigger other negative thoughts. By
mentally isolating negative thoughts—perhaps by consciously thinking of a neutral or positive
thought—we can indeed make ourselves feel better. In fact, many articles that support isolation
are from cognitive psychology and don’t even cite Freud (Baumeister et al., 1998)!
Baumeister et al. (1998) suggested ways that people may use isolation to protect themselves,
such as keeping failure feedback separate from performance standards, trivializing a misdeed,
and isolating past experiences by thinking of the present self like a different person. This may
be why declaring oneself a “born-again Christian” or a “born-again virgin” are such meaningful
designations for some.

Denial. Denial is when we refuse to believe or even acknowledge a threatening or traumatic

event, or the emotions associated with the event. For example, we may exclaim “Oh, no!” imme-
diately on hearing bad news, an effective use of denial that buys us a moment to process the
shock. Or, we might daydream or have fantasies about how things might have been. Denial may
be a helpful coping strategy in the short run, but less effective than other strategies in the long
run (Suls & Fletcher, 1985).
For example, Freud believed that when little boys see that girls’ genitals are different
from theirs, they “disavow the fact and believe that they do see a penis, all the same” (Freud,
1923b/1961, pp. 143–144). Freud theorized that boys use this denial to allay their supposed
castration anxiety, a point we will come back to later.
There is plenty of evidence that people deny feedback that is threatening to their self-
esteem. For example, people may think a test is unfair (Pyszczynski, Greenberg, & Holt, 1985)

Oh, no! Students who lived in

potentially unsafe residence
halls were more likely to
deny that they could be at
risk in case of an earthquake
(Lehman & Taylor, 1987).
216 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

or that research evidence is flawed (Liberman & Chaiken, 1992) if it helps them think well of
themselves despite a poor performance or unhealthy behaviors. People may even convince
themselves, with unrealistic optimism, that their futures are likely to be rosier than that of
their peers (Weinstein, 1980). People may also experience denial in the aftermath of a trauma
as a way of coming to grips with the event slowly (Janoff-Bullman, 1992). Denial has also been
seen in people who deny the seriousness of a breast cancer diagnosis (Carver et al., 1993), the
likelihood of being in harm’s way due to an earthquake (Lehman & Taylor, 1987), and even their
chances of experiencing an unwanted pregnancy (Burger & Burns, 1988).

Undoing. In undoing, a person who has either thought about performing or who has already
performed an unacceptable behavior attempts to nullify that action with a later action. Of
THINK ABOUT IT course, we rationally know that the behavior or thought has occurred, but through: “ . . . a pro-
cedure that may be called magical, of “undoing” [Ungeschehenmachen or un-make-happen]
Can you think of other what has been done” we can take it back or cancel it out (Freud, 1915/1957, p. 164). Freud
examples of undoing in
described it as: “negative magic . . . by means of . . . symbolism to “blow away” not merely the
superstition or children’s
games? consequences of some event (or the experiences or impression) but the event itself ” (Freud,
1925/1959, p. 119).
Freud believed undoing occurred as a part of obsessional disorders, popular customs,
and also religious ceremonies (Freud, 1925/1959). For example, perhaps you’ve heard of the
superstition whereby people must undo the bad luck of having spilled the salt by throwing a
pinch of it over their left shoulder.
More serious examples of undoing might be a woman with an eating disorder who tries
to undo eating by purging. Or an abusive man who might bring his wife flowers to atone for
having harmed her the night before. Both of these involve some pathology where a person is
truly convinced that she or he can undo the undesirable behavior. This extreme form of undo-
ing, whereby people attempt to alter the past, has not been documented in healthy individuals
(Baumeister et al., 1998).
However, a more common and less serious type of undoing that many people uncon-
sciously do is to ruminate over past events, imagining how they might have gone differently and
mentally undoing the damage (Baumeister et al., 1998; Roese, Sanna, & Galinsky, 2005). This
counterfactual thinking was studied in a sample of athletes at the 1992 summer Olympic games
(Medvec, Madey, & Gilovich, 1995). Bronze medal winners were happier than silver medalists
both at the time of their performance and on the medal stand.
Why would the people who performed worse be happier? In a subsequent study, research-
ers were able to interview athletes competing in New York State’s 1994 Empire State Games
directly after their performance. The researchers discovered that the silver medalists were more
occupied than the bronze medalists with thoughts of “I almost did better” than with thoughts

Due to undoing, bronze

medalists may be happier
than silver medalists.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 217

of “at least I did this well.” Silver medalists were preoccupied with thoughts of how they could
have undone their failed performances. Unfortunately, this counterfactual rumination only
made them feel worse.
In sum, the evidence for undoing is mixed, depending on how strict an interpretation
one takes of Freud’s original idea. In either case, magically or mentally undoing the past does
not seem to protect a person, or their self-esteem, from negative events. It might help a person
develop alternative strategies to help a future performance, but it doesn’t change the reality of
a negative event. For this reason Baumeister et al. (1998) suggested that undoing is best viewed
as a coping mechanism to deal with negative events, rather than a defense mechanism.
THINK ABOUT IT
Projection. In projection, we attribute our own disturbing or unacceptable impulses to
another person. For example, say we fight with a friend. Afterward in recalling the incident we How are the defense mech-
might remark “She was very hostile” instead of admitting our own feelings of aggression. Often- anism of projection and
times, what we find annoying in other people is actually more revealing of our own insecurities: the ideas behind projective
tests similar?
It is safer to project them onto others than to admit the failings in ourselves.
In a compelling demonstration of projection, participants attributed their undesirable
traits to another person using an elaborate cover story and three-part procedure (Newman,
Duff, & Baumeister, 1997). First, the researchers gave participants false feedback about their
personalities. They were told that they possessed four positive traits and two undesirable traits
(e.g., inflexible, indecisive, dishonest, disturbed) on a fake personality test.
Then, for the next 5 minutes participants were instructed to think about the results of
the personality test and to free associate, verbalizing their thoughts out loud as they occurred.
However, participants were instructed to not think about one of their negative trait ratings,
which was determined ostensibly at random.
Finally, participants watched a video, without sound, of a college student talking about
herself. From watching her nonverbal behavior they had to rate her personality on the same six
trait dimensions that they had received feedback on in the first part of the experiment.
Would their own false feedback affect their ratings of the target student? It would if they
were using the defense mechanism of projection to deal with the blow to their self-esteem
from the unflattering feedback on the personality test. Participants rated the target more
negatively but on only one of their negative trait dimensions: the one they had been asked
not to think about! In other words, they were more likely to project an unflattering trait that
they were trying not to think about than either a positive or negative trait that they were able
to think about.
Based on the results of this and other related experiments, the researchers concluded that
not thinking about an undesirable trait actually increases the tendency to see that trait in other
people. So Freud was right about projection!
However, the evidence also suggests that projection occurs as a result of trying to suppress
thinking about one’s own faults; it is another example of ironic processing as in the dream study
discussed earlier. That is, thought suppression—not projection—is the defense mechanism;
projection is a result of thought suppression and not a way to avoid thinking about one’s own
faults. Paradoxically, thought suppression makes people more aware of the very traits they are
trying not to think about, both negative and positive (Newman, Duff, Hedberg, & Blitstein,
1996). This increased accessibility makes it more likely that people will use these very traits to
interpret the ambiguous behavior of others.
The bottom line is that Freud identified an important phenomenon: defensive projection.
But it took current research in social and cognitive psychology to fully explain the process.
Our view of ourselves influences our view of others, for both positive and negative traits. But
we commit this projection as a result of thought suppression, not as a way of rejecting these
traits in ourselves.

Displacement. In displacement the true id impulse is expressed but the target of that
impulse is changed into a more acceptable one. Perhaps you’ve seen a child who is angry at her
mother. It would be too threatening to express that anger directly at her mother, so instead she
might express that anger by slamming the door to her room.
218 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Freud’s famous case of Little Hans concerned a 5-year-old boy who was afraid of his father,
but displaced this fear onto horses. Why horses? The horse had “black round their mouths”
and blinders that resembled his father’s mustache and glasses (Freud, 1909a/1955, p. 42). For
more about Hans and why he feared his father, see the Research Methods Illustrated feature
in this chapter.
Despite the popular appeal of this defense, there is very little evidence for displacement
(Baumeister et al., 1998). Often alternative explanations account for the results better than the
notion of displacement. For example, we know that frustration, direct retaliation, or being in bad
mood all increase aggression, but none of these involve displacement (Baumeister et al., 1998).
In fact, the one study that was specifically designed to test for displacement found no significant
effects (Bushman & Baumeister, 1998). Participants in this study were most aggressive toward
the person who angered them and did not take out their aggression on an innocent person.
The idea of displacement hinges on Freud’s notion of catharsis (from the Greek word for
cleanse or purge). The idea was that tension from unsatisfied id impulses builds up, like steam
in a closed system, and must somehow be released or else cause damage to the system in the
form of psychological symptoms. This release of the id energy is called catharsis (Breur &
Freud, 1893/1955). Acting aggressively (body) or viewing aggression (mind) should satisfy the
impulse and lead to less aggression. But does it?
To test this, participants in an experiment wrote an essay and then were later insulted by
THINK ABOUT IT a confederate who called their essay the worst they had ever seen (Bushman, Baumeister, &
What other popular notions Stack, 1999). Half the participants immediately got a chance to work out their aggression by
about catharsis are also hitting a punching bag for 2 minutes, whereas the other half didn’t. Then all participants played
invalid? For example, would an aggressive video game against the very same confederate who had insulted them. Would
watching a violent sport on participants who worked out their aggressiveness against the punching bag be less aggressive
TV increase or decrease later
toward their tormentor?
aggressiveness?
According to the catharsis hypothesis, they ought to, having already released and satisfied the
aggressive impulses triggered by the insulting confederate. However, that’s not what the research-
ers found! Participants who played with the punching bag were actually more aggressive—almost
three times as much—toward their insulter than participants who were told to sit there. Not only
is the concept of catharsis completely without merit, but acting aggressively or even viewing
aggression actually increases later aggressive behavior (Bushman et al., 1999).

Sublimation. Another way of deal-

ing with an unacceptable id impulse is to
change the impulse into something more
acceptable, a process called sublimation.
For example, aggressive urges might be
morphed into the less psychologically
threatening energy for sports, dangerous
hobbies, or healthy competition. Similarly,
Freud believed that sexual urges could
be safely expressed through hard work,
the fine arts, and other creative activities.
Freud noted that society, in socializing us,
demands that we sublimate our sexual and
aggressive urges to be productive members.
Again, despite the intuitive appeal of
sublimation, Baumeister et al. (1998) ada-
mantly claimed that there is no support
whatsoever for sublimation. They were
unable to find even a single article in a top
Despite its intuitive appeal, research journal that showed convincing
there is no empirical support evidence for sublimation. So instead they
for the notion that people tried, unsuccessfully, to find at least cor-
sublimate their sexual drives
relational evidence of possible sublimation
into creative ones.
effects.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 219

For example, Baumeister et al. (1998) looked at historical periods of great creativity and
found no corresponding increase in sexual abstinence; in fact, they found quite the opposite. Peri-
ods of intellectual creativity—think of the Italian Renaissance, Elizabethan England, or ancient
Greece, for example—were generally periods of sexual freedom as well. Similarly, the lives of the
most famous writers, musicians, and painters of the 20th century are marked by “sexual excess
and misadventure” rather than sublimation of sexual impulses (Baumeister et al., 1998, p. 1106).
Until research evidence suggests otherwise, the defense mechanism of sublimation should
be abandoned.

Repression. According to Freud, “the essence of repression lies simply in the function of
rejecting and keeping something out of consciousness” (Freud, 1915b/1957, p. 147). Keeping
an undesirable thought out of consciousness protects a person from anxiety.
Freud originally believed that repression could be conscious or unconscious, going along
with his belief in the continuity of mental life (Erdelyi, 2006b). His daughter Anna made the
distinction between suppression and repression in her interpretation of his defense mechanisms
(A. Freud, 1937/1966). In suppression the ego consciously keeps unacceptable thoughts or urges
outside of our awareness whereas in repression the process is unconscious. For example, if we are
faced with an event or a thought that makes us anxious we can consciously put it out of mind
or suppress thinking about it. However, if this forgetting happens unconsciously, without our
awareness, or out of our control, it would be an example of repression.
Freud believed that some traumatic events could be so anxiety-provoking that the ego
would bury the event deep in the unconscious. You can see this in Freud’s original graphic
in Figure 8.3. He depicts repression as a one-way slide channeling thoughts directly from the
conscious into the very heart of the unconscious.
Defense mechanisms can work on both an explicit level and an implicit level (Vaillant,
1998) and indeed, evidence suggests that one way people cope with trauma is to avoid thinking
about it, either consciously or unconsciously (Brewin, 2003; McNally, 2003a, 2003b). But does
this mean that people have completely forgotten about the traumatic event?
Probably not. First, we know from cognitive psychology that putting a thought out of our
mind consciously, through suppression, or unconsciously, through repression, only makes the
thought occur more frequently (Najmi & Wegner, 2006; Wegner, 1989, 1994; Wegner & Erber,
1992; Wegner, Schneider, Carter, & White, 1987).
Second, generally people do not forget the traumatic event, rather, they cope with the
trauma by managing their emotional responses to the event (Boden, 2006; Foa, Riggs, Massie,
& Yarczower, 1995).
Third, there is no evidence that memories can be repressed and kept out of consciousness
for significant periods of time (Boden, 2006; Crews, 2006; Hayne, Garry, & Loftus, 2006; Holmes,
1995; McNally, 2003a, 2003b; Pope, Oliva, & Hudson, 1999). However, many victims would

Don’t think about this bear:

Paradoxically, trying to not
think of something, as in
repression, makes the thought
occur more frequently.
220 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

THINK ABOUT IT rather not remember the event so they may consciously choose not to share their memories
with friends, family, therapists, or researchers. What may seem on the surface to be repression
Why would there be no may really be due to fear, guilt, or embarrassment (Boden, 2006; Freyd, 2006).
need for the other defense Though the controversy is not entirely over, in light of the evidence available today, repres-
mechanisms if repression
were completely effective?
sion probably ought to be removed from a list of effective defense mechanisms (Rofé, 2008).
Instead, more research on related topics in cognitive psychology such as cognitive avoidance,
retrieval inhibition, or memory bias is needed (Erdelyi, 2000).

Rationalization. Rationalization is when people reinterpret their behavior to hide their true
SEE FOR YOURSELF motivations for their actions. Essentially, the behavior is acknowledged, but it is reinterpreted
Have you ever used a ratio- to seem more acceptable. In this way, the id can be gratified without the superego disapproving.
nalization to hide your true Freud noted that a person suffering from an obsessive neurosis might justify his compul-
motivation for an unaccept- sive behavior by explaining why he did what he did in a rational way. He described a patient
able behavior? of his, who having tripped on a branch in a park, threw the branch into some nearby bushes.
On the way home, the man was suddenly struck with the thought that the branch might be
more dangerous to passers-by in this new place than in the original place along the path.
Freud believed that the man’s anxiety caused him to go back and replace the branch on the
path, but instead of acknowledging this compulsion, the man rationalized it by convincing
himself the branch was safer in its original place, even though, objectively, it wasn’t (Freud,
1909b/1955).
The idea that we rationalize our decisions, beliefs, feelings, and attitudes forms the basis
of cognitive dissonance theory from social psychology (Gray, 2001; Kay, Jimenez, & Jost, 2002).
According to this theory, when we are faced with an inconsistency between our attitude and our
behavior or between two beliefs, it causes us to feel dissonance; that is, to feel like hypocrites
(Festinger, 1957). To feel better—and to convince ourselves that we are indeed logical people—
we find ways of rationalizing or justifying our behavior and beliefs. What cognitive dissonance
calls justification is a specific example of the Freudian defense mechanism of rationalization.
Cognitive dissonance theory was later revised to suggest that we feel the need to rationalize our
beliefs and behaviors only when our actions make us feel bad about ourselves (Aronson, 1968). In
this way cognitive dissonance acts as a defense mechanism to preserve our self-esteem. The empiri-
cal support for cognitive dissonance theory is overwhelming. For example, by motivating people
to explain themselves using the defense mechanism of rationalization, cognitive dissonance theory
has been used to help people overcome eating disorders (Wade, George, & Atkinson, 2009), engage
in safer sex (Stone, Aronson, Crain, Winslow, & Fried, 1994), and conserve water (Dickerson,
Thibodeau, Aronson, & Miller, 1992), to name just a few applications of the theory.

You can see how the defenses all involve some kind of transformation of either the impulse, the
target, or the person feeling the impulse (Freud used the colorful word vicissitudes to describe
the changing nature of the instincts). Keeping these three processes separate will help you dis-
tinguish among the various defense mechanisms.
As you can see, there is quite a lot of evidence for the defense mechanisms. Psychologists
continue to explore these and other defense mechanisms in their practice and in their research in
personality, social psychology, developmental psychology, and cognition (Cramer, 2000, 2006).

Psychosexual Stages
One of the foundations of Freudian psychoanalysis is that adult personality is formed as a result
“[Psychosexual hypotheses] of childhood experiences. Freud set out to describe the process of development based on the
are better understood recollections of his patients in a series of stages called the Psychosexual stages of development.
However, much of what Freud hypothesized about development is controversial. To be able to
metaphorically or discarded
evaluate Freud’s theory, we need to understand just what his claims are. As you read about his
altogether. Knowing which theories below, see if they make sense to you from what you know about child development
ones to discard, however, is from other classes you’ve taken, or from your own experience with children.
not always an easy task.” Because the sexual instinct was of utmost importance to Freud, he interpreted the psy-
Westen et al. (2008, p. 65) chological phenomena he observed within a sexual framework. Each psychosexual stage of
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 221

development starts with a libidinal urge that is experienced in a specific, biologically deter-
mined, part of the body (Freud, 1955). The infant or child feels tension in an erogenous zone
and must find a way of gratifying the id impulse in a socially acceptable way.
Once the id instinct is gratified, the tension subsides and the child is psychologically
able to move into the next stage. However, if the child has received too much or too little
gratification—and Freud did not differentiate between the two—then some libidinal energy
gets left behind (Fenichel, 1945/1995). The child then has fewer psychological resources left
to deal with the challenges of the next stage. The result is a fixation, where psychic energy is
still devoted to resolving the earlier issue instead of moving fully into the next stage. THINK ABOUT IT
A person who is fixated at one of the stages will show certain adult personality character-
Do you agree that personal-
istics and engage in behaviors directly related to the fixation. In addition, the person will show ity is set by age 5? Why or
symbolic activities related to the fixation. In keeping with Freud’s emphasis on the intercon- why not?
nectedness of body and mind, we see evidence of the fixation in both the body (erogenous
zone-related activity) and in the mind (symbolic activity).
Freud hypothesized that we are born with an id, the source of these libidinal urges, so
that id impulses are present from birth (Freud, 1915/2000). By age 2, the ego is formed as
we learn to control our bowel functions, and by age 5 the superego is formed as a result of
resolving the Oedipal complex. By the time a child is around 5 years old, the three parts of
the personality—id, ego, and superego—are formed and work together. This is why Freud
believed that the first 5 years were the most important for development and believed that
personality was set by the age of 5. Table 8.1 summarizes the key elements of Freud’s psycho-
sexual states of development.

Table 8.1 Summary of Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development

Adult Fixation
Name of Erogenous Personality Symbolic
Stage Zone Ages Task Characteristics Activities Activity
Oral stage Mouth 0–18 Early: feeding Oral, incorporative Eating, drinking, Collecting things,
months personality: dependent smoking, kissing good listener,
gullible
Late: weaning Oral sadistic personality: Gum chewing, Sarcasm,
aggressive nail-biting, cynicism, ridicule
overeating
Anal Anus/ 1–3 years Early: feces Anal expulsive Lack of sphincter Overly generous,
stage buttocks expulsion personality: self- or bowel control, gives things away,
confident, uninhibited, bed-wetting creative
resistant to authority
Late: feces Anal retentive Constipation Stinginess,
retention personality: rigid, orderliness,
compulsive, live up to stubbornness,
expectations of others perfectionistic
Phallic Genitals 2–5 years Boys: Oedipus Phallic character: Concern with Power tools,
stage complex, hyper-masculinity virility, machismo cars, trucks, large
castration, machinery
anxiety
Girls: Oedipus Hysterical character: Flirtatiousness, Promiscuity,
complex, penis Hyper-femininity seductiveness castration of men:
envy male-bashing
Latency (None) 5–puberty Sublimation (A period of psychological rest—no fixation at this stage)
stage
Genital (None) Adulthood To marry, procreate, be a productive member of society:
stage “Lieben und arbeiten” which means “To love and to work”
Source: Bornstein 2005, Table 1, p. 327. Bonstein, R. F. (2005). Reconnecting psychoanalysis to main stream psychology. Psychoanalytic Psychology, 22(3), 323–340. Copyright
American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.
222 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Oral Stage. At birth and until about 18 months of age, an infant’s life revolves around feeding
(Freud, 1915/2000). The erogenous zone of the oral stage is the mouth. The child gains pleasure
through the mouth, as she takes in nourishment. Early in the oral stage infants are concerned
with feeding, sucking, and swallowing. Later in the oral stage, the child develops teeth. Now the
oral pleasures change from taking in to biting and devouring. If a child gets too much or too
THINK ABOUT IT little pleasure from these activities—taking in while very young or biting when a little older—
Did you know that Freud then the infant may develop an oral fixation as an adult.
loved to collect Greek, If the lack of appropriate gratification occurred early in the stage, the results might be the
Roman, and Byzantine oral incorporative personality. As an adult, this person would replay this early infantlike state
antiques? He was seldom by showing excessive dependency and by trying to gain oral satisfaction by eating, drinking,
without his trademark cigar smoking, or kissing. She might also try to get satisfaction through symbolic oral incorporative
and, as a therapist, was a
activities like collecting things, being a good listener, and being gullible (taking in what people
good listener.
tell her).
However, if the lack of gratification occurred later in the stage, then a person might develop
the oral sadistic personality showing aggressive behavior, oral activities like gum chewing,
nail-biting, or overeating, and the symbolic biting behaviors of sarcasm, cynicism, and ridicule.

Anal Stage. Once an infant has been weaned, the next biological milestone is learning bowel
and sphincter control, as this is the age that most children must face toilet training. Between the
ages of 1 and 3 years, the child must learn where and when it is appropriate to relieve himself.
This is the first time that a child must adhere to societal expectations, as enforced by the parents,
instead of being totally indulged. How the child reacts to the monitoring and control of the
parents can determine adult personality.
A child might react by feces expulsion, obtaining gratification by letting loose whenever and
wherever. As an adult, this anal expulsive personality will show the personality traits of being self-
confident, uninhibited, nonconventional, and resisting of authority. He may show the physical
behaviors of lack of sphincter or bowel control, and bed-wetting. He may also show the symbolic
behaviors of being overly generous and giving things away, and also by being highly creative.
Alternatively, a child might react to parental control of her feces by refusing to go, holding
on to her bowel movements. This adult anal retentive personality is rigid, compulsive, and lives
up to the expectations of others. She might have physical anal problems (e.g., constipation),
and also show the symbolic anal retentive activities of being stingy, highly organized, stubborn,
and perfectionistic (Freud, 1908/1959).
Today we know that in adults, bowel and bladder problems are real physical disorders and
are not related to an anal fixation.

Phallic Stage. The phallic stage is the most complicated and the most controversial of Freud’s
stages of development. So far, the developmental stages have tracked the id impulses from the
mouth to the anus. Now, in the course of toilet-training the child discovers his penis (Freud
couched everything in terms of masculine development, so let’s put aside for a moment what
happens if you don’t happen to have a penis). In the phallic stage, the child feels id impulses in
the penis and seeks gratification here by masturbation.
The young boy feels sexual feelings toward the mother and wants to marry his mother.
However, there’s one problem: the father. The boy starts to harbor hatred for his father, as the
father is his rival for the love and attention of the mother. The boy must now find some way
of resolving this Oedipus complex (Freud, 1925/1961), named for the mythical Greek king of
Thebes who unwittingly killed his father and married his mother.
At the same time, the boy discovers that girls are missing a penis. He reasons that girls must
have had one, and therefore must have had it cut off and reacts with “horror at the mutilated
creature” (Freud, 1925/1961, p. 252). Because his penis is the source of both pleasurable feel-
ings and sexual feelings toward his mother the boy develops castration anxiety and lives in
fear that the father will cut his off as well. Freud noted that this fear may have originated with
actual castration threats, not uncommon at the time in children who had been admonished to
not touch themselves.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 223

As a result, the boy then realizes that he must repress his desire for his mother and his
hostility for the father or else he may face retribution from the father. So he represses these
feelings and instead identifies with the father. By identifying with the father, imagining that
he is the father, he gets to possess his mother, at least in his mind, through wish fulfillment of
the id. Through identification, he also internalizes the father’s superego, taking on his father’s
morality.
If a boy does not resolve his Oedipus complex and identify with the father he may become
fixated at this stage. Such a man develops a phallic character marked by an overly exaggerated
sense of masculinity or machismo. This phallic character continually strives to prove his virility
by engaging in hobbies that are symbolic of the phallus: power tools, cars, trucks, and a desire
for large machinery.
In girls, the process works slightly differently, with a much less satisfactory ending. Like
the boy, the girl starts out strongly attracted to the mother, after all she is the source of comfort
and food. The girl makes a “momentous discovery” that boys have a penis “strikingly visible
and of large proportions, [and] at once recognize it as the superior counterpart of their own
small and inconspicuous organ, and from that time forward fall a victim to envy for the penis”
experiencing penis envy (Freud, 1925/1961, p. 252).
The girl reasons that she must have had one, but that it was somehow cut off. And because
the only person close enough to have done so is her mother, she thinks that her mother must
have cut off her penis. At the same time, she is sexually attracted to the father, but she is also
angry and jealous because he has a penis and she doesn’t.
The sad conclusion Freud comes to is that there is no satisfactory way for a girl to resolve
her Oedipus complex: “it may be slowly abandoned or dealt with by repression or its effects
THINK ABOUT IT
may persist far into women’s normal mental life” (Freud, 1925/1961, p. 257). A girl’s penis envy
essentially keeps her fixated at this stage until she can achieve symbolic possession of a penis Which is more important
through having a baby (ideally, a male baby) with a man who resembles her father. “She gives for Freudian theory, the lack
of a penis or the lack of a
up the wish for a penis and puts in place of it a wish for a child: and with that purpose in view
superego?
she takes her father as a love-object” (Freud, 1925/1961, p. 256).
Because girls do not come to identify with their fathers, they have no way of developing a
superego. Therefore women are lacking in moral character and are naturally inferior to men:
“I cannot evade the notion (though I hesitate to give it expression) that for women the level of
what is ethically normal is different from what it is in men” (Freud, 1925/1961, p. 258). This is
why Freud believed that anatomy is destiny.
Many people oversimplify Freud by thinking that the lack of a penis is what makes women
inferior to men. But it’s the lack of a superego that is more damaging for the status of women,
according to Freud.
A woman who is fixated at this stage develops a hysterical character, marked by an exag-
gerated femininity and activities such as flirting, seducing men, and promiscuity (think of
Scarlett O’Hara the Southern belle from Gone With the Wind). She may find ways of symboli-
cally remedying her penis envy by trying either to gain the penis she lacks through promiscuity,
or to begrudge men the penis they have by symbolically castrating men through insulting and
belittling them.
What did Freud have to say to women at the time who objected to his theory? “We must not
allow ourselves to be deflected from such conclusions by the denials of the feminists, who are
anxious to force us to regard the two sexes as completely equal in position and worth” (Freud,
1925/1961, p. 258).

Latency Stage. The latency stage, from age 5 until puberty, is a time of no significant devel-
opments, at least in terms of id impulses and activity in erogenous zones. Freud hypothesized
THINK ABOUT IT
that id impulses are sublimated into other activities like schoolwork, athletics, and friendships
with same-sex peers (Freud, 1915/2000). Because of the child’s reproductive immaturity, these What kinds of developmen-
impulses cannot be satisfied and so must be defended against with sublimation. However, today tal changes do children go
through from ages 5 until
we know that this is an important time for physical, cognitive, social, and emotional develop-
puberty?
ment in children.
224 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Freud failed to recognize that

the latency period, ages 5 to
13, is an important time of
physical, cognitive, social, and
emotional development in
children.

THINK ABOUT IT Genital Stage. Once young people reach puberty they are, or least they were in Freud’s day,
considered adults. If people passed successfully through the oral, anal, phallic, and latency
When does a person stages, getting proper gratification, then they would be able to face the responsibilities of adult-
become an adult in today’s hood. To be an adult—and Freud was very clear on this, reflecting his conventional, conserva-
society? Why?
tive, and narrow Victorian sensibility—meant that you would be heterosexual, marry, have
children, and be a self-sufficient, productive member of society. This philosophy is summed
up in his phrase “Lieben und arbeiten” which means “To love and to work” (Erikson, 1950).
If, however, a person was unsuccessful in resolving the tasks or challenges of each of the
psychosexual developmental stages, he or she would have problems in adulthood caused by a
fixation in one of the stages. And how did Freud suggest that we resolve a fixation? Why, by psy-
chotherapy of course, where these unconsciously repressed urges and ungratified id impulses
“Freud was one of the could be explored and the fixation resolved.
most creative thinkers in
Problems With Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development. A thorough critique of
psychology, but that doesn’t
Freud’s claims, even if we just limit it to a discussion of the Oedipus complex, would take
mean he was right about an entire volume by itself! However, because much of what he said is very controversial, it is
everything.” worth discussing some of the major critiques. Indeed, some of these apply to other aspects of
Psychologist Roy Baumeister as cited his work as well.
in Azar (1997, p. 28) First, he worked out his theory of psychosexual development by analyzing the recollections
of his patients and himself. Further, we know that his patients were generally suffering from
some sort of emotional problem. Essentially, he started with adults who had problems, and
asked them to remember their childhoods, instead of studying children at each of the stages
“The process of moral
or by studying a handful of children as they progressed through the stages, or by comparing
internalization may have the childhoods of adults with and without problems. As a result, his theory is based on biased
already begun long before methods and biased sampling.
young children would have Second, think about what Freud’s theory of the Oedipal complex starts with: knowledge
even experienced much of an of genital differences between males and females. Do children between the ages of 2 and 5
Oedipal or Electra complex, really know about genital differences? Apparently, they do not know enough to either feel
inferior or to fear castration as Freud claims (Bem, 1989; Brilleslijper-Kater & Baartman,
much less have resolved
2000; Katcher, 1955).
it. . . . [P]erhaps it’s time to Third, boys and girls do not differ in morality, despite the theorized lack of superego
lay his theory of Oedipal formation in girls. One author, after finding no differences in morality of boys and girls and
morality to rest.” finding that children are able to behave morally much sooner than Freud imagined by toddler-
Shaffer (2009, p. 343) hood even, urged psychologists to abandon this invalid Oedipal morality theory (Shaffer, 2009).
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 225

Finally, his whole theory of psychosexual development hinges on the notion of sexual
fantasy. However, what if his adults were remembering not just thoughts, wishes, or fantasies
of sexual acts, but memories of actual sexual assaults?
Originally, Freud believed that his patients, both men and women, were victims of sexual
assault as children. He presented a paper in 1896 called “Etiology of Hysteria” (Masson, 1984a,
1984b). Of the 18 patients with hysteria undergoing therapy with Freud at the time, all of them
had a history of sexual assault, with independent corroborating evidence in some cases.
Jeffrey Masson—a leading Freud scholar and project director of the Sigmund Freud
Archives until he went public with Freud’s original ideas over the objections of the officers
of the archives, including Anna Freud herself—described the assault theory based on Freud’s
correspondences of the time. Freud believed that the assaults were real and not a result of false
memories or leading questions on the part of the therapist because
Freud’s patients recalled their traumas “with all the feelings that belonged to the
original experience”; that is, they took the permission to remember as a permis-
sion to feel, and the feelings apparently absent from the original assault were at
last experiences: the anger, the disgust, the sense of helplessness and betrayal, all
these powerful emotions surfaced. Freud was like an explorer who has chanced
on a long-submerged world. (Masson, 1984b, p. 35)
Even one of Freud’s colleagues at the time, Sándor Ferenczi, reportedly found similar evidence
in his patients, but found the reports hard to believe because they suggested that the sexual abuse of
children was widespread at the time. However, in 1905 Freud recanted the 1896 paper and instead
concluded that the incidents were fantasy, emanating from the sexual feelings of the child. Masson
believed—based on original unpublished documents and correspondence at the time, much of
which had been censored by Freud and his followers to eliminate any mention of his unfortunately
named seduction theory—that Freud capitulated to pressures at the time and was forever haunted
by this decision. Instead of exposing a powerful and respected colleague at the time as a fraud,
implying that other respected colleagues at the time could be child molesters and exposing child
abuse for the widespread problem it was, Freud claimed he was mistaken and withdrew the theory.
By blaming the victim of a botched operation for her own physical problems saying that
she nearly bled to death “deriving from repressed wishes not an unskilled surgeon” and Freud’s
own negligence in the case, he saved his own reputation and the reputation of the colleague
(Masson, 1984b, p. 41). However, by hypothesizing that children have sexual feelings for adults,
Freud was able to excuse the suspect behavior of a few of his colleagues, including perhaps his
own father, and essentially blamed the victim for his or her own abuse.
Let’s consider for a moment if Freud’s theory of psychosexual development was indeed a
theory, not of normal development, but of the development of a child who had been abused.
Does childhood sexuality originate within the child, or with the child’s experience with an
adult? Could early sexual abuse account for how children would know about genital differences
at so young an age? Also, why must a girl hate her mother instead of merely identifying with
her like boys do with their fathers? Might the girl be angry at her mother, not for cutting off her
penis, but for failing to protect her from an abusive father? And why must a girl also be angry
at her father? Could he have been the perpetrator of the abuse? No wonder that being able to
marry and have sexual relations in marriage became the benchmarks of healthy development.
We might well ask ourselves which theory accounts for the data better, Freud’s original assault
theory or his later theory of childhood sexuality?
Masson (1984b) claimed that some of Freud’s case histories make more sense if reread with
sexual abuse in mind. Consider Freud’s description of a session with a young woman:
THINK ABOUT IT
I told her that I was quite convinced that her cousin’s death had had nothing
at all to do with her state, but that something else had happened which she Do you agree with Masson
had not mentioned. At this, she gave way to the extent of letting fall a single that some of Freud’s case
studies make more sense if
significant phrase; but she had hardly said a word before she stopped, and her reread with sexual abuse in
old father, who was sitting behind her, began to sob bitterly. Naturally I pressed mind?
my investigation no further, but I never saw the patient again. (p. 45)
226 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

However, critics refute Masson’s claims and argue that Freud either lied about his patient’s
reports, incorrectly inferred abuse from their symptoms, or created false memories in his
patients, and that the medical community of the time rejected Freud’s claims for these reasons
and not because they found his allegations of abuse repugnant (Gleaves & Hernandez, 1999).
The seduction theory, combined with Freud’s notion of repression, fueled the false memory
controversy of the 1980s (Erdelyi, 2006a). At the time, there were a number of cases in the news
of people who claimed to have remembered traumatic events that had happened to them years
before. Later, these traumatic events were shown to be false. The popular press perpetuated the
invalid belief that memories could be repressed for years and then suddenly come to the surface.
Past incidences of abuse were believed to be responsible for a whole list of psychological and
physical complaints, even if the person involved couldn’t recall any such abuse.
What causes false memories? First, memory does not work like an electronic recording; it is
constructive and vulnerable to inconsistencies including the implantation—and recovery—of
false memories (Loftus, Garry, & Feldman, 1994; Schacter, 1987; Sedikides & Green, 2006).
Second, false memories may also occur due to leading questions or suggestions by inept or
unscrupulous therapists (Loftus & Bernstein, 2005; Kihlstrom, 2006), a charge leveled by some
critics at Freud himself (Esterson, 1993, 1998, 2001, 2002a, 2002b). However, some recovered
memories may be real.
Although scholars continue to debate the status of Freud’s seduction theory (see Gleaves
& Hernandez, 1999, for a good summary), alas, the failure to take childhood sexual abuse seri-
THINK ABOUT IT ously from the start has done damage to the field and to countless individuals. We must keep
in mind that “false alarms do not imply the absence of true hits” (Erdelyi, 2006a, p. 40). The
Why do people continue to true tragedy is that these concepts have entered the culture so that most people, especially those
believe in the Oedipus com-
who have not taken a psychology class, somehow continue to believe that childhood sexuality
plex, despite no supporting
evidence for its existence? and the Oedipus complex are real, psychologically meaningful concepts, instead of misguided
and invalid theories.
As long as we expect to see Oedipal behaviors—or oral or anal for that matter—we are
apt to recognize them in the world around us as a result of our own self-fulfilling prophesies
and confirmation biases, and not due to Freud’s alleged genius in shedding light on impor-
tant aspects of human experience. Certainly, Freud was on the right track in identifying the
importance of early family experiences on later development, but he was wrong in hypothesiz-
ing that it revolves around sexual feelings. The empirical evidence does not support Freud’s
psychosexual stages of development.

Research Methods Illustrated: Case Study and Psychobiography

C
ase study, an in-depth study of a single person, has traditionally been an important
technique in medicine and clinical psychology to illustrate disorders. Psychobiography is
the use of psychological theory, usually personality theory, to organize a person’s life into a
coherent story (McAdams, 1988). Notable case studies in personality include Jenny (Allport, 1965),
Henry Kissinger (Swede & Tetlock, 1986), a man who sailed solo around the world (Nasby & Read,
1997), and various U.S. presidents (Simonton, 1999).
A case study can help us reach a greater understanding of the personality of a specific person
(Elms, 2007), showing us how a person is unique, especially after we’ve discovered commonalities
among people or between this person and other people (Schultz, 2005). Like any research method,
there are strengths and weaknesses to the case study method. Of course, the major weakness is that
we can draw conclusions only about this particular person; we can’t generalize to other people and
we can’t demonstrate causality in the way a true experiment can.
However, rather than supporting or disconfirming a theory, like experiments, a case study
can be used to generate theory. Whereas the logic of an experiment is deductive (generalizing
from a general principle to a specific instance), the logic of a case study is inductive
(generalizing from a specific instance to a general principle). In this way, the life of an individual
person can inspire a new theory (Carlson, 1988). Case studies can help us understand a theory
better by seeing how the theory may work in a real person with all of his or her idiosyncrasies
(Elms, 2007). Case studies provide useful evidence, explanation, and interpretation of how a
theory may work when applied to a single person (Elms, 2007).
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 227

The strength of a case study

depends on the choice of subject
and on the thoroughness of the
researcher. Researchers, whenever
they conduct research but especially
when doing a case study, need to be
aware of their own personal biases
that may unduly influence their work.
Also, researchers need to remain
open to the possibility that they
could be wrong about a person and
should take pains to verify, ideally
though multiple sources of data, their
conclusions about the subject of
their case study.
Freud was known for a number
of famous case studies, including
Leonardo Da Vinci (Freud, 1910/1964)
and Woodrow Wilson (Freud, 1967). In the case study method,
Let’s take a look at his case of Little psychologists study a single
Hans, the 5-year-old boy who person in great depth.
developed a fear of horses (Freud, Pictured here is Bertha
1909a/1955). Hans was the son of Pappenheim, whom Freud
one of Freud’s associates who carried wrote about as “Anna O” in a
out the analysis of the boy himself famous case study.
and reported the events as they
unfolded to Freud. Of course, Hans’s
case was met with great excitement, as this was a chance to see how the theorized sexual instincts
of the phallic stage would play out in an actual child.
Hans’s father reported that between ages 3 and 4 Hans was very curious about “wiwimakers”
(unfortunately translated as widdlers in English). He quickly understood that horses and dogs had
one but that tables and chairs didn’t. When his father drew a picture of a giraffe after an outing to the
zoo, Hans insisted that they add the giraffe’s wiwimaker as well (see Figure 8.4). He noticed that his
3-month-old baby sister Hannah had a “tiny, little one.” He saw his father’s, but when he asked if his
mother had one, she replied that of course she did. At the same time, Hans would often touch himself,
Widdler
a habit his parents wished to break him of. They even threatened to cut off his penis if he didn’t stop.
At about age 5, Hans developed a phobia about going out, for fear that a horse would bite him.
When he was taken outside, he would immediately wish to return home and be comforted in the
arms of his mother. Later, they discovered that he was particularly afraid of horses with blinders on Figure 8.4 The picture of a
and black harnesses around their mouths (see Figure 8.5). giraffe drawn by Hans’s father.
Hans’s fears seemed to increase after an extended summer vacation in the country. While The wiwimaker was added by
his father worked in the city, Hans could spend time alone with his mother. He especially liked to Hans himself. Source: S. Freud,
cuddle with her in the morning. He even had a dream during this time that his mother left him and 1955/1909a, p. 13. Freud, S.
he had nobody to cuddle with. Hans’s father blamed his mother for spoiling the boy by spending (1955/1909a). Analysis of a
so much time with him as well as, in his mind, excessive displays of affection. His father noted that phobia in a five-year old boy.
Hans still had not stopped touching himself, but grew increasingly anxious about this habit (recall In Standard edition: Volume
Hans’s “wanting’s not doing” quote during our discussion of wish fulfillment and the superego). 10. (p. 5–149). London, UK.:
One night Hans had a telling dream: “In the night there was a big giraffe in the room and a Hogarth Press. (Original work
crumpled one; and the big one called out because I took the crumpled one away from it. Then it published 1909).
stopped calling out; and then I sat down on top of the crumpled
one” (Freud, 1909a/1955, p. 37). A few days later Hans expressed Figure 8.5 The picture Hans’s
his fear that one or both of his parents might leave him, and this father drew of a horse with black
came out later at breakfast. Hans’s father got up to leave and around his mouth and blinders
Hans remarked: “Daddy, don’t trot away from me!” on. Source: S. Freud, 1955/1909a,
For Freud and Hans’s father, this unusual choice of words p. 49. Freud, S. (1955/1909a).
suggested the unconscious reason for his fear: His father was Analysis of a phobia in a five-
the horse! Of course, they interpreted the fear to be that Hans year old boy. In Standard edition:
was afraid that the horse (his father) would hurt him because he Volume 10. (p. 5–149). London,
wanted his mother all to himself. UK.: Hogarth Press. (Original
work published 1909).
228 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

Freud and Hans’s father believed that this was all part of Hans’s Oedipal complex. First, Hans
was obviously in love with his mother. Second, though he claimed to be fearful when his father
was away, he really wanted his father out of the picture so he could have his mother all to himself.
Freud reasoned that Hans wanted to do away with his father (the big giraffe) to have his mother
(the crumpled giraffe). Then, Hans developed a castration anxiety and feared that his father would
cut off his penis as revenge for wanting his mother. So instead of fearing his father, Hans displaced
that fear onto horses and came to fear horses. This was later confirmed by his fear, actually a
disguised wish, that his father would fall down and die like in an actual horse-and-cart accident he
unfortunately witnessed while out with his mother.
But, can you think of an alternative explanation for his fear? How might a small child react to
an accident involving carts and horses? How might a typical 3-year-old react to a new baby in the
house? How might a 4-year-old react to his father being away from home for an extended period
of time? Finally, not long after these events Hans’s parents separated and eventually divorced. Does
this suggest to you a different interpretation of events?
This classic case demonstrates both the advantages and the problems of the case study
method. Though this case allegedly illustrates Freud’s theory of childhood sexuality including id
impulses, the Oedipus complex, and castration anxiety, Freud himself realized the biases contained
in the case. He cautioned, “psychoanalysis is not an impartial scientific investigation, but a
therapeutic measure” (Freud, 1909a/1955, p. 104).

“The assumption that there

are unconscious mental
Psychodynamic Theory Since Freud
processes, the recognition of There have been a number of movements within psychoanalysis since Freud’s time. In the
the theory of resistance and early days, some of Freud’s colleagues broke with him and started their own systems. These
repression, the appreciation neo-Freudians included Alfred Adler, Carl Jung, Karen Horney, Eric Fromm, and Harry Stack
of the importance of Sullivan. Like Freud, they developed their own theories of personality and techniques of therapy
(Westen et al., 2008).
sexuality and of the Oedipus
In particular, some objected to Freud’s “id psychology” and developed their own ego psy-
complex—these constitute chology, which focused on the development and functions of the ego rather than the impulses
the principal subject matter of the id. These early pioneers included Heinz Hartmann and Freud’s own daughter Anna
of psycho-analysis and the Freud (Westen et al., 2008).
foundations of its theory. No Systems such as object rela-
one who cannot accept them tions theory, self-psychology, and
relational psychology soon followed
all should count himself a
(Wolitzky, 2006). All were rooted in
psycho-analyst.” psychoanalysis, but placed a greater
Sigmund Freud (1955, p. 247) emphasis on mental representa-
tions of the self and others and less
of an emphasis on sex and aggres-
sion. Object relations theory, for
example, focuses on the cognitive
and emotional processes involved
in intimate relationships: how we
form close relationships, bond,
and cognitively represent impor-
tant others. Object relations theory
is concerned with the impact of
actual experiences instead of fan-
tasy (Westen et al., 2008). Major
theorists in object relations theory
Karen Horney (1885–1952) include Heinz Kohut (1966, 1971,
took issue with many 1977, 1984), Otto Kernberg (1975,
of Freud’s concepts and 1984), Charles Brenner (1982), and
established feminine
Stephen Mitchell (1988, 1993, 1997;
psychology.
Greenberg & Mitchell, 1993).
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 229

What does psychoanalysis look like today? There are five postulates that define contempo- “There are very few analysts
rary psychoanalytic theory. These are aspects of Freudian theory that are supported by experi- who follow all of Freud’s
mental data and which are endorsed by most psychoanalytic psychologists today (Westen, formulations.”
1998a, 2000): Morris Eagle, president of the psy-
1. Much of our thoughts, feelings, motives, defenses, fears, and wishes are unconscious. choanalysis division of the American
Unconscious processes remain central to contemporary psychoanalysis. Psychological Association as cited in
Horgan (1996, p. 106)
2. Part of being human is recognizing that we have conflicting thoughts, feelings, and motiva-
tions. Behavior is often an imperfect compromise among these forces. Our unconscious
is more rational than Freud thought; feelings influence our cognitions more than modern
cognitive psychology originally thought. THINK ABOUT IT
3. Personality begins to form in childhood and shows continuity into adulthood. Childhood Why is the distinction
experiences are important in making us who we are as adults, especially when it comes to between fantasy and real-
our relationships with others. ity important to object
4. Mental representations of self, others, and relationships are important. These representa- relations theory? Why was
fantasy more important to
tions guide the way we form later relationships and the kind of psychological problems we
Freudians?
may experience.
5. Personality development and growth involves moving from an immature, dependent state
to a mature interdependent state. Development involves more than managing our sexual
and aggressive urges; it includes managing feelings of dependency, independency, and
interdependency in socially appropriate ways.
To see what these five postulates look like in a contemporary theory, let us consider a current
theory, developed through and supported by empirical research. Attachment theory has been
described as the resurrection of the psychodynamic theory of personality (Shaver & Mikulincer,
2005). Though originally grounded in psychoanalytic thinking, attachment theory has moved
beyond these roots to become an influential theory of personality, close relationships, and devel-
opmental psychology and has already changed psychoanalytic theories of child development
(Westen et al., 2008; see also Fonagy, Gergely, & Target, 2008; Shaver & Mikulincer, 2007).

Attachment Theory
Brief History
Imagine a typical children’s hospital in the United States or Europe during the early part of the “[The child] may be ill-fed
20th century. Infants and toddlers were kept in individual cubicles and were tended by masked and ill-sheltered, he may
and hooded nurses and doctors who walked carefully to avoid stirring up germs. Parents were be very dirty and suffering
not permitted to touch, hug, cuddle, comfort, or even see their children for the duration of their
from disease, he may be
hospital stay, sometimes up to 1 year. The attending medical staff would handle the children
only minimally, propping bottles on pillows to feed them efficiently and antiseptically (Karen, ill-treated, but, unless his
1994). parents have wholly rejected
As chilling as this sounds to us, that was pretty much the standard way hospitals and him, he is secure in the
orphanages worked in those days. People were more concerned about sterility, orderliness, and knowledge that there is
the physical needs of children than about their emotional needs. How did infants and children someone to whom he is of
raised in these conditions fare? Not very well. Despite better nutrition and a cleaner environ-
value and who will strive,
ment, the children healed slower, seemed listless and depressed, and when they returned home
(or were eventually adopted) they had behavioral problems ranging from anger to delinquency even though inadequately, to
to detachment. Parents complained that the child they brought home was a very different child provide for him.”
from the one they checked in a short time ago (Karen, 1994). John Bowlby as cited in Karen
John Bowlby, a child psychiatrist originally trained as a psychoanalyst, was one of the young (1994, p. 64)
interns caring for children in a clinic very much like this. He was disturbed by what he saw in
hospitals and clinics of the day and set out to document that children’s emotional needs were THINK ABOUT IT
just as—if not more—important than their physical needs. Bowlby believed that emotional ties
What is it like for hospital-
with mother, the primary caregiver for most children at the time, had an impact on emotional ized children today?
regulation, interpersonal relations, and mental health across the life span (Shaver & Mikulincer,
230 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

The Personality of Everyday Life

Taking the trauma out of a hospital stay
While observing children in the hospital, Bowlby noticed a distinct pattern of emotional
responses to separation from the primary caregiver, be it the mother, the father, or a nurse.
First is protest, where the infant cries, clings to, and tries to actively seek out the mother
to either prevent her from leaving or to reestablish contact with her. Second is despair,
where the infant shows sadness, passivity, and an increased hopelessness that the mother
will return and appears to be mourning her loss. Finally, there is detachment, where the
infant responds to the returning mother with loss of interest, turning away, apathy, and
a lack of attachment behaviors seen before the separation (Bowlby, 1969). After reunion
with the primary caregiver some children returned to normal after a number of days, but
some children remained affected for a very long time.
This same pattern was also found in primate infants. Infant monkeys, separated from
their mothers, preferred a warm, cuddly, terrycloth monkey over the cold, hard wire mesh
surrogate mother even though only the wire mesh mother had food. Though psycholo-
gists at the time predicted that the monkey would prefer the mother who provided it with
nourishment, Harlow discovered that contact comfort was a more powerful force, and the
observations of Bowlby bear this out in human infants (Harlow, 1958).
Even Anna Freud noticed that during the Second World War, some children preferred
to sleep next to their mothers in a dark and scary air raid shelter under the streets of Lon-
don than alone in the sterile but safe clinic for children she ran just outside the city. Alas,
she failed to appreciate the full import of her observations (Karen, 1994).
Today, hospitals make arrangements for a parent or guardian to stay in the room with
the child for the entire length of the child’s hospital stay. Some hospitals, such as the world-
renowned St. Jude’s Children’s Research hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, avoid hospital-
izing children entirely! They recognize that a child’s parents and family are a great source
of emotional and social support, especially during an illness. By encouraging families to
stay together and to stay in a homelike setting rather than in the hospital, these hospitals
aim to fulfill the attachment needs of children for a secure base and a safe haven.

2007). Although he agreed with Freud’s view that much of adult behavior has its roots in child-
hood social experiences, he wanted to observe these events directly and over time rather than
rely on adults’ reminiscences (Shaver & Clark, 1994).
Bowlby theorized that the attachment system evolved to keep infants close to their moth-
ers and safe from harm. According to Bowlby: (1) An infant who trusts that the mother will
THINK ABOUT IT be accessible and responsive will be less fearful than an infant who does not have confidence
that the mother will be available. (2) This confidence is built up slowly from birth through
Can internal working mod-
els account for supposed adolescence and will remain relatively unchanged through adulthood. (3) These expectations
love at first sight? are fairly accurate reflections of the experiences individuals have actually had. Bowlby referred
to these expectations as internal working models (Bowlby, 1973).
As a result of our early attachment relationships we form two sets of internal working
models: working models of others and working models of our self. The working model of others
comes from our expectations of our primary caregiver’s responsiveness. The working model
of our self comes from our feelings of worthiness, lovability, and competence, as individuals
deserving of help (Bowlby, 1969). These internal working models of others and of ourselves
remain with us throughout our lives and form the basis of subsequent close relationships:
They organize our memories and guide future interactions with people we would like to be
close with.
But more than that, according to Bowlby, having secure attachments allows us to function
better out in the world. With a secure base, we show increased exploration of our world, and
develop self-regulation and the ability to rely on others when necessary. Insecure people are not
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 231

Securely attached children

will use their parents as a safe
base from which to explore
the world.

able to explore the world or make healthy connections with others. A person with an anxious
attachment may be overly dependent on others, whereas an avoidant person may be overly
self-reliant (Shaver & Mikulincer, 2007).
Bowlby’s work would be merely theoretical musings if not for the research of Mary
Ainsworth. Ainsworth and her colleagues regularly visited infants and mothers in the Balti-
more area multiple times during the baby’s first year and watched how they interacted while
the mother attended to the baby’s needs during a 4-hour visit (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters,
& Wall, 1978). Researchers rated the mother’s sensitivity to the infant’s signals; acceptance,
as opposed to rejection, of the infant and his or her needs; cooperation with the infant’s
desires and rhythms, rather than being interfering, demanding, or intrusive; and availabil-
ity to the infant, rather than ignoring the infant’s signals. For example, Ainsworth and her
assistants recorded every time the mother or baby touched, cuddled, smiled, vocalized, made
eye contact, or had face-to-face interactions. She noticed that some mothers were particu-
larly sensitive and responsive to the infant’s signals. Then—inspired by Bowlby’s work—she
wanted to see how the infants reacted when separated from their mothers. She developed a
laboratory technique called the Strange Situation.
In the Strange Situation a mother and her infant are brought to a laboratory room filled
with toys. Over the next 30 minutes, the mother and the baby go through a series of separa-
tions and reunions, lasting about 3 minutes each. The infant’s reactions are carefully monitored
during three key periods: free play with the mother in the room, separation where the mother
departs, and reunion when the mother returns.
Not only did Ainsworth and her colleagues see remarkable differences in infants’ behavior
in the Strange Situation, but they also were able to relate the infants’ attachment behaviors to
the mothers’ sensitivity and responsiveness in the home (Ainsworth et al., 1978). They identi-
fied three patterns of attachment.
At home, children of sensitive and responsive mothers cried less, communicated better,
obeyed more, and enjoyed close bodily contact more than children of less responsive mothers.
Though they enjoyed physical contact, they were not clingy and actually sought physical contact
less than infants in the other two groups. According to Ainsworth these infants showed secure
attachment. In the Strange Situation of the laboratory they used the mother as a secure base
from which to explore the toys in the lab and as a safe haven to return to for safety and comfort
when danger is near, such as the approach of the laboratory assistant (Ainsworth et al., 1978).
In contrast, other mothers were less affectionate during the child’s first 3 months and
frequently disliked and avoided close bodily contact with the child during the first year. These
infants showed avoidant attachment to their mothers in the Strange Situation. Even though
they actively explored the toys in the lab, they seemed oblivious to their mother’s departure
and return and did not seek her out as a safe haven. Whereas these children appeared to be
232 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

SEE FOR YOURSELF independent and unemotional during separation, their heart rates were as high as the secure
infants’, suggesting that despite outward appearances they were greatly distressed by the separa-
The next time you are tion (Spangler & Grossmann, 1993).
around a child, watch care- Finally, a third group of mothers frequently ignored their babies’ signals but did not reject
fully to see if you can see
close bodily contact. These mothers were inconsistent in responding to their infants or seemed
the child using his or her
caregiver as a secure base to respond in an interfering, nonsensitive way. At home, their infants cried more than usual
from which to explore the even in the mothers’ presence, and explored their environments less, a pattern repeated in the
world or as a safe haven to Strange Situation. Though the infants showed distress upon separation from their mothers in
return to when things get the Strange Situation and ran to them when the mothers returned, the infants did not seem
scary. to accept the comfort the mothers attempted to offer, arching away as mothers attempted to
hug them. Overall, these infants seemed generally anxious. These infants have an anxious-
ambivalent attachment to their mothers (Ainsworth et al., 1978).
Later, a fourth disorganized/disoriented group was identified in the Strange Situation
(Main & Solomon, 1990). Parents of these infants are often full of fear, themselves, or inad-
vertently behave in ways that are frightening to an infant (e.g., showing anxious facial expres-
sions or awkward postures). Because it is difficult for the infant to approach such a parent, the
child has no idea of how to respond. Sadly, many of these parents have experienced their own
attachment-related traumas, such as the loss of a parent or caregiver through death or separa-
tion. Parents who maltreat their infants tend to have infants with a disorganized/disoriented
attachment but not all disorganized/disoriented children have a history of abuse.
As you might expect if the attachment system is important for survival, using the mother
as a secure base is universal—at least across the United States, Japan, Israel, Columbia, Ger-
many and Norway—but what makes for an ideal infant or a secure infant varies somewhat by
culture (Posada et al., 1995; Rutter, 2008). Across many cultures, the essential ingredients of
attachment are a caregiver who notices the baby’s signals, interprets them accurately by taking
the baby’s perspective, responds promptly and appropriately, and can be depended on to do
so (Ainsworth et al., 1974; Bretherton, 1990). The mother’s sensitivity to her infant appears
“What is more natural than to play a greater role in the infant’s attachment than the child’s temperament at this early age
that we should persist in (Fraley & Shaver, 2008).
looking for happiness along
the path on which we first Attachment Patterns for Life?
encountered it? . . . We are Bowlby described the patterns of attachment from cradle to grave as being like a railway sys-
never so defenseless against tem (Bowlby, 1973). Though the system may start with a single main route, it often forks into
suffering as when we love, a number of individual lines depending on life experiences (see the photo below). A recent
never so helplessly unhappy
as when we have lost our
loved object or its love.”
Sigmund Freud (1929/1989, p. 33)

Bowlby used the metaphor

of a railway to describe
attachment trajectories across
the life span.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 233

meta-analysis of 27 different samples across various ages between 1 to 16 years suggests that
these lines indeed remain very close to their original routes despite life experiences that cause
them to diverge (Fraley, 2002). The correlation between early attachment and attachment at
any later point in time is approximately r = .39.
Even more impressive is that recent studies find a 70 to 75% agreement between an infant’s
secure or insecure attachment in the Strange Situation and his or her attachment in late ado- THINK ABOUT IT
lescence and young adulthood. Where participants changed their attachment style, it was due
What kind of experiences
to life stresses, including death of a parent, parental divorce, or a life-threatening illness of the could make attachment
participant or a parent that often changed a secure environment into an insecure one (Crowell, patterns become less
Fraley, & Shaver, 2008). This suggests that internal working models are more like updated repre- secure? More secure?
sentations modified by life experiences and events, as Bowlby suggested, as opposed to the very
psychodynamic suggestion that they are residues from childhood (Shaver & Mikulincer, 2005).
There is also some evidence that attachment patterns are socialized into the next genera-
tion, which is not a surprise if attachment comes from a caregiver’s responsiveness. To assess
an adult’s attachment pattern, researchers developed the Adult Attachment Interview, or AAI
(Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985; see Hesse, 2008, for a review). Adults are asked to recall their
childhoods and the kind of interactions they had with a parent. The manner in which partici-
pants revealed their memories was very telling. Participants fell into one of three categories of
attachment styles, very similar to the three styles of infant attachment (Main, 1996).
In numerous studies using the AAI, parents’ recollections of their own childhood experi-
ences predicted the attachment of their children in the Strange Situation 76 to 85% of the time
(Karen, 1994). In fact, one study was able to trace attachment patterns across three genera-
tions! Mothers were given the AAI when they were pregnant and again when their child was
11 months old. The AAI was also given to their mothers. Then, when their child was 23 months
of age, the mothers and infants were placed in the Strange Situation.

Attachment Styles in Adulthood THINK ABOUT IT

By the time we are adults, we have formed internal working models of ourselves and others in Is attachment still important
close relationships. Researchers hypothesized that people will have different expectations for in adulthood?
romantic love depending on their adult attachment style, that is, their internal working models.
Their adult romantic relationships will look very much like their childhood attachment behav-
ior patterns (Fraley & Shaver, 2008; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007; Mohr, 2008).
To test this, researchers ran a “Love Quiz” in the Rocky Mountain News, a major newspaper
in their area (Hazan & Shaver, 1987). Part of the quiz asked respondents to answer a question-
naire about their experiences and to choose which one of three paragraphs best described their
feelings (see Table 8.2). The description of the three adult attachment styles was based on the SEE FOR YOURSELF
original description of infants in the Ainsworth et al. (1978) study rewritten to apply to adult
Which paragraph in
romantic behaviors.
Table 8.2 best applies to
Over 1,200 people aged 14 to 82, with an average of 36 years old, responded to their ad. you?
People could readily identify with one of the three paragraphs in proportions comparable to the

Table 8.2 Adult Attachment Styles

% Attachment Description
56 Secure “I find it relatively easy to get close to others and am comfortable depending on them and
having them depend on me. I don’t often worry about being abandoned or about someone
getting too close to me.”
25 Avoidant “I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others; I find it difficult to trust them completely,
difficult to allow myself to depend on them. I am nervous when anyone gets too close, and often,
love partners want me to be more intimate than I feel comfortable being.”
19 Anxious-Ambivalent “I find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I often worry that my partner
doesnt really love me or won’t stay with me. I want to merge completely with another person,
and this desire sometimes scares people away.”
Source: From Hazan and Shaver (1987, Table 2, p. 515). Hazan, C., & Shaver, P. R. (1987). Romantic lover conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 52(3), 511–524. Copyright American Psychological Association.
234 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

original findings with children (Ainsworth et al., 1978). There were no differences in childhood
experiences with separation from parents between the three groups, but people with different
adult attachment styles seemed to experience love differently.
People who described themselves as secure described their most important love experience
as happy, friendly, and trusting. They believed that romantic feelings of love come and go over
the course of a relationship, and that such feelings could return to the high intensity of the early
days of a romance. Secure adults reported warmer relationships with both of their parents and
also that their parents had a warmer relationship with each other than the other two groups.
Avoidant lovers demonstrated a fear of intimacy, and relationships marked by emotional
highs and lows and jealousy. They believed that the romantic head-over-heels-love depicted
in movies does not exist. They also believed that true romantic love seldom lasts and that it is
rare to find a person whom they could really fall in love with. Avoidant adults described their
mothers as cold and rejecting.
Anxious-ambivalent lovers experienced obsession, a desire for reciprocation and union,
emotional extremes, strong sexual attraction, and jealousy with their partners. They fell in love
easily, but seldom found true love. They also believed that romantic feelings come and go over
the course of a relationship. In a second study, anxious-ambivalent lovers reported the most
THINK ABOUT IT
loneliness and secure lovers the least (Hazan & Shaver, 1987).
Why does the quality of the If we develop our attachment style from our early experiences, how might divorce affect
parents’ relationship have a attachment? This question was explored in a study of undergraduate men and women who
greater impact on an adult
reported on their parents’ marriages and identified their adult attachment style (Brennan &
child’s attachment style
than marital status? Shaver, 1993). They found evidence that the quality of the parents’ relationship, not the status
itself, had a greater impact on a child’s attachment style.
Brennan and Shaver (1993) found that there was no relationship between adult attachment
style and parents’ marital status. However, among parents who were still married, there was an
effect on adult attachment. Parents who were described as being happily married had children
with all three kinds of adult attachment styles. But parents who were unhappily married tended
to have fewer securely attached adult children and more insecurely attached adult children,
especially with the avoidant style.
On a hopeful note, these styles could be modified if the parent, especially the custodial
parent, remarried happily. In this case, more adult children turned out secure. If both parents
remained unmarried, then the adult child was likely to describe themselves as one of the inse-
curely attached styles.

Attachment and Adult Personality Functioning

“How bold one gets when Let’s consider for a moment how adults react to separation from their attachment figures.
one is sure of being loved!” Although we wouldn’t be able to place an adult in the Strange Situation for children, some
Sigmund Freud (1960/1992, p. 11) researchers discovered an adult equivalent of the Strange Situation. In a clever operationaliza-
tion of the concept of separation, researchers observed 109 couples at the airport, aged 16 to
68 years, about half of whom were married (Fraley & Shaver, 1998). A bit more than half of the
couples were separating; the rest were traveling together. The experiment took place at a time
when people could walk right up to the gate to say goodbye to a traveling friend and even wave
at them from the window while watching the plane take off!
In this study, one researcher asked couples to fill out a survey about their attachment style,
the nature of their relationship, and, if separating, their distress at leaving their partner. Mean-
while, a second experimenter who knew nothing about the couple rated their separation and
attachment behaviors by observing their behavior from a short distance away in the departure
lounge while the participants were saying goodbye to their partners or entering the airplane
with their partners.
Couples separating at the airport reacted very much like children separated from their
mothers in the Strange Situation; their reactions were a reflection of their attachment style. First,
there were more attachment behaviors in separating couples than in couples traveling together.
Couples who were separating were particularly likely to sit close to their partner; kiss, hug, stroke
their partner’s head or face in a comforting manner; and perhaps even well up with tears or cry.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 235

Do adults separating at an
airport show attachment
behaviors like those shown
by children in the Strange
Situation?

Second, the longer a couple had been together, the less distress they reported at separation.
Longer-term couples also showed less attachment behaviors than shorter-term couples at separa-
tion. Finally, there was an interaction between gender and attachment style in separation behavior.
Women with attachment anxiety reported more distress when facing separation than
women in couples who were traveling together, even though they didn’t seem to show different
separation behaviors. However, women with attachment avoidance showed more withdrawal
and avoidance of their partners and less contact, contact-seeking, care-seeking, and caregiving
than women in couples traveling together.
Men with attachment anxiety showed less contact with their partners than men who were
traveling with their partners. Men with attachment avoidance who were separating showed no
particular pattern of responses or behaviors. This study illustrates that, just as Bowlby suggested,
attachment behaviors operate to maintain contact with caregivers when separation is imminent.
What about breaking up? Loss or threat of the loss of an important relationship should also
elicit attachment-like behaviors. In one study, over 5,000 internet users voluntarily filled out a
questionnaire asking about their anxiety and avoidance in close relationships and to describe a
recent breakup of a serious relationship (Davis, Shaver, & Vernon, 2003). Participants who were
secure in their attachments, scoring low in both anxiety and avoidance, reported using more
social coping strategies like using friends and family as a safe haven to deal with the breakup
of a relationship.
However, participants who showed attachment anxiety or attachment avoidance reported
more distress and a harder time in dealing with their breakups. As you might expect, partici-
pants high in avoidance were more likely to use self-reliant coping strategies, preferring to go
it alone rather than seek solace with friends and family. They also blamed themselves for the
loss rather than their partners.
Participants with attachment anxiety reported the hardest time of all three attachment
styles. They reported greater physical and emotional distress, a preoccupation with their lost
love, and interference with exploration. Paradoxically, they would show angry and vengeful
behaviors and yet went to great lengths in their attempts to reestablish the relationship. Rather
than rely on friends or go it alone, they turned to more dysfunctional ways of coping including
alcohol and other drugs.
If adult love relationships parallel children’s attachment patterns, what about exploratory
behavior? Might secure adult attachments provide support for exploration in the adult world
of work? This hypothesis was tested in a study of attachment styles, job satisfaction, leisure
activities, and well-being (Hazan & Shaver, 1990).
Participants for this study were readers of the Denver Post newspaper who responded to a
questionnaire that appeared in the Sunday magazine section. This questionnaire assessed their
adult attachment style using the paragraph measure (Hazan & Shaver, 1987; see Table 8.2). As
236 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

a follow-up they were sent a two-page questionnaire specifically asking about work-related
attitudes and behaviors. As expected, there was a significant relationship between attachment
and attitudes toward work.
Secure respondents reported a positive approach to work, and showed the least likelihood
of the three groups to procrastinate, fear failure, and have difficulty completing work tasks.
They were also least likely to fear rejection from coworkers. They had a healthy balance between
their personal life and their work life, taking time off to enjoy vacations, putting relationships
before work, and not letting work jeopardize their health. They reported the highest ratings
of work satisfaction and success of all three groups. Essentially, feeling secure, they have the
confidence to explore safely in the world of work and focus on their careers out of their own
interests and desires.
In contrast, anxious-ambivalent respondents preferred to work with others on projects, yet
felt misunderstood and underappreciated at work and resented the perceived intrusiveness of
others. They seemed to be motivated by the approval of others, worried that others would not
appreciate their efforts, and were likely to fear rejection for poor performance. They reported
that their personal lives interfered with their work life. For these people, exploration—in the
form of performance, achievement, and respect and admiration from others—had become a
way of satisfying unmet attachment needs rather than a way of pursuing their own interests or
developing their own talents. This group had the lowest average income of the three attachment
THINK ABOUT IT
groups even after controlling for differences in education.
What attachment experi- Finally, avoidant respondents seemed to use work as a way of avoiding close relationships
ences might help people with others. They reported an almost compulsive approach to work, feeling nervous when not
achieve a better balance of working and deriving little pleasure from vacations. They also preferred to work alone and
work and relationships?
found that work left little time for relationships. Avoidant adults used work as an excuse for
avoiding interacting with others and to distract themselves from the anxiety associated with
unmet attachment needs. Other studies find similar results for the relationship of adult attach-
ment styles and achievement motivation (Elliot & Reis, 2003).
Overall, studies find that attachment patterns are related to a whole range of positive
outcomes in adults. For example, secure adults show less defensive behaviors including self-
enhancement biases and intergroup biases (Fraley & Shaver, 2008). Insecure adults show less
tolerance of out-group members, less humanistic values, and are less compassionate and altru-
istic (Fraley & Shaver, 2008). Facing the world without a secure base and safe haven leads to a
consistent struggle for stable self-worth as an adult (Foster, Kernis, & Goldman, 2007; Fraley
& Shaver, 2008).
Secure adults are more likely than insecure adults to show the defining features of what
the humanistic psychologist Carl Rogers (1968) called the fully functioning person: openness
to new experiences, trust in oneself and the world, lack of fear of disapproval or rejection,

Adults with an avoidant

attachment style may use
work to avoid intimate
relationships with other
people.
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 237

experiencing thoughts and emotions deeply, sensitivity and responsiveness to others’ needs,
and volunteering in their communities (Fraley & Shaver, 2008).
Evidence suggests that, indeed, attachment styles are powerfully related to many different
outcomes in adulthood related to both love and work. Maybe Freud wasn’t too far off when he
suggested that “to love and to work” was the goal of healthy development!

Chapter Summary
So, what do you think? Is Freud dead? Does Freudian theory contribute anything to the science “Freud should be placed
of personality? Or, have researchers and clinicians taken the useful parts of Freudian theory, in the same category as
expanded, revised, and built on it so much so that what remains of the original theory is indeed
Darwin, who lived before the
useless? Does Freudian theory belong “along with other Mesozoic curiosities, in a museum of
natural history,” a view challenged by psychologist Drew Westen (1998a, p. 356)? discovery of genes.”
Freud hypothesized that humans were driven by the unconscious life and death instincts. Neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp as cited
Though these impulses, especially for sex and aggression, stay hidden in the unconscious, they in Guterl (2002, p. 51)
occasionally infiltrate our consciousness through hypnosis, free association (e.g., the word
association test championed by Carl Jung), dreams, parapraxes, jokes, symbolic behaviors,
Study and Review
and projective tests. Freud’s structural model of personality (id, ego, and superego) remains a
on mysearchlab.com
useful metaphor for describing personality functioning; his topographical model (conscious,
preconscious, unconscious) is best viewed as a continuum. The ego must find ways of satisfying Go online for more
these id impulses within the bounds of morality (internalized in the superego as the conscience resources to help you
and the ego ideal) and reality. Defense mechanisms are ways the ego can deal with unacceptable review.
impulses. Current research clearly supports some of the defenses Freud suggested (reaction
formation, isolation, denial, rationalization), provides mixed support for two (undoing, projec-
tion), and provides no support for others (repression, displacement, sublimation).
Freud interpreted psychological changes associated with growth and development in chil-
dren with biological changes across a series of psychosexual stages: oral, anal, phallic, latency,
and genital. Freud was correct in recognizing the importance of early relationships on later
development but was misguided in interpreting them as sexual in nature and as fantasies.
Especially controversial is the phallic stage where boys go through castration anxiety and must
resolve their Oedipus complex and girls suffer from penis envy. Freud used the case study
method to draw and support many of his conclusions.
Experimental evidence supports certain aspects of Freud’s theory including the impact
of the unconscious, role of conflict and compromise of motives, the importance of childhood
experiences in shaping adult personality, mental representations of the self and other, and that
healthy personality development requires learning to regulate sexual and aggressive feelings.
Psychoanalytic approaches today build on some of the basic principles of Freudian theory:
the importance of unconscious processes, conflict, continuity of personality across the life span,
mental representations of the self and others, and the importance of childhood experiences on
adult personality. These ideas are championed by current approaches including ego psychology,
self-psychology, and object relations theory.
Attachment theory, developed by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, confirms that we
form internal working models of key attachments from our early childhood that affect our adult
relationships. Secure attachment develops out of a relationship with a caregiver who is sensi-
tive, responsive, and dependable. Attachment is assessed in infants by observing them interact
with their primary caregiver in the laboratory Strange Situation. For adults, there is the Adult
Attachment Interview, a paragraph measure, and questionnaire measures. People’s attachment
patterns tend to be somewhat consistent over their lives, and across generations. Attachment
in adulthood is related to beliefs about love, reactions to separation from a partner, and even
to achievement and satisfaction at work, that is, “To love and to work,” just as Freud predicted.
One demonstration of the impact of internal working models on later love relationships
is the experiment that opened this chapter: People felt that a relationship with a potential
dating partner who resembled a past love was likely to be particularly intimate compared to a
238 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality

description of a person who did not resemble a past love. People were particularly vulnerable
to a potential date who resembled their first love.
The debate on Freud will not be over anytime soon. Certainly, there are parts of Freudian
theory we can lay to rest. Perhaps we should keep Freudian theory in its place as an interesting
theory from a historical point of view and instead focus on modern empirical incarnations
such as attachment theory.

Review Questions
1. What were the results of the Brumbaugh and Fraley (2006) study where participants rated
personal ads that resembled a past romantic relationship? How would Freud explain these
results? How would attachment theory explain these results?
2. Why does Drew Westen compare Freud to Elvis Presley? Is Freud dead?
3. What are instincts? What two categories of instincts did Freud posit? What is libido?
4. What techniques are used to uncover the unconscious? What are parapraxes? What are
symbolic behaviors?
5. How did Carl Jung use the word association test to study unconscious processes? What did
he find? What technique is a modern-day equivalent of the word association test?
6. What three parts make up the personality? At what three levels do these parts function?
7. What is primary process thinking? What is the pleasure principle? In what two ways does
the id seek gratification?
8. What is identification? What is the reality principle? What is secondary process thinking?
9. What are the two parts of the superego?
10. What are the three kinds of anxiety? How does the ego cope with anxiety? Which defense
mechanisms have the strongest research support? Which ones have mixed support? Which
ones have no support?
11. What are the psychosexual stages of development? What is a fixation? In what two ways is
a fixation expressed? How does a fixation affect adult personality?
12. What is the Oedipus complex? How do boys and girls resolve this complex? What do the
male and female adult fixations at this stage look like? What is the seduction theory? What
is the evidence for Freud’s psychosexual stages of development?
13. What is the case study method? What are some pros and cons of the case study method?
How does Freud’s case of Little Hans illustrate these pros and cons?
14. What five postulates define contemporary psychoanalytic theory?
15. What is attachment? What is an internal working model? What two sets of internal working
models do we develop as a result of our early attachment experiences?
16. What is the Strange Situation? What are the four attachment patterns seen in the Strange
Situation?
17. Do early attachment patterns stay with us for life? Are attachment patterns similar across
generations?
18. What is the relationship between attachment style and adult expectations of romantic
relationships? What impact does divorce have on attachment? How do adults respond to
a separation from their loved one? Do adult attachment styles predict work behavior?
 Chapter 8 Intrapsychic Foundations of Personality 239

Key Terms
Transference Reality principle Fixation
Instincts Secondary process thinking Oral incorporative
Eros Conscience personality
Thanatos Ego ideal Oral sadistic personality
Libido Topographic model of Anal expulsive personality
Free association personality Anal retentive personality
Dream analysis Motivated unconscious Oedipus complex
Manifest content Cognitive unconscious Castration anxiety
Latent content Conversion reaction Phallic character
Parapraxes Defense mechanism Penis envy
Freudian slip Reaction formation Hysterical character
Symbolic behaviors Isolation Case study method
Word association method Intellectualization Internal working models
Complex Denial Strange Situation
Schema Undoing Secure attachment
Implicit Association Test Projection Secure base
(IAT) Displacement Safe haven
Structural model of Catharsis Avoidant attachment
personality Sublimation Anxious-ambivalent
Primary process thinking Suppression attachment
Pleasure principle Repression Disorganized/disoriented
Reflex action Rationalization Adult attachment interview
Wish fulfillment Psychosexual stages (AAI)
Identification Erogenous zone Fully functioning
This page intentionally left blank
CHAPTER
9 REGULATION
AND MOTIVATION:
SELF-DETERMINATION
THEORY
THREE FUNDAMENTAL PSYCHOLOGICAL NEEDS
HOW DO WE SATISFY THESE NEEDS?
Fostering Autonomy: Autonomy Support
Fostering Competence: Structure and Optimal Challenge
Fostering Relatedness: Involvement
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: RELATEDNESS IN COLLEGE STUDENTS
THEN AND NOW: UNDERMINING INTRINSIC INTEREST
CONNECTIONS BETWEEN SELF-DETERMINATION THEORY AND OTHER THEORIES IN PERSONALITY
Autonomy and Locus of Causality
Competence and Self-Efficacy Theory
Relatedness and Attachment Theory
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: PATH ANALYSIS
WHAT IT MEANS TO BE SELF-REGULATED
Types of Motivation
Causality Orientations
SELF-DETERMINATION THEORY APPLIED
Health Behaviors
Sports Behaviors
Work Behaviors
Read the Chapter on The Pursuit of Happiness
mysearchlab.com THE TAE BO STUDY REVISITED
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

241
242 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

W
“When we are motivated hen I was in my first year of college, students in the Psychology 101 class (some
by goals that have deep 500 of them) were required to do a special project: pick a behavior of their own to
meaning, by dreams that modify. Although my friends chose to quit smoking or apply their acne medications
more regularly, I decided to increase my violin-playing, something that I had, regrettably, let
need completion, by pure
lapse since starting college.
love that needs expressing,
My university had a number of practice rooms in the basement of the student center.
then we truly live life.” Students could sign out a room and pick up and return the key at the front desk, which also
Greg Anderson, American athlete happened to be where they sold candy by the pound. For every half hour of practicing I did, I
and trainer would buy a small bag of M&Ms as my reward. Given that the reward followed directly after
the desired behavior (practicing), and was something I really liked (chocolate), I thought my
plan was foolproof.
Sure enough, I started practicing regularly and was able to revisit pieces I had mastered in
high school. I was enjoying rediscovering the violin so much that one day, after about a week
or so of this training, I was halfway back to my residence hall before I realized—with horror
SEE FOR YOURSELF thinking that I would fail the assignment—that I forgot to give myself the reward. And that
I had forgotten to reward myself for the past few days! And yet, the behavior persisted in the
Is there some behavior absence of the reward. I was certain that I would fail the assignment because of this anomaly.
you wish you engaged in However, when I received my grade, I was pleased to find that I had actually discovered the
more regularly like studying,
right answer: There’s more to motivation than rewards and punishments. And in some cases
exercising, or practicing an
instrument or a hobby? the intrinsic reward of mastery can be more effective that the extrinsic reward of candy—even
chocolate!
According to the self-determination theory of Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, there is
a big difference between engaging in an activity because of extrinsic reasons and engaging in
the same activity for intrinsic reasons (Deci & Ryan, 1985b; Ryan & Deci, 2000). When we are
extrinsically motivated, acting because of some external pressures like rewards (M&Ms) or
punishments (failing an assignment), we may not enjoy the activity as much, perform our best,
SEE FOR YOURSELF or continue the behavior on our own. However, when we are intrinsically motivated acting out
of our own desires and by our own choice doing things that are fun or satisfying to us (making
What kinds of activities do
music), we enjoy what we are doing and increase our well-being in the process. According to
you engage in just for the
fun of it? self-determination theory, the reasons why we do something are often more important than
what we do.
Consider the following experiment (Vansteenkiste, Simons, Soenens, & Lens, 2004). Stu-
dents in a high school physical education class participated in a unit on Tae Bo, which combines
the martial arts movements of Tae Kwon Do with the speed and rhythm of boxing. The students,
in Grades 10 to 12, were randomly assigned to conditions that varied in whether the instructor
emphasized an intrinsic or extrinsic goal for the activity and whether he communicated these
goals in a supportive or a controlling manner.

Doing a little Tae Bo for

intrinsic reasons with a
supportive instructor leads to
greater motivation than doing
it for extrinsic reasons or with
a controlling instructor.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 243

For example, the instructor 100 Figure 9.1 Students who

Persistence 4 Months Later

Supportive learned Tae Bo in a supportive
who introduced students to the Context
Tae Bo unit emphasized intrinsic 80 context and with an intrinsic
goals by telling the students that goal were more willing to
Controlling
60 Context demonstrate their skills 4
“Doing a little Tae Bo helps you to
months later. Source: Based
remain physically fit and prevents 40 on means reported by
you from becoming sick at a later Vansteenkiste et al. (2004).
age.” In other classes, he emphasized 20
extrinsic goals by saying “Doing a
little Tae Bo helps you to remain 0
physically appealing to others and Intrinsic Extrinsic
prevents you from gaining weight at Goal
a later age.”
At the same time, in the supportive conditions, the instructor demonstrated various exer-
cises to students while emphasizing that students had the option of trying the Tae Bo exercises
by using phrases such as “we ask you to,” “you can,” or “you might” during the class. In the
controlling conditions the instructor used phrases such as “you are obligated,” “you should,”
or “you have to” to emphasize that the students had little choice about whether they would
participate in the exercises.
After this introduction, a certified Tae Bo instructor entered the room and, unaware of SEE FOR YOURSELF
which conditions the students were in or that they were even part of an experiment, proceeded
to teach exercises and practice with the students for the next two classes. How might parents, teach-
What impact did goal and context have on students’ motivation and performance? Quite a ers, or bosses communicate
their expectations to you
big one! Students with an intrinsic goal for learning Tae Bo put in greater effort during classes
in a way that would be
than students with an extrinsic goal. They also performed the exercises better when tested a few more supportive and less
days after learning the exercises. Also, students in the supportive context put in greater effort controlling?
and performed better than students in the controlling context.
The impact of goal and context was even greater on persistence (see Figure 9.1). To test
the students’ willingness to engage in Tae Bo even after the unit had ended they were asked if
they would be willing to demonstrate some Tae Bo exercises in another class. The request came
1 week later, 1 month later, and 4 months after the Tae Bo unit ended. Although students in
the supportive context and students with an intrinsic goal persisted longer than students in
the controlling context or students with an extrinsic goal, students who had both a supportive
context and an intrinsic goal for learning Tae Bo showed the greatest persistence of all 4 months
later. They were even more likely to join the school’s official Tae Bo club!
These results illustrate two important predictions of self-determination theory. First, the
reasons why we do something—intrinsic or extrinsic reasons, for example—are important for
effort, performance, and task persistence. Second, the way another person communicates his
or her expectations and instructions to us also has a big impact on our effort, performance,
and task persistence. Given that we are surrounded by people who wish to impart their expec-
tations on us—such as health care professionals, parents, bosses, and teachers—and the fact
that we are likely to be in these very same positions imparting our expectations on others, self-
determination theory has a lot to say about motivation and performance.
In this chapter we will learn about self-determination theory and how people vary in how
self-determined they feel. We will also consider aspects of the situation that can help people feel
motivated and happily engaged in their activities at work and play rather than unmotivated,
disengaged, and depressed. Then we will apply this theory to understand health behaviors
(like following the doctor’s orders, staying healthy), sports behaviors, work behaviors, and the
pursuit of happiness.

Three Fundamental Psychological Needs

Self-determination theory is grounded in the humanistic tradition which emphasizes respon-
sibility, growth, and the actualizing tendency (Deci, 1980; Deci & Ryan, 1985b). It views the
244 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

THINK ABOUT IT individual as an active organism seeking the best way, not merely to survive, but also to grow
and develop. Carl Rogers (1951) called this the actualizing tendency: the motive to actualize
How does the humanistic or bring about growth and positive change. Think of a wild flower that is so destined to grow
tradition compare to the that it blossoms even in a sidewalk crack. Of course, not all environments support the growth
behavioristic tradition with
its emphasis on the rein-
of an individual—flower or human—but according to the humanistic tradition, when people
forcement of behavior? are not being pushed around by the environment they have the ability to find what they need
for growth.
In addition to the physiological needs of food, water, and air, people have inborn psycho-
logical needs that must be met to survive and thrive. According to self-determination theory,
there are three basic and universal psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and related-
ness (Deci & Ryan, 1985b; Ryan & Deci, 2000). In fact, of all the psychological needs that have
been studied by psychologists such as Henry Murray (1938) and Abraham Maslow (1954)—
including self-actualization (Maslow, 1954), security, money, influence, popularity, health, self-
esteem, self-respect, and pleasure—the three needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness
SEE FOR YOURSELF appear to be the most important (Sheldon, Elliot, Kim, & Kasser, 2001). Further, these needs
are important for all people in a wide range of cultures studied, regardless of whether they were
What was the worst class
you’ve ever been in? Why?
born and raised in a collectivistic or individualistic culture with traditional or egalitarian values
(Deci & Ryan, 2008b; Sheldon et al., 2001).
First, individuals must feel that they can freely choose what to pursue, instead of being
pushed around, forced to do things, or burdened with a lot of have tos, shoulds, or musts from
the people or situations around them or even from themselves. This is the need for autonomy.
Autonomy is feeling free and able to make choices about one’s actions, being self-regulating and
able to determine one’s own actions and plans, as opposed to feeling like a pawn at the mercy
of others or fate (Deci & Ryan, 1985b).
SEE FOR YOURSELF Second, individuals also need to feel competent at their pursuits, achieving mastery at tasks
that are neither too easy nor too hard for them. This is the need for competence. Competence
What was the best class
you’ve ever been in? Why? is feeling effective in one’s actions and having the opportunities and experiences to exercise,
expand, and express one’s abilities (Deci & Ryan, 1985b).
Finally, individuals also need to feel they have meaningful relationships with people
around them, like peers or supervisors. This is the need for relatedness. Relatedness is feel-
ing connected to others, having people to
care for, and to receive care from (Ryan
& Deci, 2000). Relatedness can also come
from feeling a sense of belonging within a
community like a school, a work organi-
zation, a club, or a town (Reis & Patrick,
1996).
When these three needs of autonomy,
competence, and relatedness are met,
people will feel motivated and will hap-
pily participate in some activity—that
is, they will feel intrinsically motivated,
perform well, and, as a result, build skills
and increase their well-being (Ryan &
Deci, 2000). These three basic psychologi-
cal needs are universal and essential for
Humans, like all living things, healthy development. Everybody requires
seek out conditions in which these psychological nutriments whether
they can survive and grow they are explicitly aware of them or not
to their full capabilities. (Ryan & Deci, 2008a).
Self-determination theory To illustrate these three needs, think
describes the conditions
back to one of the worst classes you’ve
that foster motivation and
well-being.
ever encountered either in high school
or in college. When I ask my students
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 245

this question, they often describe experiences where they felt that one of their needs was
not being adequately met, although they didn’t think of it in these terms at the time. For
example, students often have a bad experience in a class that is too difficult for them or in
which they are totally bored. A sense of competence is missing in both of these situations.
Students often dislike classes where there are a lot of required readings or heavily structured
assignments where they have little choice about what to do and how to do it. These are
examples of classes where autonomy is sorely lacking. Finally, students sometimes say that
they didn’t get along with a teacher who might have been uncaring, cold, or disrespectful.
Other students will explain that they just didn’t enjoy being in a class where they didn’t have
an opportunity to get to know the other students very well. These are examples of where
relatedness is lacking.
By the same token, imagine a class that you really enjoyed. Was it because you worked
hard but saw that hard work pay off as you mastered the material? Was it because the teacher
gave a lot of freedom to students and encouraged creativity in the completion of assignments?
Or was it because you had a strong group of friends suffering with you or a teacher who went
out of his or her way to reach you? In these cases, classes that met your needs for competence,
autonomy, and relatedness may have increased your motivation, learning, and well-being. In
fact, I bet you can imagine a class or a work situation in which you felt incompetent, pushed
around, and yet you got through it due to a bunch of dedicated friends sharing the experience
with you!

How Do We Satisfy These Needs?

Just like flowers need soil and water provided by the environment to grow and thrive, people “He cultivates rare orchids.
need to get their needs met by the context or situation in which they find themselves. People And people.”
must balance their internal needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness with the nutri- The chair of a small psychology
ments provided by external environments (Ryan & Deci, 2008a). Certain aspects of the environ- department talking about a clinical
ment can foster the fulfillment of the three needs (see Table 9.1). psychologist on staff.

Table 9.1 How to Foster the Three Psychological Needs

Need Provided By In These Ways
Autonomy Autonomy support Recognize individual’s unique perspective
Give choices where possible
Use minimal pressure
Encourage initiative
Link to the individual’s goals, values
Support individual’s choice
Help the individual live with the consequences of the
choices at a level he or she can cope with
Competence Structure Clear expectations
Clear contingencies
Feedback provided
Break task into smaller, manageable pieces
Optimal challenge Task not too hard
Task not too easy
Relatedness Involvement Time
Interest
Energy
Source: Connell and Wellborn (1990).
246 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

“It is our choices, Harry, that Fostering Autonomy: Autonomy Support

show us what we truly are,
For persons to satisfy their need for autonomy they must feel they can act out of their own
far more than our abilities.” volition (i.e., from their own wishes, preferences, and desires). For example, parents, teachers,
Professor Dumbledore as cited in coaches, therapists, work supervisors, and even our close friends can help us make our own
Rowling (1999, p. 333) choices and develop our own way of doing things, or they can attempt to control and pres-
sure us into doing or thinking as they want us to. Strategies that help individuals develop and
express their own self are autonomy supportive; the opposite of autonomy support is control.
Ideally, parents, teachers, coaches, therapists, work supervisors, friends, and partners will have
our own best interests at heart and wish to help us develop our own autonomy. However, this
may not always be the case, like at certain jobs for example, or when parents must set limits to
help teach or protect a child from harm. Even under these conditions, there are ways of being
autonomy supportive without being pressuring, authoritarian, and directive or resorting to
controlling and punitive methods.
One way to support autonomy is by providing choice (Connell, 1990). For example, a
parent will have better luck getting a toddler to eat vegetables by asking: “Would you like peas
or carrots?” than by saying “Eat your vegetables.” Recall that this is how the instructor in the
Vansteenkiste et al. (2004) experiment introduced Tae Bo in the supportive condition. Similarly,
a parent or a teacher can support the autonomy of a child by using the minimal amount of
pressure necessary to gain the child’s compliance instead of immediately using threats to get
the child to obey. When a friend of mine visited the doctor for swollen feet the doctor didn’t
come right out and tell him to lose weight; instead he was sort of blasé and said something like
“I find that my patients have the most difficulty in losing weight,” implying that it would be
nice if my friend lost weight but that the doctor wasn’t going to pressure him into it or make
him feel bad for not doing it.
Another way that a person can support another’s autonomy is by encouraging initiative—
that is, to give people a chance to decide for themselves what they would like to do or how they
would like to do it without fearing repercussions for choosing poorly (Connell, 1990). Autonomy
SEE FOR YOURSELF
cannot be developed if a person is hesitant or fearful to make any choice whatsoever. Children
Which assignments do learn to regulate and control their own behavior by making choices on trivial matters, like choos-
you like better, ones where ing what to wear as a toddler, and then gradually learning how to make bigger decisions, like
you pick your own topic or choosing their own friends and activities as teenagers.
where the professor assigns To do this, parents, teachers, supervisors, therapists, or doctors need to support their
one? Why? Do competence
child’s, worker’s, or patient’s, choice, even if they disagree with it (Connell, 1990). For example,
or autonomy have anything
to do with your answer? students are often required to write a paper, but most of the time professors allow students to
choose their own topics—even if it is a topic the professor has already read a hundred papers
on! Good professors may limit topics or preap-
prove topics to make sure that all students work
on a fruitful topic; bad professors may limit top-
ics to only the ones they do research on. Making
the choice of what topic to write on helps build a
sense of autonomy in students.
At the same time, parents and teachers
should then stand by to help their children or
students live with the consequences of these
decisions—after all, that’s how we learn—but
at a level the child or student can cope with
(Connell, 1990). A psychology professor I knew
Giving children choices over would take his children with him to run errands
some behaviors, even if on Saturdays. When they were finished, they
parents may not agree with would visit the local candy shop where the
those choices, helps children children could choose any kind of candy they
build a sense of autonomy.
wanted as a treat. The only catch was that the
This girl is well on her way to
developing autonomy, if not
children couldn’t cry or make a fuss if they didn’t
her fashion sense. like what they picked (the store had a strict no-
return policy on the beautiful handmade candies
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 247

displayed in cases throughout the shop). Most of the time their choices worked out, but occa- THINK ABOUT IT
sionally they ended up with something they didn’t like. Their father, an expert in motivation,
would say something like “Oh, those are your mom’s favorites! Go see if she has something Which is better: to tell a
she’d be willing to swap with you for those.” By this seemingly small treat, his two children child “It’s your bedtime now”
or “Your bedtime is in 5 min-
learned to make decisions, try new things, take responsibility, and to live with their decisions. utes”? Why?
In short, he helped them develop autonomy in an age-appropriate way by applying these
principles of autonomy support.
Even when it is not possible to give others choice and control, there are things that people
can say to help the individual retain some sense of autonomy. For example, recognizing and
respecting the individual’s point of view and feelings about the matter or helping individuals
see how their actions relate to their personal goals, beliefs, or values, goes a long way toward
helping people regulate their own behavior and stave off helplessness (Connell, 1990). For
example an advisor might say: “I know you’re not happy about having to study for the LSATs
while everybody else is out enjoying the nice weather. But it’s only for a few more weeks, and
besides, you want to get into a good law school so you can become a lawyer. It will all be worth
it in the end.”
Using these principles, researchers were even able to get kids to paint neatly. First and
second graders were asked to draw a picture of a house they would like to live in using
watercolors and paper neatly laid out in front of them in the experimental room (Koestner,
Ryan, Bernieri, & Holt, 1984). Children were randomly assigned to one of three conditions
in which an adult explained the rules to them. Children in the controlling limits condition
were told “Before you begin, I want to tell you some things that you will have to do. There
are rules that we have about painting. You have to keep the paints clean . . . . I want you
to be a good boy (girl) and don’t make a mess with the paints.” Children in the autonomy
supportive limits condition were told “I know that sometimes it’s really fun to just slop the
paint around, but here the materials and room need to be kept nice for the other children
who will use them.” There was also a control group that were given no limits on how they
were to paint.
After this painting activity, the children were given the opportunity to continue to
paint or to switch to another activity while the experimenter was out of the room for a
few minutes. During this time, an assistant, unaware of which condition the child was in,
surreptitiously monitored the child’s activity. The experimenters wanted to know how the
differing instructions would affect the child’s intrinsic motivation, as measured by their
choice to continue to paint or not. They also wanted to know if setting limits affected the
children’s creativity and enjoyment of painting.
The children in all three groups did as they were told and did not make a mess with
the paints. However, that was not the big news: Children in the autonomy supportive limits
condition actually had greater enjoyment of painting and more artistic and creative paintings
than children in the controlling limits condition (see Figure 9.2). Specifically, their paintings
were higher in creativity, technical merit, over-
all quality, the number of colors used, and the
level of detail. Further, the autonomy support-
ive limits condition and the no limits condi-
tion were not significantly different from each
other on these variables. Even more amazing
is that these differences between groups car-
ried over into the free choice period where
children in the no limits and autonomy sup-
portive limits conditions painted longer than
children in the controlling limits condition
(see Figure 9.3). These results suggest that lim- Limits and rules need
its can be communicated to children without not undermine intrinsic
undermining their autonomy, in a way that motivation if they are
communicated in an
increases their motivation and the quality of
autonomy-supportive way.
their performance.
248 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

Figure 9.2 Overall quality 9 Fostering Competence: Structure and

of children’s paintings as
a function of condition.
Optimal Challenge
ns = not a significant ns
To build competence, people need tasks that are aimed
difference between these at the right level—not too easy, not too hard—with

Overall Quality
groups; other comparisons are steps that are clear and doable. Specifically, people need
significant Source: Koestner et to know exactly how to carry out a task and what the
al. (1984).
results of their actions will be. For example, if you are
learning how to edit a document on the computer for
the first time, it might be helpful to know that if you
1 right-click on the mouse a menu will appear. People
also need to know what is expected of them (e.g., “You
Condition need to choose copy from the menu”) and they need to
No Limits get immediate feedback from the task (“Uh oh, cut is
Autonomy Supportive Limits
highlighted, where’s copy?”) or from another person so
that they can learn the correct way to do a task (“cut is
Controlling Limits
just above copy”). Large or difficult tasks need to be bro-
ken down into smaller steps, the way a basketball coach
might institute drills to work on skills like passing, shooting, and dribbling, with the ultimate
SEE FOR YOURSELF
goal of winning a game. By attempting a task that is at the right level, where the steps necessary
How did you first learn to to carry out the task are clear and doable, and where there is immediate feedback, people learn
ride a two-wheel bike? Did very quickly how to master a task, building their sense of competence (Connell, 1990).
you have training wheels? You can see this in action by coaches in how they train their players, by parents who set up
When did they come off? household chores for their children (little kids set the table; bigger kids load the dishwasher), by
work supervisors (“10 sales calls is a great goal for today”), and even in many computer games.
Amazingly enough, this kind of structure is built into the Wii Fit game system. First, as part of
the initial setup, the system calibrates an appropriate fitness level based on a player’s age and
weight. This ensures that people are working toward a fitness goal that is neither too easy nor
too hard for them. Then, as players start a game, the screen gives visual feedback to let players
know exactly how they are doing.
For example, in one activity that trains players to control their balance on a board, the screen
shows two columns visually indicating how much weight they have placed on each leg. Users must
match their weight distribution to some standard set by the computer, leaning left or right to get
the two columns to line up a certain way. In the early trials, players don’t have to be too exact to hit
the standard. But as the game progresses, the computer demands that players get more and more
precise in their movements. That is, the game trains players by successive approximation to become
better at controlling their movements and balance. Of course, during the entire process players
get both the visual feedback on the screen and a host of happy sounds when they achieve the goal
(“Yay!”) or sad sounds when they don’t (“Awww!”).
These features help players master physical activities
Figure 9.3 Time spent 360 like balance, agility, and coordination, and presum-
painting during the free
Time Spent Painting During

choice period as a function

ns ably increase their fitness level in the process.
300
An important part of satisfying the need for
Free Choice Period

of condition. ns = not
a significant difference 240 competence is working on tasks that are opti-
between these groups; mally challenging (Connell, 1990; Csikszentmih-
180 alyi, 1975; Deci, 1975). Tasks that are too difficult,
other comparisons are
significant Source: Koestner 120
where the demand outpaces the person’s skills, may
et al. (1984). cause the person to feel frustrated and then wor-
60 ried and anxious. Tasks that are too easy may cause
relaxation and then boredom. Engagement in tasks
that have a clear set of goals, that require appro-
Condition
priate responses, give immediate feedback, and
No Limits
in which people are operating at their maximum
Autonomy Supportive Limits capacity can lead to a positive state called flow
Controlling Limits (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975, 1997; see Figure 9.4).
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 249

People can develop

competence at an activity
when expectations are made
clear, contingencies between
behavior and outcomes are
explained, tasks are broken
down into manageable pieces,
and feedback is given, even
if all of this is provided by a
computer game.

Flow is an experience marked by complete absorption, deep enjoyment, intense con-

centration, and almost an altered state, as people block out all irrelevant stimuli and focus
entirely on the task at hand (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975, 1997). Athletes call this being in the
zone; religious mystics call it ecstasy (Csikszentmihalyi, 1997). Think of an artist who persists SEE FOR YOURSELF
single-mindedly on a painting, ignoring hunger and fatigue (Getzels & Csikszentmihalyi,
Have you ever experienced
1976). When in a state of flow, people have no sense of time, reporting that minutes seem to flow? When?
pass in mere moments.
Flow experiences are especially likely to happen when people are engaged in creative activi-
ties, music, sports, games, and religious rituals. A composer explained how it felt when his music
writing was going well:

You are in an ecstatic state to such a point that you feel as though you almost
don’t exist. I have experienced this time and time again. My hand seems devoid

Figure 9.4 Tasks that are

Arousal optimally challenging lead to
High a state called flow. Intensity
of experience increases with
Anxiety Flow
distance from a person’s
average levels of challenge and
skill, as shown by the concentric
rings. Source: From Nakamura
Challenges

and Csikszentmihalyi (2009,

Control Figure 18.2, p. 201). Nakamura,
Worry J., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2009).
Flow theory and research.
In S. J. Lopez & C. R. Snyder
(Eds.), Oxford handbook of
positive psychology research
Relaxation (p. 195–206). Oxford, UK: Oxford
Apathy University Press.

Boredom

Low High
Skills
250 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

of myself, and I have nothing to do with what is happening. I just sit there
watching in a state of awe and wonderment. And the music just flows out by
itself. (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975, p. 4)

Even just immersing oneself in everyday activities that are highly meaningful and which
demand the right balance of challenge and skill can produce flow. Flow states are by no means
the only way that a person can have their need for competence met, but they certainly are a
powerful means of feeling competence, which together with autonomy, fosters motivation
and engagement (Shernoff, Csikszentmihalyi, Schneider, & Shernoff, 2003). Tasks that are
just a bit beyond a person’s skill level, personally meaningful, highly enjoyable, engrossing,
or worth doing for their own sake, lead to the greatest amount of intrinsic motivation and
positive emotion.

Fostering Relatedness: Involvement

Autonomy support and task structure both occur within a relationship, whether it be
patient–doctor, teacher–student, parent–child, boss–worker, therapist–client, partner-to-
partner, or friend-to-friend. The quality of these relationships can increase the likelihood
that autonomy and competence needs will be met. People feel related or connected to oth-
THINK ABOUT IT ers through involvement: the interest shown in them and their concerns, the time a person
Is there something unique spends with them, and the energy that others invest in them (Connell, 1990; Grolnick &
about parental attachments Ryan, 1987, 1989). For example, you may recall a teacher or coach who spent extra time
or can attachments to any with you or who took a special interest in your progress. Or perhaps a parent or grandpar-
adult meet a child’s need for
ent helped you with a school project or shared their expertise with you, like teaching you
relatedness?
to cook or fish. These efforts made you feel connected and made it easier for you to feel
motivated.
One experiment’s failed attempt at a control condition inadvertently demonstrated the
importance of relatedness. In this experiment, 4- to 5-year-old children played with colorful
markers under various reward conditions (Anderson, Manoogian, & Reznick, 1976). In the
control condition, where the child merely drew in the presence of a neutral experimenter,
both the child and the experimenter found it awkward and unsettling to not interact with
each other. Even as the experimenter didn’t
make eye contact with the child, attend to
his or her drawings, and ignored the child’s
overtures, children persisted at getting the
attention of the experimenter. Compared
to the reward conditions, children in this
control condition showed the lowest intrin-
sic interest of all conditions, when their
motivation to draw with the markers was
assessed a week later.
Part of what makes teachers auton-
omy-supportive is that they establish a
warm, supportive relationship with their
students (Reeve & Jang, 2006). Autonomy-
supportive teachers spend time listening to
students, give students time to talk, and take
the students’ perspective. These behaviors
establish a sense of warmth, affection, and
acceptance of students, fostering related-
ness. In contrast, controlling teachers seem
Relatedness, along with to ignore the teacher–student relationship
competence and autonomy, is
altogether and focus on correct answers and
important for the motivation
desired classroom behaviors instead (Reeve
and engagement of college
students. & Jang, 2006). Autonomy-supportive teach-
ers show a sensitivity and attunement to
 The Personality of Everyday Life
Relatedness in college students
Early research on students’ motivation for attending college focused on feelings of compe-
tence and autonomy, ignoring relatedness (Vallerand & Bissonnette, 1992). But for college
students of color, relatedness to family, peers, and professors is especially important for
their motivation and engagement. Students of color who perceive their campuses as hostile
and unfriendly—indicating a lack of relatedness—are at risk for performing poorly in
college and eventually dropping out (Smedley, Myers, & Harrell, 1993).
To study the relatedness of college students, researchers developed the Need for Relat-
edness at College Questionnaire (NRC-Q) to measure connectedness with friends and
family back home, and faculty, staff, and peers at college (Guiffrida, Gouveia, Wall, &
Seward, 2008; see Table 9.2).
Using this questionnaire, researchers discovered that relatedness was an important
source of motivation for all college students regardless of their cultural background.
Students were engaged in college for the relationships they hoped to develop (e.g., with
friends), the teaching they looked forward to receiving (e.g., with professors), and the love
and support of their family and friends back home. Researchers also found that friends
and family back home could provide both intrinsic reasons (e.g., to give back to people
who have supported and helped you) and extrinsic reasons (e.g., to keep up with others
around you) for attending college. Intrinsic reasons, along with relatedness to peers and
relatedness to faculty and staff, lessened a student’s intention to drop out of school. Extrin-
sic reasons were not related to a student’s intention to drop out of college.
These results highlight the predictions of self-determination theory that relatedness
is an important but often overlooked variable in predicting motivation and engagement.
Whether we are talking about students attending college or children in a classroom,
involvement of parents, teachers, and peers can help fulfill a person’s need for relatedness.

Table 9.2 The Need for Relatedness at College Questionnaire (NRC-Q)

I go to college . . .
How well does each statement reflect your reasons for attending college? Rate each statement on a 1 (Does not correspond at all) to
7 (Corresponds exactly) scale.
Relatedness with peers at college (M = 11.03):
12. To make new friends
2. To meet friends who can relate to me and around whom I am comfortable
9. To become a member of an interesting and fun student organization
Relatedness with family and friends from home (helping them, making them proud, giving back to them) (M = 13.12):
1. To give back to my family
11. To be able to help my family
4. Because I want to make my family and friends from home proud of me
Relatedness with faculty and staff (M = 10.96):
5. Because I am interested in connecting with faculty who have expertise in my areas of interest
7. To get to know faculty and staff whom I can learn from and feel comfortable around
3. To connect with a mentor who will support me and look out for me
Relatedness with family and friends from home (to keep up with them) (M = 7.51):
10. To keep up with family members or friends from home
6. To relate to my friends from home who have gone to college
8. To help me talk to my friends or family members
Note: Responses are summed for each subscale. Average score for a group of college students on each of the subscales is given in parentheses. Numbers refer to the order of the items as presented
on the original questionnaire.
Source: Adapted from Guiffrida et al. (2008, Appendix, p. 261). Guiffrida, D., Gouveia, A., Wall, A., & Seward, D. (2008). Development and validation of the need for relatedness at college questionnaire (NRC-Q).
Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 1(4), 251–261. Copyright American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission.

251
252 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

students by sensing the cognitive and emotional states of their students and adjusting their
instruction accordingly.

Then and Now: Undermining Intrinsic Interest

Is rewarding kids for getting good grades a good thing? In the Philadelphia area at the end
of the 2009–2010 school year kids could cash in on their As to get pizza, ice cream, fast food,
and even trading cards at some national chains, including Pizza Hut (Buckman, 2010). And
that doesn’t even count the summer reading programs at local libraries that also promise kids
rewards for reading on their own!
We can all agree that diligent work and reading skills are important for kids, but what if
these extrinsic rewards inadvertently prevented kids from developing a lifelong love of read-
ing for its own sake? Just what is the effect of extrinsic factors like rewards, and also external
controls like deadlines, imposed goals, competition, surveillance, and evaluations, on intrinsic
motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2008a)?
This question of the impact of extrinsic rewards on intrinsic behavior has a long his-
tory in social psychology, and in fact was the inspiration behind self-determination theory
(Deci, 1971; Ryan & Deci, 2008a). One of the earliest experiments was a landmark study
rewarding nursery school children for drawing with markers (Lepper, Greene, & Nisbett,
1973).
Researchers selected children who had shown an interest in drawing with markers to
take part in an experiment on children’s drawing. Children came to the laboratory, one
at a time, and were randomly assigned to one of three conditions. In the expected reward
condition, children were told that they would earn “A Good Player Award” for drawing. In
the unexpected reward condition, children received the same “Good Player Award” but only
after they drew with the markers. This condition tested whether merely getting a reward
lowers intrinsic interest or if explicitly contracting for the reward lowers interest. In a third
no reward (control) condition, children drew with the markers but did not hear about nor
receive an award.
All the children drew with the markers, received their awards (if they were in the expected
or unexpected conditions), and returned to their regular classrooms. Then, after about a week
or so, markers appeared in the children’s regular classrooms and the children were observed
from behind a one-way mirror. The experimenters recorded how much of their free play time
the children spent drawing with the markers.
THINK ABOUT IT Despite what a behaviorist might predict—that rewards will increase the desired
behavior—rewards actually had the opposite effect! Not only were the drawings made by
What kinds of activities do the children in the expected reward condition during the experiment rated by judges as
people get paid for doing?
inferior, but the children also played with the markers less when back in their regular class-
Are they generally fun to
begin with? rooms and the experiment was over than children in the unexpected reward and no reward
conditions (see Figure 9.5).
This effect is called the undermining of intrinsic interest or the overjustification effect.
When intrinsic interest in an activity is already high, like drawing was for these children, if
extrinsic factors are made more salient, by giving a reward, for example, then people will dis-
count their own intrinsic reasons for doing the behavior. It’s as if they say to themselves, “This
must be one of those times when people have to make me to do something that’s not very fun
to begin with.” As a result, people come to see the activity as the means to some end and cease
to view the activity as desirable in itself. Both cognitive dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957) and
self-perception theory (Bem, 1967, 1972) support this logic.
In the almost 40 years since this work was done, over 128 well-controlled experiments have
tested the effect of extrinsic rewards on intrinsic interest. According to a meta-analysis the results
are clear and consistent: tangible rewards—including anything from money to marshmallows—
undermine the intrinsic interest of participants, both children and college students (Deci, Koestner,
& Ryan, 1999). In particular, rewards that are given explicitly for reaching a level of performance or
for finishing a task are more likely to have an adverse effect than rewards that do not require engag-
ing in a specific task or which are not contingent on completion, quality of output, or reaching
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 253

Very Good Figure 9.5 Judges’ ratings

of drawing quality during the

Spent Playing With the Markers

Percent of Free Choice Time
20 5 experiment and percentage of
free play time spent drawing

Quality of Drawings
4 with the markers after the
experiment as a function of
3 reward condition. Source:
10 Lepper et al. (1973). Quality was
2 rated on a 1 to 5 scale.

0
Condition Very Poor

Expected Reward Expected Reward

No Reward No Reward
Unexpected Reward Unexpected Reward

some standard of excellence (Deci et al., 1999, but see also Eisenberger, Pierce, & Cameron, 1999, THINK ABOUT IT
for a dissenting view).
The key to predicting when rewards or threats of punishments will have negative What meanings does the
effects on motivation and performance is to realize that external motivators can convey phrase “I am proud of you”
convey?
two meanings: control and information (Ryan & Deci, 2008a). The controlling aspect of
an extrinsic factor suggests that the behavior is under external control (“You are doing the
activity because I am giving you this reward”), essentially thwarting people’s satisfaction
of the need for autonomy. The informational aspect provides feedback about people’s
performance on the task (“One more and you’ll have 10!”) so that they can adjust their
behavior and thereby satisfy their need for competence. A reward that is experienced as THINK ABOUT IT
controlling (“Excellent! You should keep up the good work.”) will rob a person of auton-
What meanings does the
omy and undermine intrinsic interest. But a reward that is experienced as informational phrase “See, I knew you
(“Excellent! You’re doing great.”) will increase feelings of competence and not undermine could do it” convey?
intrinsic interest.
So it is not the reward per se that is good or bad, but how the reward is communicated
and interpreted that determines whether the control or the information aspect will be more
salient with the ultimate impact on motivation and performance. External motivators such

What is the impact of rewarding

people for getting good
grades?
254 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

THINK ABOUT IT as deadlines, imposed goals, competition, surveillance, and evaluations may also undermine
intrinsic interest and performance if they are used to control (robbing autonomy) instead of
What could you say to for information (to increase competence).
somebody to praise him Somebody at Pizza Hut grasped this important distinction, for now their website
or her without undermin-
ing the person’s intrinsic
emphasizes the informational and non-performance-contingent nature of the reading
motivation? rewards program by proclaiming, “Motivate children to read by rewarding their reading
accomplishments with praise, recognition, and fun!”—all conditions that are less likely to
undermine their intrinsic interest in reading.

Connections Between Self-Determination

Theory and Other Theories in Personality
If some aspects of self-determination theory sound familiar to you that’s because the theory
builds on and unites previous research in psychology. In particular, other theorists and research-
ers have recognized the importance of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. In this section,
we highlight and clarify some of these connections.

Autonomy and Locus of Causality

People can differ in their beliefs about control (Rotter, 1966). Those with an internal locus of
control believe they can influence what happens to them through their own efforts, behavior,
or characteristics. Those with an external locus of control believe that what happens to them
is due to chance, luck, fate, or other people. They believe that they have little control over what
happens to them. Locus of control describes the connection between behavior and outcomes.
The opposite of having control is feeling helpless (we discuss the importance of control beliefs
in more depth in Chapter 10).
Autonomy describes the connection between choice and behavior; the extent to which
people feel free to choose their own behaviors or follow their own interests. Personality psychol-
THINK ABOUT IT ogists refer to the connection between choice and behavior as locus of causality (DeCharms,
1981). As you can see, locus of causality (autonomy) is slightly different from locus of control.
What causes a person to
feel guilty? Is that internal or
People may understand the contingency between their behavior and some outcome and are able
external? to control their behaviors (locus of control), but they may not want to or feel free to engage in
those behaviors (locus of causality).
The opposite of autonomy is compliance (including conformity to norms and obedience
to a direct order) or defiance, both of which occur in direct response to the controlling actions
of another (Patrick, Skinner, & Connell, 1993). Anytime a person gives in to external (e.g.,
rewards, punishments) or internal (e.g., guilt) pressures to behave in a certain way, he or she is
behaving without autonomy.
Sadly, school, especially in the lower grades, is often structured to reward compliance
instead of autonomy (Patrick et al., 1993). For example, have you ever been faced with the
choice of writing what the teacher wanted rather than what you believed on an essay or a paper?
In both cases—either writing what the teacher wants or writing what you believe—the behavior
of writing is completely under your control. However, the feeling of pressure to just do what
you are told and the lack of being able to act in a way that is truly and authentically yourself
illustrates an external locus of causality as well as a lack of autonomy.

Competence and Self-Efficacy Theory

Feelings of competence are very similar to a sense of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is the belief
that one can be competent and effective at some activity (Bandura, 1977a, 1982, 2000b, 2001).
There are two parts to self-efficacy beliefs (see Figure 9.6). First is the outcome expectation, the
belief that behaving in a certain way will produce a certain outcome. Then there is the efficacy
expectation, the belief that one is capable of acting in a certain way; that is, the expectation
about whether a person will succeed or fail at performing the required action.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 255

Person Behavior Outcome Figure 9.6 The two parts

of self-efficacy: efficacy
expectations and outcome
Efficacy Outcome expectations. Source: Lepper
Expectations Expectations et al. (1973). Quality was rated
on a 1 to 5 scale. Bandura, 1977,
Figure 1, p. 193. Bandura, A.
(1977a). Self-efficacy: Toward a
For example, imagine a person recovering from a back injury who is told that one way of unifying theory of behavioral
preventing such injury is by strengthening her abdominal muscles. Her physical therapist tells change. Psychological Review,
her that if she does certain exercises every day she will get stronger. This describes how her 84(2), 191–215. Copyright
behavior (exercising) will lead to an outcome (increased strength). Is this enough for her to American Psychological
be motivated to do her exercises? She may indeed hold this outcome expectation, but she also Association. Reprinted with
permission.
needs to hold an efficacy expectation and believe that she is capable of physically getting down
on the ground to do the sit ups or whatever the exercise demands. According to self-efficacy
theory, the efficacy expectation is more important than the outcome expectation. There are
many situations where people know what they ought to do—or not to do—but feel incapable
of actually doing it. Self-determination theory would call this a lack of perceived competence.
Knowing people’s self-efficacy predicts how motivated they will be before and during an
activity (Bandura, 1977). Self-efficacy determines which activities people are likely to engage in
or avoid; how much effort they will put into that activity; whether they are likely to persist or
give up, especially when the going gets tough; how well they perform; and what their emotional
reactions might be before, during, and after the activity. Although self-efficacy theory predicts
amount of motivation, it does not differentiate among types of motivation the way that self-
determination theory does.
We develop our self-efficacy beliefs from four sources of information (Bandura, 1977,
1982). The most direct way is through personal experience. Successes build efficacy whereas
failures decrease efficacy. Having a bad experience while skiing is likely to keep a person off the
slopes for a long time and maybe even forever!
The second way is through the vicarious experience of watching another person enact
the behavior and succeed or fail and then trying it ourselves. From observing others we can
see what the task is all about so that we can anticipate what might happen when it is our turn.
We also learn strategies to improve our own chances of succeeding. Have you ever witnessed a
spectacular move of an athlete or dancer and thought that maybe you could do that? Or maybe,
you’ve had the opposite experience of realizing that you could never do that! Then you’ve expe-
rienced how self-efficacy beliefs can be increased or decreased through observational learning
and social modeling. Especially empowering are personal stories of people who have overcome
difficulties in their lives through determination and effort (Bandura, 1977a).

Whee! Self-efficacy beliefs

come from direct experience,
watching others, persuasion,
and our physical and
emotional reactions while
engaging in an activity.
256 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

THINK ABOUT IT Self-efficacy beliefs can also develop or change through social persuasion. That is, friends,
coaches, teachers, or therapists, for example, might be able to convince another person that he
Can systematic desensiti- or she is capable of taking a desired action (e.g., Miserandino, 1998). Their persuasion often
zation or guided imagery involves changing efficacy expectations (“Yes, you can call him up. Just take a deep breath and
techniques decrease fear
and increase self-efficacy?
dial his number”), but can also involve outcome expectations (“Here’s his number, what’s stop-
Why? ping you?” “Keep your eye on the ball, not the other player!”).
Finally, self-efficacy beliefs can come from physical and emotional states. According to self-
efficacy theory, we read our own physical and emotional reactions and adjust our self-efficacy
beliefs accordingly. Do you have a gut reaction to the thought of giving a speech in front of the
class or to the memory of a scary amusement park ride? Activities or the thought of activities that
make us sweat, tire us out, or cause aches and pains lower our self-efficacy and may prevent us
from attempting an activity (“I’m getting dizzy just looking at that ride”) or may cause us to stop
the activity (“OK, three times on that roller coaster is enough”). Activities that energize us or occur
in the absence of negative visceral reactions increase our self-efficacy and make us want to attempt
the activity (“OK, I’ll give it a shot.”) or continue at it (“Hey, this isn’t so bad. Let’s go on it again!”).
Tension, anxiety, and depression on many tasks, as well as feelings of fatigue and pain on tasks that
require stamina and strength may be interpreted as signs of low self-efficacy (Bandura, 2000b).
Psychologists have used principles of self-efficacy theory to decrease people’s fears of trav-
eling by automobile, using elevators and escalators, climbing stairs to high levels, dining in
restaurants, shopping in supermarkets, and entering public places (Bandura, Adams, Hardy, &
Howells, 1980). In addition to treating phobias, self-efficacy theory has been used to help people
recover from cardiac arrest (Bandura, 1982), to explain the effectiveness of groups (Bandura,
2000a), and the academic achievement and career choices of students (Bandura, Barbaranelli,
Caprara, & Pastorelli, 2001).

Relatedness and Attachment Theory

Relatedness is very much like attachment, and in fact, self-determination theory builds on work
in attachment theory. Recall from Chapter 8 that an attachment figure can be a secure base from
which to explore the world and a safe haven to retreat to in times of stress (Bowlby, 1973; Shaver
& Mikulincer, 2007). In the same spirit, self-determination theory recognizes the fundamental
importance of this need to be connected or attached to, not just caregivers or partners, but to
friends, coworkers, teammates, peers, and other people in our world. Feeling connected to oth-
ers, along with autonomy and competence, gives us the motivation to engage with the world,
persistence when the going gets tough, and increased well-being.

Research Methods Illustrated: Path Analysis

R
esearch in self-determination theory often uses a statistical technique called path analysis
to test how variables affect each other. Though the mathematics behind this technique are
pretty complicated, the logic is fairly straightforward and builds on the logic of regression.
Generally, researchers have some idea of how they think variables are related and path analysis
is a way of testing their hunches. In a path analysis, researchers use statistics to test their hypotheses
about how variables relate to one another. Researchers then draw a path diagram visually
showing the significant effects of the variables on each other. Variables can have a direct effect
on another variable, an indirect effect on another variable, or no effect on another variable. Direct
effects are generally identified by a solid line; indirect effects by a dotted line, and no effect by the
absence of a line. The head of the arrow tells us the direction of the effect. Lines with double arrows
indicate that two variables affect each other.
Each of the lines connecting variables represents the regression coefficient, which is how much the
x variable is weighted when it is used to predict the next variable in the model. The higher the weight
the greater the impact one variable has on the other. A weight can be positive, indicating that it causes
an increase in the next variable, or negative, indicating that it causes a decrease in the next variable.
For each model researchers propose, they test (1) if the overall model accounts for a significant
amount of variability in the data; (2) if the weights are significantly different from 0; and (3) if the
effects are direct or indirect. Once these questions have been answered, researchers draw a path
diagram of the results, with variables, lines, arrows, and significant weights identified.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 257

Figure 9.7 Path analysis

Perceived Autonomy of work performance and
Performance
Support of Work
Evaluations adjustment. Source: From Baard
Climate
et al. (2004, Figure 1, p. 2061).
Reprinted with permission from
0.57** 0.24**
Baard, P. P., Deci, E. L., & Ryan,
R. M. (2004), “Intrinsic need
Intrinsic Need
satisfaction: A motivational
Satisfaction
basis of performance and well-
being in two work settings,”
0.14** 0.46** Journal of Applied Social
Psychology, 34, pp. 2045–2068.
Autonomous Permission conveyed through
Causality Adjustment
Orientation
the Copyright Clearance Center.

Consider the path diagram shown in Figure 9.7. This comes from a study of 528 employees
from a major U.S. investment banking firm (Baard, Deci, & Ryan, 2004). The researchers wanted to
test predictions of self-determination theory in the workplace. This overall model was better than
other models the researchers tested in explaining their results. For example, gender was not a
significant predictor in the model, so it was not included in this path diagram. As you can see, all
of the pathways are direct (the lines are solid), one way (arrow heads on one end only), and highly THINK ABOUT IT
significant (starred weights).
Is it possible for good per-
This analysis suggests that workers’ perceived supportiveness of their work environment
formance evaluations to
had a direct impact on the satisfaction of their needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness increase personal adjust-
(measured in this study as one big variable called intrinsic need satisfaction). Also, approaching ment at work? The research-
the world in an autonomous, intrinsically motivated way as opposed to being extrinsically ers tested this hypothesis.
motivated or feeling like the world pushes you around, also had a direct effect on workers’ need What did they find?
satisfaction.
Further, having their needs met had a direct effect on workers’ performance evaluations and
adjustment. Because these two weights are positive, it means that having their needs met increased
the quality of workers’ performance and increased their psychological adjustment in the work
environment (Baard et al., 2004). Workers whose needs were met by an autonomy supportive climate
showed greater emotional stability and better health than workers whose needs were not being
met. Notice that the arrow between need satisfaction and performance evaluations is one way, so
we know that having good performance evaluations does not satisfy workers’ needs for autonomy,
competence, and relatedness. That is, need satisfaction is a cause, not a result, of high performance.
Now that you understand the basics of what path analysis is and how to interpret a path
diagram, you can understand some of the fascinating research which has been done applying self-
determination theory in various domains.

What It Means to Be Self-Regulated

When faced with a task that is not particularly intrinsically interesting, say an assignment for
school or work, what do you say to yourself to get yourself to do it? Do you give up and avoid
thinking about it? Do you think of the dire consequences that could happen if you don’t do SEE FOR YOURSELF
it? Do you promise yourself a treat if you do it? Do you remind yourself of how this activity
is related to important goals you hold, a strategy of providing autonomy support, as we saw Think of something you
have to do this week. What
earlier in the chapter? Or, does doing it come naturally to you, as an extension of who you are,
do you tell yourself to get
so that doing it is really no big deal? Although the behavior may look identical to an outsider motivated for it?
when done for any of these reasons the outcomes are radically different.
Motivation is best characterized on a continuum, ranging from extrinsic to intrinsic, varying in
how much volition or autonomy a person feels they have (Ryan & Deci, 2000). There is even a kind
of motivation called amotivation that is a state of having no motivation, where people are neither
extrinsically nor intrinsically motivated, perhaps feeling apathetic or alienated. Being self-regulated
means adjusting our own behaviors and attitudes somewhere along this continuum of motivation
depending on the situation and the activity at hand (see Figure 9.8). Self-regulation embodies the
258 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

The Self-Determination Continuum Showing Types of Motivation With Their Regulatory Styles, Loci of Causality, and
Corresponding Processes
Behavior Nonself-Determined Self-Determined

Intrinsic
Motivation Amotivation Extrinsic Motivation
Motivation

Intrinsic
Regulatory External Introjected Identified Integrated Regulation
Non-Regulation
Styles Regulation Regulation Regulation Regulation

Perceived Impersonal External Somewhat Somewhat Internal Internal

Locus of External Internal
Causality
Relevant Nonintentional, Compliance, Self-Control, Personal Congruence, Interest,
Regulatory Nonvaluing, External Ego-Involvement, Importance, Awareness, Enjoyment,
Processes Incompetence, Rewards and Internal Rewards Conscious Synthesis, Inherent
Lack of Control Punishments and Punishments Valuing With Self Satisfaction

Figure 9.8 The types of motivation and regulation within self-determination theory, along with their placement along the
continuum of relative self-determination. Source: Ryan and Deci (2000, Figure 1, p. 72). Deci and Ryan (2008a, Figure 1, p. 17)
Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2008a). Facilitating optimal motivation and psychological well-being across life’s domains. Canadian
Psychology, 49(1), 14–23. Copyright American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.

humanistic values of freedom, responsibility, and authenticity, all part of being fully functioning
according to Carl Rogers (1968), which is at the very heart of self-determination theory.

Types of Motivation
Intrinsic motivation and intrinsic regulation occur when people engage in an activity due to
reasons inherent in the activity itself, like satisfaction or pleasure. Actually, very few activities we
undertake in the course of a typical day are intrinsically motivating. Yet, most of our activities—
such as walking to class, grocery shopping, returning phone calls, going to the library, brushing
our teeth—are undertaken with some measure of volition; that is, we are generally not forced
or coerced into grocery shopping or brushing our teeth, yet there is nothing inherently plea-
surable about pushing a bristled implement around in your mouth with some special soaplike
substance! We engage in many activities in our day, especially chores and other activities that
are not particularly intrinsically interesting, by being self-regulating.
“[B]eing controlled by oneself In contrast to intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation occurs when an activity is under-
taken for reasons that are external or separable from the activity itself, like gaining a reward
can be fully as uncomfortable
or avoiding a punishment (Ryan & Deci, 2000). There are four types of extrinsic motivations,
and detrimental to intrinsic which vary in how much autonomy or volition is involved (Deci & Ryan, 2008b). At one extreme
motivation . . . as being is external regulation , which is completely extrinsic and controlled by something or someone
controlled by another.” outside ourselves. Perhaps as a child you brushed your teeth to gain a reward like watching your
Deci and Ryan (1985b, p. 106) favorite TV show or the praise of being called “good boy” or “good girl.”
Next comes introjected regulation in which the behavior is controlled by something
within ourselves. Introjected regulation is experienced as just as controlling as external regula-
tion, except that we act as our own controlling agents, using guilt, anxiety, conditional self-
esteem, obligation, approval, or other thoughts to control ourselves. For example, I doubt that
there is a parent who is going to tell you to brush your teeth before bed tonight and say “good
boy” or “good girl” when you do (external regulation). However, you might make yourself brush
your own teeth and perhaps feel good about yourself when you do (introjected regulation).
Both external and introjected regulation are considered controlled and therefore part
of extrinsic motivation because the person feels pressured or controlled by demands and
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 259

Experiences with extrinsic

regulation as a child are often
internalized as introjected
regulation as an adult.

contingencies (Deci & Ryan, 2008b). Despite all appearances of being actively engaged in an
activity, when people are acting under external or introjected regulation they may also experience
apathy, lower creativity, drug and alcohol abuse, and poor psychological health (Deci et al., 2001).
Two other kinds of extrinsic motivations are autonomously regulated but are still consid-
ered kinds of extrinsic motivation because they are not inherent in the activity (Deci & Ryan,
2008b). Identified regulation is when we accept the activity as personally meaningful, per-
haps for some greater goal which is more important than hassles involved in the task at hand.
Under integrated regulation, people have internalized the goals and values of the enterprise
(e.g., work environment, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, getting an education) even though the
particular activity (e.g., preparing reports, quitting smoking, taking an exam) is not inherently
interesting.
For example, people who believe that they should take care of their bodies would prob-
ably show identified regulation for brushing their teeth and might not mind the momentary
discomfort of hard bristles and medicine flavored toothpaste. However, if the only reason a
person brushes her teeth is to avoid having a nasty case of gingivitis, that would be an example
of external regulation.
Consider a person who maintains a healthy lifestyle: He regularly exercises, doesn’t smoke, THINK ABOUT IT
eats five servings of vegetables, avoids sugary drinks, uses organic products, and enjoys out- Recall the activity you
door activities on the weekend. Suppose taking care of his teeth is just one of the many ways identified at the beginning
he expresses this aspect of his personality, it’s part of who he is, and he probably doesn’t even of this chapter. Why do you
have to think about it. In this case, brushing his teeth is an example of integrated regulation want to do it? What does it
suggest about your moti-
where the identification with the activity is integrated into other aspects of the self (Ryan &
vation for the task?
Deci, 2000). Activities that are integrated are generally expressions of our true, authentic selves.
Getting back to the questions that opened this section, how do you motivate yourself for
an activity that is not particularly interesting? The possible strategies suggested there represent
the different kinds of regulation just discussed—nonregulation, external regulation, introjected
regulation, identified regulation, and integrated regulation.
This discussion of the different kinds of motivation and how people can regulate their
own behavior suggests that people can willingly undertake even uninteresting tasks if the
meaning and greater value behind the activities is understood. People who are more autono-
mous or self-regulated in their motivation can take up activities with identified, integrated, or
intrinsic regulations and engage in these activities with more interest, enthusiasm, confidence,
and show greater performance, persistence, and creativity (Deci & Ryan, 1991; Sheldon, Ryan,
Rawsthorne, & Ilardi, 1997) in these endeavors than people who are more controlled in their
activities (Ryan & Deci, 2000). They also show increased vitality (Nix, Ryan, Manly, & Deci,
1999), self-esteem (Deci & Ryan, 1995), general well-being (Ryan, Deci, & Grolnick, 1995), and
longer-lasting changes in health behaviors (Deci & Ryan, 2008b).
260 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

Perhaps you can also see now why the various ways of providing autonomy support sum-
marized in Table 9.1 work: They help people find ways of regulating their behavior along this
continuum. By supporting autonomy, agents such as parents, teachers, coaches, therapists,
work supervisors, and friends foster internal motivation and self-determination. By being con-
trolling, these agents foster external motivation and non-self-determination (Deci & Ryan,
1985b; Grolnick & Ryan, 1989). When we choose activities that are intrinsically interesting
where possible, and regulate our behavior when choice is not possible, we maintain our own
self-determination.

Causality Orientations
By the time we reach adulthood, we have a lifetime of experiences that can build our autonomy,
lead us to develop competencies, and connect us with family, friends, and others. For people
who have their needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness met, the world is a very dif-
ferent place than for people who have had a lifetime of being pushed around, not developing a
sense of their own competencies, or feeling unsupported by people around them. People differ
in their causality orientations or their typical ways of self-regulating (Deci & Ryan, 2008b).
These are important individual differences in what people expect from the world and how they
approach specific situations.
Though people may express each of these orientations to some extent, generally one ori-
entation is stronger than the others. People show consistent, general ways of approaching tasks
across many behaviors (brushing your teeth, practicing foul shots), situations (at work, at
home), and even domains (academics, sports).
There are three causality orientations: autonomous, controlled, and impersonal. The
autonomous orientation describes the degree to which people interpret a situation as
autonomy supportive, providing information for their own self-regulation (Ryan & Deci,
2008a). People develop an autonomous orientation when all three basic needs are regularly
met. People with an autonomous orientation are attracted to situations that have the poten-
tial to stimulate their intrinsic motivation and which they find optimally challenging. The
autonomous orientation is associated with autonomous self-regulation, greater initiative,
good performance, and psychological well-being (Deci & Ryan, 2008b). You may recall the
THINK ABOUT IT study, discussed earlier, of work performance at an investment banking firm (see Figure 9.7)
Can causality orientations
in which workers with a more autonomous orientation were more likely to have all three of
be changed? their needs met and to have more positive performance evaluations and better psychological
adjustment (Baard et al., 2004).
A controlled orientation describes the degree to which people look for controls in the
environment and let the environment or their own introjects determine and regulate their own
behavior (Ryan & Deci, 2008a). People develop a controlled orientation when some degree of
their needs for competence and relatedness are satisfied, but the need for autonomy is not. Peo-
ple with a controlled orientation approach situations ready to respond to situational demands
and contingencies. People with the controlled orientation self-regulate through introjects and
external contingencies, are dependent on rewards and other controls, and show diminished
well-being (Deci & Ryan, 2008b).
An impersonal orientation describes the degree to which people feel they lack control
over important outcomes (Ryan & Deci, 2008a). An impersonal orientation develops from
consistently having all three needs thwarted. People with an impersonal orientation approach
situations through amotivation with detachment and apathy, believing that there is little they
can do to attain desired outcomes. People with an impersonal orientation show poor function-
ing and poor well-being (Deci & Ryan, 2008b).
Causality orientations are measured through the General Causality Orientations Scale
(GCOS; Deci & Ryan, 1985a). The GCOS presents respondents with 12 hypothetical situations
and 3 ways they might respond (see Table 9.3). Respondents rate each possible reaction on
a 1 to 7 scale of how likely they would be to react in each of these ways. Each of the possible
responses represents one of the causality orientations. Responses are totaled separately for each
orientation, and respondents receive a score indicating the strength of each of the orientations.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 261

Table 9.3 Sample Item and Orientations From the General Causality Orientations Scale
How likely is each outcome?
You have been offered a new position in a company where you have worked for some time. The
first question that is likely to come to mind is:
I wonder if the new work will be interesting? Autonomous Orientation
Will I make more at this position? Controlled Orientation
What if I can’t live up to the new responsibility? Impersonal Orientation
Source: Deci and Ryan (1985a, p. 118). Reprinted from Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1985),“The general causality orientations scale: Self-determination
in personality,” Journal of Research in Personality, 19, 109–134. Copyright © 1985, with permission from Elsevier.

Self-Determination Theory Applied

We can understand the three psychological needs and the conditions that foster these needs
in one model of motivation and engagement (Connell & Wellborn, 1990; see Figure 9.9).
According to this model, the context provides the nutriments for meeting the three needs,
that is, structure for competence, autonomy support for autonomy, and involvement for
relatedness. When these needs are met, we feel motivated for action and will experience
positive emotions and feel like being engaged in the task at hand, be it school (Miseran-
dino, 1996; Skinner, Furrer, Marchand, & Kindermann, 2008), work (Gagné & Deci, 2005),
health maintenance (Ryan, Patrick, Deci, & Williams, 2008; Williams et al., 2006, 2009; Wil-
liams, Grow, Freedman, Ryan, & Deci, 1996; Wilson, Mack, & Grattan, 2008), close relation-
ships (La Guardia & Patrick, 2008), therapy (Ryan & Deci, 2008b), or parenting (Joussemet,
Landry, & Koestner, 2008). Across all of these contexts, as a result of our actions we will
increase our skills, abilities, and general well-being.
However, if our needs are not met in a context that fails to provide either involvement,
structure, or autonomy support, we will not feel motivated. Instead of engaging in the activi-
ties of the enterprise (e.g., studying, working, exercising, etc.) we may feel disaffection. For
example, people who are engaged in a context show productive behaviors such as attention,
effort and persistence, whereas people who are disaffected show behaviors such as lack of effort
and withdrawal (Skinner et al., 2008). Instead of positive emotions like curiosity or enjoyment,
they may express negative emotions like depression, frustration, or boredom (Skinner et al.,

Actions
Context Self and Outcomes
Emotions

Feel Skills and

Structure
Competent Abilities

Engagement &
Positive Emotions
Autonomy Feel
vs.
Support Autonomous
Disengagement &
Disaffection

Feel
Involvement Adjustment
Related

Figure 9.9 A motivational model of the effects of psychological needs on engagement. Source:
From Connell and Wellborn (1990, Figure 2.2, p. 51). Reprinted from Connell, J. P., & Wellborn, J. G. (1990),
“Competence, autonomy, and relatedness: A motivational analysis of self-system processes,” as appeared in
M. Gunnar & L. A. Sroufe (Eds.), The Minnesota Symposia on Child Psychology Vol. 22, p. 43–77 (Minneapolis,
MN: University of Minnesota Press). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
262 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

2008). As a result of disaffection, as shown in these behaviors and emotions, we will miss out
on the chance to increase our skills and abilities, and may even end up experiencing the distress
of poor psychological adjustment.
If all of this sounds a bit abstract to you, that’s what a theoretical model is. But if we apply
this model to a specific context the model may make more sense. Part of the power of this
model is that it can apply to many different situations. Let’s take a closer look at some of these.

Health Behaviors
“Diseases are of two Researchers and practitioners have applied the principles of self-determination theory to help
types: Those we develop patients take better care of themselves (Ryan et al., 2008). The more autonomy, competence,
and relatedness patients feel, the more willing and able they are to quit smoking (Williams
inadvertently, and those
et al., 2006), successfully manage blood sugar levels (Williams et al., 2009), lose weight (Wil-
we bring on ourselves by
liams et al., 1996), and exercise regularly (Wilson et al., 2008). The self-determination model
failure to practice preventive of motivation and engagement has even been used by dentists and hygienists to get people to
measures. Preventable illness take better care of their teeth (Halvari & Halvari, 2006; see Figure 9.10).
makes up approximately 70% In the beginning of this study, patients in a dental clinic had their motivation for taking
of the burden of illness and care of their teeth measured and their teeth examined for plaque and evidence of the gum
disease gingivitis (Halvari & Halvari, 2006). About 1 month later, all participants had their
associated costs.”
teeth cleaned. Then, about 2 months later, patients were randomly assigned to receive either a
C. Everett Koop, surgeon general of
special intervention or standard care. Patients in the intervention group returned to the clinic
the United States from 1982 to
for a one-on-one session with a dental hygienist. Patients in the standard care condition did
1989 (1995)
not return to the clinic and did not have this extra session about home oral health care. The
lack of specific instruction was standard treatment at the time.
During the intervention, the hygienist asked patients in this condition about any den-
tal problems they might have been experiencing. They listened to and acknowledged the
THINK ABOUT IT patient’s feelings and perspectives, and then gave feedback and suggestions. If a patient was
having a problem, the hygienist presented patients with a combination of x-rays, pictures,
What prevents people from examples, and information about how to remedy and prevent common gum problems.
taking steps to protect
Patients were given options about treatments they could do at home to prevent problems
themselves from prevent-
able diseases? along with a meaningful rationale for each option. The hygienist demonstrated the correct
techniques of flossing and brushing and gave patients a chance to practice these techniques.

Plaque
T1

Perceived 0.39*** Perceived

Competence Competence
0.43*** 0.13
T1 T3
0.41***
Autonomy Health ⫺0.42*** 0.49***
Plaque Gingivitis
Support Behavior
T3 T3
T2 T3

Autonomous 0.24* Autonomous

0.20* 0.33**
Motivation Motivation
T1 0.30** T3

Gingivitis
T1

Figure 9.10 Self-determination theory model of oral health care: Self-determination theory predicted the
amount of plaque patients had at the end of the experiment better than amount of plaque at the start of the
experiment did. Significant pathways are marked by asterisks: *p 6 .05, **p 6 .01, ***p 6 .001. T1 = Beginning
of experiment, T2 = Two months later, T3 = End of experiment. Source: Halvari and Halvari (2006, Figure 1,
p. 300) Halvari, A. E. M., & Halvari, H. (2006). Motivational predictors of change in oral health: An experimental test
of self-determination theory. Motivation and Emotion, 30, 295–306.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 263

All the while, she encouraged and conveyed confi-

dence in their ability to do these tasks. During the
entire intervention controlling or pressuring lan-
guage was kept to a minimum. At the end of the
session, patients were given toothbrushes, floss, and
brochures reinforcing good dental care at home.
Then, 7 months later, all participants returned
to the clinic where their motivation, perceived com-
petence for dental care, attitudes toward dental care,
and dental health behaviors were assessed. Finally, all
participants had an oral examination in which plaque Open up and say
and gingivitis were again measured. ahh . . . tonomy! Patients
The researchers hypothesized that the interven- who are competent at
tion would increase patients’ perceived competence for brushing and flossing and
dental care and their sense of autonomy in practicing who take responsibility for
good dental hygiene. Patients with greater competence doing so have less plaque
would floss and brush better, and as a result, show less than patients who lack
plaque and gingivitis at the end of the experiment. competence and autonomy.
Figure 9.10 shows the results of the path analysis test-
ing this model.
The results supported these predictions. The intervention (the box labeled autonomy sup-
port T2) was successful in giving patients an increased sense of competence and autonomy (the
boxes labeled perceived competence T3 and autonomous motivation T3, respectively). Patients
whose competence and autonomy needs were being met either through the intervention or
SEE FOR YOURSELF
because they had a strong sense of autonomy to begin with were more likely to take better care
of their teeth and to have less plaque than patients who believed they lacked competence and What kinds of things does
autonomy. This self-determination theory pathway was a better predictor of plaque at the end your dentist or hygienist say
of the experiment than was the amount of plaque patients had at the beginning of the study! In to you? Do you feel com-
petent and motivated or
addition, gingivitis at the end of the study was indirectly influenced by feelings of competence
incompetent and pressured
and autonomy through the amount of plaque patients had at the end of the study and directly after a visit?
through the amount of gingivitis patients had at the beginning of the study.
This study illustrates that feelings of autonomy and competence, nourished by autonomy
support and task structure, motivated people to take better care of their teeth. Increased moti-
vation led to increased health behaviors which led to a healthier mouth.

Sports Behaviors
Which phrase do you agree with more: “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing” or “It’s
not whether you win or lose but how you play the game”? As we saw earlier in this chapter,
feedback can communicate two meanings: control and information (Ryan & Deci, 2008a).
The mere outcome of a game played against another opponent—winning or losing—conveys
information about a person’s skill. So there is nothing inherently motivating or demotivat-
ing about competition by itself. However, the context in which the competition occurs can
undermine intrinsic motivation if athletes experience the situation as controlling (Reeve &
Deci, 1996).
College students who solved a block puzzle faster than their opponents, regardless of
whether they were specifically instructed to beat their opponent or to just do their best, reported
greater perceived competence than participants who lost the competition. However, partici-
pants who were pressured into winning (e.g., winning is the only thing that matters; focus your
attention on being the winner) felt less intrinsic motivation and lowered perceived autonomy
than participants without the pressure (Reeve & Deci, 1996). This suggests that coaches can
have a huge impact on how their players interpret and experience practices and competitions
to the benefit or detriment of their motivation.
In a study of soccer players aged 12 to 16 in Valencia, Spain, researchers found that coaches
influence both the ability of their players to self-regulate their motivation and the emotional
experiences of their players while playing and practicing (Álvarez, Castillo, & Duda, 2008).
264 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

Coaches have a direct effect

on players’ motivation and
well-being.

Using path analysis, they discovered that the extent to which players’ needs for autonomy,
competence, and relatedness were met, directly and indirectly increased their enjoyment
and decreased their boredom of the game (see Figure 9.11). The more players perceived that
coaches provided autonomy support, structure and involvement, the more the players were
self-regulated and engaged in practice using intrinsic or identified regulation instead of exter-
nal or introjected regulation or amotivation (see Table 9.4). Self-regulated motivation, in turn,
also increased players’ enjoyment of the game.
As promising as these results are, keep in mind that these athletes were studied at one
moment in time, so we are unable to know for sure if coaches behaviors caused the athletes
to feel that their needs were being met. Recall our caveat that correlation is not causation. To
answer definitively what impact coaching has on athletes’ motivation and well-being, we need
to study coaches’ behaviors and athletes’ experiences over time. This is precisely what was done
in a study of gymnasts (Gagné, Ryan, & Bargmann, 2003).
Using a diary study, researchers followed the day-to-day motivation to attend practice,
satisfaction of the three needs, emotions, energy level, and self-esteem of a team of 45 female
gymnasts, 7 to 18 years of age (Gagné et al., 2003). Gymnasts were part of a competition team
that practiced an average of 7 hours a week. They filled out questionnaires before and after
every practice for 15 practices over the course of a month. The researchers wanted to know how
fluctuations in an athlete’s feelings of motivation, energy, and self-esteem related to perceptions
of their coach’s and parents’ autonomy support, structure, and involvement, and feeling that
their needs were being met during practice (see Table 9.5).

0.51
Enjoyment
0.18
Coach 0.47 Psychological 0.29 Self-Determined ⫺0.43
Autonomy Need
Support Satisfaction
Motivation ⫺0.17

⫺0.16 Boredom

Figure 9.11 Self-determination theory path analysis of soccer players’ context, need satisfaction, motivation, and
emotions. All marked pathways are significant. Numbers marked are standardized beta weights. Negative numbers
indicate that one variable decreases the next variable in the path. Source: Adapted from Álvarez et al. (2008, Figure
3, p. 145). Reprinted with permission from Álvarez, M. S., Balaguer, I., Castillo, I., & Duda, J. L. (2008), “Coach autonomy
support and quality of sport engagement in young soccer players,” The Spanish Journal of Psychology, 12(1), 138–148.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 265

Table 9.4 Why Do You Practice Your Sport? Sample Items From the Sport Motivation Scale
Item Type of Regulation
For the excitement I feel when I am really involved in the activity Intrinsic Motivation
Because it is one of the best ways I have chosen to develop other aspects of myself Identified Regulation
Because I must do sports to feel good about myself Introjected Regulation
For the prestige of being an athlete External Regulation
I don’t know anymore; I have the impression that I am incapable of succeeding in this sport Amotivation
Note: Self-determined motivation was assessed with a Spanish version (Balaguer, Castillo, & Duda, 2007) of the Sport Motivation Scale (SMS; Pelletier et al., 1995). Responses are rated on a 7-point
Likert scale ranging from 1 (Does Not Correspond at All) to 7 (Corresponds Exactly).
Source: Adapted from Álvarez et al. (2008, p. 142).

As you might expect, these gymnasts were highly self-determined in their motivation, THINK ABOUT IT
scoring the highest in identification and intrinsic regulation. Younger gymnasts showed more
introjected regulation than older gymnasts. Gymnasts who were high in identification attended Why did younger gymnasts
show less self-determined
practices more regularly.
motivation than older
The more autonomy-supportive parents and coaches were perceived by the gymnasts to gymnasts?
be, the more self-regulating the gymnasts were, showing more identified and intrinsic moti-
vation. Gymnasts who were more self-regulated experienced more positive emotions dur-
ing practices, like feeling excited, alert, enthusiastic, and inspired. They also showed more
energy and vitality during practice (e.g., feeling alive, energized, spirited) and more stable
self-esteem, and attended more practices. Gymnasts who were less self-regulating, feeling
more controlled by their parents or the coach, reported more introjection and external
motivation, experienced more negative emotions during practice, such as feeling distressed,
nervous, sad, and irritable. They also showed less energy and vitality, and more unstable
self-esteem.
During a practice session, gymnasts who reported that the practice fulfilled their needs
for autonomy, competence, and relatedness experienced a boost in positive affect, energy, and
stability of self-esteem by the end of that practice compared to how they felt at the beginning
of practice. In particular, gymnasts who perceived the coach was highly involved in their train-
ing on a given day had more stable self-esteem during a practice session than gymnasts who
perceived their coach as being uninvolved.
This study illustrates two parallel effects. First, there is the self-regulation style that gym-
nasts bring to practice. This style is developed over the course of a lifetime of experiences
with parents as well as through past interactions with their coach. We might think of this as
the backdrop for what goes on in a particular practice. The self-regulatory style of individual
gymnasts is part of their personality, and was fairly stable over the month that these gymnasts
were studied. In general, gymnasts who were more self-regulated showed greater engagement
and well-being than gymnasts who were less self-regulating.

Table 9.5 Selected Items From the Need Satisfaction Scale

Need Item
Autonomy My coaches helped me choose my own direction during practice
Competence I was good at gymnastics
Relatedness I felt like I was part of the team
Note: This scale assessed the extent to which gymnasts felt that their needs were met during a practice session. Responses were rated on a
5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (Completely Disagree) to 5 (Completely Agree).
Source: Adapted from Gagné et al. (2003, p. 378).
266 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

Second, what did vary over the course of the study, was the impact of each practice session
on the engagement and well-being of the gymnasts. Each practice session affected the extent
to which gymnasts felt their needs were met. A good practice session—one in which their
needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness were met—left them feeling better than
when they came in: more excited, alert, inspired, energetic, enthusiastic, and so on. However, a
bad practice—one in which their needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness were not
met—made them feel worse than when then came in: more distressed, nervous, sad, irritable,
lonely, dispirited, discouraged, and not so sure of themselves.
Comparing the results of this study with the Álvarez et al. (2008) study of Spanish soccer
players (see Figure 9.11), we can confidently say that the extent to which a coach fosters the
three needs within their players during a given practice session causes an increase in the self-
regulation, engagement, and well-being of their players.

Work Behaviors
SEE FOR YOURSELF According to Stone, Deci, and Ryan (2009), today’s workplace has changed in recent years and
so managers need to change their ways of thinking as well. Where management once applied
How important to you are a carrot-and-stick approach to motivating their workers by offering rewards or punishments
prestige, money, and free- to control them, we now know that such controlling methods are problematic. At the very
dom in a job?
least, these methods require continual monitoring and surveillance, and at the very worst,
they often undermine intrinsic interest. Further, the nature of work today in our information
economy requires more thought and creativity than routine factory jobs of earlier times. One
simply cannot foster creativity and talent with controlling methods, as we saw with children’s
artwork in the Then and Now feature. Finally, because of the cost and effort required to hire
and train skilled workers, organizations are shifting their focus and caring more about the
retention and satisfaction of employees than they once did, seeking to boost well-being of
workers in addition to organizational productivity. Self-determination theory provides the
tools to increase motivation, creativity, satisfaction, and job performance of workers (Deci,
Connell, & Ryan, 1989; Stone et al., 2009).
There are a number of steps that managers can take to foster the motivation of their
workers, leading to a sustainable motivation—that is, a self-directed, rather than externally
controlled, motivation that persists in the absence of direct surveillance (see Table 9.6). These
steps are all ways of providing autonomy support, structure, and involvement to help satisfy
workers’ needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness. As we saw, when people feel that
their needs are being met they will be more engaged in the work at hand.
These principles were put into action to help employee morale in the Xerox Corporation
during a period of downsizing in the late 1980s (Deci et al., 1989). The participants in this
study were nearly 1,000 technicians and their field managers. Technicians spent practically all of
their time on the road dealing with clients, whereas field managers were responsible for about
18 technicians who formed their work team. Individual technicians had little contact with the
other technicians except for monthly team meetings and saw their field manager only once a
week or so to hand in time cards.

Table 9.6 How to Create Autonomous Motivation in a Work Setting

1. Ask open questions and invite participation in problem solving.
2. Actively listen and acknowledge employee perspectives.
3. Offer choices within structure including the clarification of responsibilities.
4. Provide sincere, positive feedback that acknowledges initiative and factual, nonjudgmental feedback about problems.
5. Minimize coercive controls such as rewards and comparisons with others.
6. Develop talent and share knowledge to enhance competence and autonomy.
Source: From Stone et al. (2009, Table 1, p. 80). Beyond talk: Creating autonomous motivation through self-determination theory. Journal of General Management, 34, 75–91.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 267

During this period of uncertainty, wages were frozen and layoffs were widespread. Both
technicians and managers were understandably upset by the pay freeze, and felt tremendous
pressure to perform fearing that they could easily be the next person laid off and lose their jobs.
Technicians reported that instead of feeling supported by their managers—who were no doubt
feeling pressure of their own from above—they felt pressured and controlled. Managers reported
feeling isolated and avoided talking to other managers for fear of revealing weakness in themselves
or in their team. As you can see, the needs of autonomy and relatedness were both lacking under
these conditions, although corporate management didn’t think of the problems in these terms.
To help remedy this situation, corporate management wanted to change the organizational cli-
mate to include more participative management (which would increase autonomy) and employee
involvement (which would increase relatedness). It instituted special training, established problem-
solving groups, restructured work teams, and brought in external consultants to help implement
these changes. Some of these consultants were trained in principles of self-determination theory.
During the intervention, these consultants modeled autonomy-supportive behaviors and involve-
ment in their interactions with the managers so that managers would experience for themselves
the power of the self-determination theory model of motivation and engagement.
As part of the intervention, field managers met together and were given a chance to express
their negative feelings about the work climate and to have their perspective acknowledged.
Then, managers shared strategies that had worked for them with their own teams. During
the process, the consultants modeled how to listen empathetically, taking the perspective of
the managers, and acknowledging their feelings. Field managers were then trained in how to
support their workers’ self-determination using aspects of autonomy support including giving
them choice whenever possible, providing them with noncontrolling feedback, and showing
acceptance and acknowledgment of their perspective.
In the process of mastering these skills, managers learned to support and encourage each
other. Then, when they returned to their regular work teams, they were able to use these skills
with their own technicians. As a result, technicians felt less pressure and control, and more
support and freedom in the workplace. For example, instead of passing the pressure they were
feeling onto the technicians, managers sought support from the other managers. Managers also
supported initiative in their workers, and helped them be more self-regulating.
Over the 18 months of the study, technicians’ satisfaction with their work increased as a
THINK ABOUT IT
direct result of the field managers’ support of their self-determination. At the beginning, the
researchers were likely to hear things like “This is the kind of company that doesn’t give a damn Many people today face
about its people” (Deci et al., 1989, p. 586). But by the end of the study workers with managers an uncertain work environ-
ment. Could similar inter-
who supported their self-determination started to feel better and more positive about most
ventions improve employee
aspects of their work situation. Workers with controlling managers continued to feel bad and morale and motivation?
to express negativity about most aspects of their work.

Autonomy, competence, and

relatedness can increase
workers’ motivation and job
satisfaction.
268 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

The more managers supported the self-determination of their technicians, the more trust-
ing of the corporation technicians were and the less pressure they felt at work. Technicians also
reported greater satisfaction with feedback from their managers, opportunity for input, and
job security over the course of the study.

The Pursuit of Happiness

What leads to happiness? Does pursuing the ideals of achieving fame, fortune, and good looks
lead to well-being? Though these goals are pursued by many people, both in the U.S. and in
other countries, some researchers wonder if the pursuit of these extrinsic goals disconnect
people from their family, friends, and community, making it difficult to achieve a sense of
well-being and mental health.
For many people, pursuing the “American Dream” of financial success does indeed have a
dark side (Kasser & Ryan, 1993, 1996). That is, young people who aspire to financial goals (e.g.,
being able to buy things they want, being their own boss, having a prestigious job) are more
depressed, more anxious, and less self-actualized than people who strive for self-acceptance
(having a meaningful life, knowing and accepting themselves) or affiliation (having friends,
spouse, children).
This is true even in a formerly communist country like Russia, where young people today
are able to pursue the values of a free-market economy even though they were not raised in
such a climate (Ryan et al., 1999). U.S. and Russian college students who value intrinsic goals
more than extrinsic goals have higher subjective well-being, life satisfaction, self-esteem, and
self-actualization.
“The U.S. Constitution However, that’s not the whole story: Well-being also depends on people’s reasons for pur-
doesn’t guarantee happiness, suing financial success (Carver & Baird, 1998). For example, students who agreed that it would
be fun to have a job that paid well or that it was important to them to have the freedom to
only the pursuit of it. You
do what they choose or who felt that it would be satisfying to have a job that paid well, had
have to catch up with it higher self-actualization. In contrast, students who believed that achieving financial success is
yourself.” something you’re supposed to do, or that it would make their family proud, or that people will
Ben Franklin respect them if they are financially successful were less self-actualized.
The trouble is, too often the pursuit of fame, fortune, or good looks involves relying on
external standards rather than on a person’s internal standards (Kasser & Ryan, 1996). That is,
it involves extrinsic motivation rather than intrinsic motivation. So, it is both what you choose
to pursue and why you pursue it that is important for well-being and happiness (Sheldon,
Ryan, Deci, & Kasser, 2004). Fame, fortune, or good looks, in and of themselves, do not lead
to well-being and happiness but rather freely choosing what to pursue, feeling competent in
one’s endeavors, and being meaningfully related to others along the way does lead to happiness
(Kasser & Ryan, 1996).

The Tae Bo Study Revisited

Do you recall the study that opened this chapter on teens learning about Tae Bo in their
gym class? The experimenters manipulated the autonomy supportiveness of the instructor
(Vansteenkiste et al., 2004). In one condition he emphasized the students’ own choice in
whether to participate or not in the exercises, whereas in the other, he pressured students
into participating. At the same time, the experimenters also manipulated whether students
would engage in Tae Bo for intrinsic or extrinsic reasons. Both autonomy support and an
intrinsic goal led to greater effort by the students, better performance, and higher persistence
up to 4 months later. And the combination of both autonomy support and an intrinsic goal
had the best outcomes of all!
You can see now how these manipulations helped foster a sense of autonomy in the students.
Having their need for autonomy satisfied increased the students’ motivation for learning and
practicing Tae Bo. Further, being fully engaged in their Tae Bo class, they no doubt developed
competence at this new skill.
 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory 269

Imagine a lifetime of such experiences in which people build autonomy and competence
while having warm, supportive relationships with peers and adults. By the time we reach adult-
hood, we have some generalized notions about what to expect from the world. People differ
in the extent to which they feel pushed around or supported by the world. These causality
orientations account for differences between people in how they approach new situations and
interpret feedback which impacts their psychological functioning and well-being (Ryan & Deci,
2008a, 2008b). So, a little Tae Bo may be good, but autonomy, competence, and relatedness are
even better!

Chapter Summary
Self-determination theory suggests that people’s intrinsic or extrinsic reasons for undertaking
Study and Review
an activity are related to important outcomes. When people act because they feel pressured
on mysearchlab.com
to, they lose motivation, their performance suffers, and they experience a loss of well-being.
However, when people act out of their own volition, they are able to sustain motivation, per- Go online for more
form well, and increase their well-being. This illustrates the need for autonomy, one of three resources to help you
primary psychological needs. review.
According to self-determination theory, all people, regardless of cultural background,
have three inborn psychological needs that are necessary to survive and thrive: autonomy
(choice, volition), competence (mastery, skillfulness), and relatedness (connection with
others). These needs have been studied extensively by psychologists from many differ-
ent traditions. Self-determination theory builds on the work of related theories including
locus of causality (autonomy), self-efficacy theory (competence), and attachment theory
(relatedness). People get these needs met from the social situation. Autonomy support helps
people feel autonomous, structure and optimal challenge helps people feel competent, and
involvement helps people feel relatedness.
One prediction of self-determination theory is that rewards and punishments may back-
fire, causing people to lose interest in an activity and to not perform their best, especially at
activities that require creativity. This overjustification effect has been demonstrated in children
and adults, with all sorts of rewards (e.g., monetary, praise, candy, etc.). External motivators
such as deadlines, imposed goals, competition, surveillance, evaluations, and rewards that com-
municate information about competence at a task do not necessarily undermine motivation
and performance. However, rewards that signal lack of autonomy and the presence of control
will be detrimental to motivation and performance.
Part of being autonomous is having the ability to self-regulate one’s behaviors especially
when it comes to engaging in activities that are not intrinsically interesting. Motivations can
vary in how self-determined they are, from amotivation (or nonregulation), external regulation,
introjected regulation, identified regulation, integrated regulation, and intrinsic regulation. The
least self-determined regulation is amotivation, when people feel apathetic and disengaged. The
most self-determined motivation is intrinsic regulation, when people act because of inherent
interest in the task.
After a lifetime of having one’s needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness met—
or not—people develop expectations about the world called causality orientations. People
may have an autonomous, controlled, or impersonal orientation and differ in their motiva-
tion, engagement, psychological adjustment, and overall well-being.
Path analysis is a statistical technique researchers use to test that a hypothesized model
accounts for a significant amount of variance in the data better than do other models. Path
analysis identifies direct and indirect effects of variables on each other. The results are generally
summarized in a diagram with significant paths drawn between variables. Path analysis can
tell us which causal paths are more likely among a set of variables, but cannot prove causal-
ity unless the variables are measured at different times or were manipulated as part of a true
experiment. Researchers have used path analysis to test predictions from the self-determination
theory model of engagement.
270 Chapter 9 Regulation and Motivation: Self-Determination Theory

“Don’t ask what the world According to the self-determination theory model of engagement, the three needs can be
needs. Ask what makes fostered or thwarted by the social context. When these needs are met, people feel motivated,
you come alive, and go do engaged, perform at a high level, build skills, and increase their well-being. When these needs
are not met, people will feel disengaged and disaffected, show low motivation, experience nega-
it. Because what the world
tive emotions, not increase their skills, and overall have poor well-being. This model has been
needs is people who have
applied to numerous domains including school, work, health, close relationships, therapy, and
come alive.” parenting.
Howard Thurman, American For example, when health professionals help their patients meet these needs, people take
educator more responsibility over their health and experience greater health as a result. Coaches who help
their players meet these needs have players who are more motivated and enjoy practices more.
At work, employees who feel more autonomous, competent, and related to their coworkers and
supervisors show greater work satisfaction and work more independently. Finally, freely choos-
ing what goals to pursue, feeling competent at one’s pursuits, and feeling meaningfully related
to others while doing so leads to lasting happiness. Accepting external goals such as pursuing
fame, fortune, or good looks because of societal pressures is a recipe for unhappiness.

Review Questions
1. What is self-determination theory? What two predictions of self-determination theory are
illustrated by the Tae Bo study?
2. What are the three fundamental psychological needs? How do we satisfy these needs? What
are some specific examples of how these needs may be met in a particular situation?
3. What two meanings might rewards and punishments for performance convey? What kind
of feedback is likely to undermine intrinsic interest?
4. How are autonomy and locus of causality similar? How are competence and self-efficacy
similar? How does relatedness build on attachment theory?
5. What is path analysis? When understanding a path diagram, what do solid lines, arrow
heads, and weights indicate?
6. What does it mean to be self-regulated? What are the different kinds of regulation? What
are the different types of motivation?
7. What are the three causality orientations? How do people with each of these orientations
approach new situations?
8. What is the motivational model of engagement that describes how aspects of the context,
self, and actions can lead to positive or negative outcomes?
9. How has self-determination theory been applied to dental care, athlete’s motivation, work
motivation, and the pursuit of happiness?

Key Terms
Self-determination theory Overjustification effect Intrinsic regulation
Extrinsically motivated Locus of control Extrinsic motivation
Intrinsically motivated Locus of causality External regulation
Humanistic tradition Self-efficacy Introjected regulation
Actualizing tendency Outcome expectation Identified regulation
Autonomy Efficacy expectation Integrated regulation
Competence Path analysis Causality orientations
Relatedness Path diagram Autonomous orientation
Optimal challenge Amotivation Controlled orientation
Flow Intrinsic motivation Impersonal orientation
CHAPTER
10 COGNITIVE
FOUNDATIONS
OF PERSONALITY
LOCUS OF CONTROL
Measures of Locus of Control
Locus of Control and Achievement
Locus of Control and Work Behavior
Locus of Control and Physical and Psychological Health
Locus of Control and Social Behavior
Cultural Differences in Locus of Control
THEN AND NOW: LOCUS OF CONTROL
LEARNED HELPLESSNESS
EXPLANATORY STYLE
Measures of Explanatory Style
Explanatory Style and Achievement
School
Athletics
Explanatory Style and Work Behavior
Explanatory Style and Physical and Psychological Health
Physical Health
Psychological Health: Depression
Explanatory Style and Social Behavior
Cultural Differences in Explanatory Style
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: FIELD STUDIES AND NATURAL MANIPULATIONS
DISPOSITIONAL OPTIMISM
Measures of Dispositional Optimism
Dispositional Optimism and Coping
Optimistic Beliefs and Expectations
Optimism and Coping Strategies
Optimists Take Action
Optimism and Judging Controllability
Read the Chapter on Optimistic Beliefs and Physiological Functioning
mysearchlab.com THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: MAKING PEOPLE MORE OPTIMISTIC
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

271
272 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

A
“The optimist sees the fter graduating from college with a degree in psychology, I wanted to save the world.
rose and not its thorns; I spent about a month doing volunteer work in a remote village in Mexico. My fellow
the pessimist stares at the workers and I organized various programs to help these people by administering a
government-sponsored literacy program, staffing a health clinic, participating in teen outreach
thorns, oblivious of the rose.”
programs, visiting the sick, and running a day camp of sorts for the youngest villagers. On one
Kahlil Gibran (1947/2006)
of my first days, I was astounded to discover a small girl about 4 years old just staring blankly
at the crayons in front of her. While the children around her giggled and grabbed crayons from
the center of the table, merrily scribbling on their papers, Elena sat mute.
When I asked her why she wasn’t drawing, she merely shrugged and sank into herself. I was
amazed that a 4-year-old might not know how to color, so I gently placed my hand around hers
and together we clutched a crayon and started to scribble. But lack of practice coloring was not
her problem; despite my instruction and encouragement Elena never did get the hang of drawing
with crayons. As the other children filled their papers with elaborately colored designs, her paper
remained strangely blank except for the few tiny scribbles we had done together.
The image of a helpless child staring at a table full of crayons stayed with me. What would
make a child so helpless that she couldn’t or wouldn’t draw like the other children? I thought
back to my psychology classes and wondered if this was what learned helplessness looked like.
Today, I might be inclined to say that Elena was depressed, or at least depressed at the thought
of drawing with crayons. Can mere thoughts depress us? If so, can changing our thoughts
change our depressive feelings? And if we change how we think, are we also changing something
fundamental about our personality?
SEE FOR YOURSELF
The possibility of changing people’s thoughts was tested in an experiment conducted by
Seligman and his colleagues (Seligman, Steen, Park, & Peterson, 2005). They randomly assigned
The next time you are feel- volunteers to one of five treatments. Every day for a week they were instructed to think about
ing down, try one of these certain things such as expressing gratitude; reflecting on good things in their lives; and either
strategies for yourself.
identifying, reflecting on, or developing character strengths such as curiosity, zest, leadership,
forgiveness, hope, kindness, and love. In a sixth, control condition, participants wrote about
their early memories. Finally, participants’ levels of depression and happiness were measured
immediately, 1 week, 1 month, and 6 months after this treatment.
Despite being somewhat depressed at the start of the study, participants who thought
about the good things that happened to them and about why they happened, and participants
who developed one of their character strengths by using it in a new way, showed decreases in

Exercising one’s character

strengths such as curiosity, zest,
leadership, forgiveness, hope,
love, and kindness can prevent
depression and increase
happiness.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 273

symptoms of depression and increases in felt happiness over the course of the experiment.
People who wrote and delivered a letter of gratitude felt better, but the positive effects lasted
only a month. However, recalling early memories or identifying and reflecting on a character
strength did nothing for depression or happiness (see Figure 10.1).
What is particularly amazing about this experiment is that the interventions were deliv- “Cogito ergo sum,” I think
ered, not by a human therapist, but by a computer! Participants never talked or interacted with therefore I am.
another person and never even stepped into a laboratory. The recruitment, measurement, and Philosopher René Descartes
intervention took place on the Internet via a website. Many therapeutic interventions depend
on the expertise or empathy of the therapist, but here is an example of an intervention working
in the absence of human interaction. Seligman et al (2005) believed that these interventions
may be even more effective when combined with the support of a caring and effective counselor
or life coach, based on preliminary data. This study demonstrates—literally and figuratively—
the power of positive thinking!
Many psychologists have identified consistent and specific differences between people in
the way they perceive and think about the world. For example, some people are more dependent
on visual cues and are more sensitive to the context. Those who are field-dependent tend to
see the big picture rather than details. In contrast, people who are field-independent rely on
their own physical sensations and have selective attention to a particular object without being
distracted by the surrounding details (Witkin, Moore, Goodenough, & Cox, 1977). Whereas
field-independent people are good at learning languages in a traditional classroom setting,
field-dependent people learn best by being totally immersed in everyday situations where they
are surrounded by a new language (Brown, 1994).
In addition to these differences in perceptions, people can differ in the constructs or sche-
mas they use to interpret the world (Kelly, 1955), whether intelligence is fixed or if it can be
increased through effort and experiences (Dweck, 1999), and in their expectations, beliefs, and
goals (Mischel & Shoda, 1995). In this chapter we focus on individual differences in expectations

Figure 10.1 Depressive

symptoms and levels of
Depressive Symptoms

happiness over time as a

function of condition. Although
1 some of the interventions have
2
an immediate impact, using only
3
strengths (5) and explaining
4 three good things (6) led to
5* lasting changes. Source: Based
6* Key on Seligman et al. (2005, Figures
1 = Identifying strengths 1 and 2, pp. 417–418).
Pre Post 1 1 3 6 2 = Gratitude visit
week mos mos mos
3 = Control
Time
4 = You at your best
5 = Using strengths
6 = 3 Good things
Happiness

6*
5*
2
3
1
4

Pre Post 1 1 3 6
week mos mos mos
Time
274 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

and beliefs and take an in-depth look at an area of current focus in personality: how people
think about the causes and impacts of events in their lives and how these differences in locus
of control, learned helplessness, optimistic and pessimistic explanatory styles, and dispositional
optimism make us who we are.

Locus of Control
To be, or not to be—that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them?
From Hamlet, by William Shakespeare (Act 3, scene i)
Which side of Hamlet’s dilemma do you agree with more: that we must put up with what life
throws at us or that we can control what happens to us?
Although Shakespeare identified these two ways of viewing the world, personality psy-
chologist Julian Rotter was the first to define locus of control as people’s beliefs about the
control of reinforcements and outcomes in their lives. People vary in the extent to which
they believe that an outcome depends on their own behavior or personal characteristics,
falling on a continuum of control beliefs. People who believe that they have some control
over what happens to them have an internal locus of control and are often called internals.
In contrast, externals, or people with an external locus of control, believe that they have little
control over what happens to them and instead believe that reinforcements or outcomes
are due to chance, luck, fate, powerful others, or are unpredictable (Rotter, 1966). Though
people may have a mix of internal and external beliefs, generally one way of thinking will
occur more often.
People develop these expectations from their experiences in the world (Rotter, Chance, &
THINK ABOUT IT
Phares, 1972). If people have been rewarded for their own actions, they will come to believe
Who do you think is more that they can indeed control what happens to them. However, if their actions have not been
likely to buy a lottery ticket? rewarded they will think that they lack control and that events happen due to external causes
Why?
or for unknown and unpredictable reasons. For example, externals who believed that events
happen due to chance or fate were more likely than internals to believe in astrology, and to
act on their beliefs by reading their daily horoscopes or buying books about astrology (Sosis,
Strickland, & Haley, 1980).
Internals and externals also differ in how they process information. Internals pay more
attention to information that may be useful to them later and they also retain more information
than externals (Wallston, 2001). For example, both hospitalized tuberculosis patients (Seeman
& Evans, 1962) and prisoners facing parole (Seeman, 1963) who were internal retained more
information related to their conditions than externals. People with an internal locus of control
act as if knowing more about one’s condition or situation is an important step toward changing
one’s circumstances.

Measures of Locus of Control

Locus of control is often measured with the Internal-External Locus of Control Scale (Rotter,
1966; see Table 10.1). Respondents are presented with 29 pairs of statements in a forced-
choice format. Each pair includes one internal locus of control statement and one external
locus of control statement. Participants must decide which statement they agree with more.
Six of the pairs are filler statements and are not scored. Scores can range from 0 to 23 with
higher scores indicating a greater external locus of control, and lower scores a more internal
locus of control.
More recently, researchers have developed scales to measure locus of control in specific
goals areas (Lefcourt, 1979, 1981, 1991) including health (Wallston, Wallston, & DeVellis, 1978),
weight management (Saltzer, 1982), personal finance management (Furnham, 1986), wealth
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 275

Table 10.1 Items From the Rotter Internal–External Locus of Control Scale
People who are internal tend to agree with these statements:
1. People’s misfortunes result from the mistakes they make.
2. In the long run people get the respect they deserve in this world.
3. Trusting to fate has never turned out as well for me as making a decision to take a definite
course of action.
4. In the case of the well-prepared student there is rarely if ever such a thing as an unfair test.
5. Becoming a success is a matter of hard work, luck has little or nothing to do with it.
People who are external tend to agree with these statements:
1. Many of the unhappy things in people’s lives are partly due to bad luck.
2. Unfortunately, an individual’s worth often passes unrecognized no matter how hard he tries.
3. I have often found that what is going to happen will happen.
4. Many times exam questions tend to be so unrelated to course work that studying is really
useless.
5. Getting a good job depends mainly on being in the right place at the right time.

Note: Based on a scale of 0 = no chance to 100 = certainty.

Source: Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement. Psychological Monographs: General and
Applied, 80(1), (Whole number 609), 1–28. Copyright American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.

accumulation (Steed & Symes, 2009), interpersonal relationships (Lewis, Cheney, & Dawes,
1977), marital outcomes (Miller, Lefcourt, & Ware, 1983), headache pain (Martin, Holroyd, &
Penzien, 1990), work (Spector, 1988), sleep (Vincent, Sande, Read, & Giannuzzi, 2004), alcohol
use (Donovan & O’Leary, 1978), and intellectual, physical, and social domains (Bradley, Stuck,
Coop, & White, 1977).
Numerous studies have been done on locus of control which suggests that more positive
outcomes in achievement, work, health, and relationships are associated with having an inter-
nal locus of control. However, Rotter himself warned that it would be too simple to declare an
internal locus of control the better or healthier way to think and external locus of control as a
bad way of thinking (Rotter, 1975). People with an external locus of control are not particu-
larly distressed by their beliefs. Many—but not all—important life outcomes are related to an
internal locus of control. Let’s consider some of the major findings in these areas.

Locus of Control and Achievement

Internals take more action than externals (Rahim, 1997), including taking political action
(Gore & Rotter, 1963; Strickland, 1965), and achieving greater academic success by studying
more, performing better on tests, and getting better grades (Nord, Connelly, & Daignault,
1974; Prociuk & Breen, 1974) than externals. In fact, internal locus of control scores at age
10 predicted greater educational attainment in adulthood (Flouri, 2006). Internals even day-
dream more about achievement and less about failure than do externals (Brannigan, Hauk,
& Guay, 1991).
Internals are better at planning and working at long-term goals (Lefcourt, 1982) and at
establishing more realistic goals (Gilmor & Reid, 1978). For example, internals finished their
college degrees faster than students with an external locus of control (Hall, Smith, & Chia,
2008). Children in Grades 3 to 5 with an internal locus of control were better able to delay
gratification than those with an external locus of control (Strickland, 1973). They were more
willing to forgo a single lollipop to obtain three lollipops 2 weeks later.
Internals assume more responsibility for themselves and hold others to high standards of
responsibility as well (Phares & Wilson, 1972). For example, they are more likely to support
the death penalty (Butler & Moran, 2007). Internals also have higher credit ratings, even after
controlling for income, education, and negative life events such as medical expenses, unem-
ployment, or a reduction in income. Internals also have higher income and more financial
knowledge than externals and are more highly educated (Perry, 2008).
276 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

THINK ABOUT IT Locus of Control and Work Behavior

Why would somebody with Having an internal locus of control quite literally pays off when it comes to career and work
an internal locus of control behavior. Based on a meta-analysis of 222 studies, workers with an internal locus of con-
show more intrinsic motiva- trol showed greater satisfaction with their pay, promotions, coworkers, and supervisors than
tion than somebody with did workers with an external locus of control (Ng, Sorensen, & Eby, 2006). Internals showed
an external locus of control? greater job commitment, intrinsic motivation, productivity, career success, and job challenge
and worked more hours than externals. In contrast, externals experienced greater job over-
load, work problems, stress, burnout, absenteeism, and conflicts between family and work
responsibilities.
College students with an internal locus of control show better career decision-making
skills (Millar & Shevlin, 2007). An internal locus of control was associated with greater work
involvement in both skilled and unskilled workers across six countries (Reitz & Jewell, 1979).
Internals are particularly sensitive to pay incentives and work particularly well under incentive
systems such as sales or piecework. People with an internal locus of control tend to be more
satisfied with their jobs (Spector, 1982) whereas people with an external locus of control were
among the most stressed and burned out in a sample of distressed nurses in Germany (Schmitz,
Neumann, & Oppermann, 2000).
Entrepreneurs, people who start their own business, though more internal than nonentre-
preneurs, are not necessarily more successful than people who work for others (Venkatapathy,
1984). Entrepreneurs with an internal locus of control did more business-related activities
such as working longer hours, expanding the business, and setting goals for the business than
externals did (Durand & Shea, 1974). The authors suggested that people with an internal locus
of control are better able to turn their thoughts and dreams into actions.
Business owners who were more internal coped better with a devastating hurricane and
flood that hit central Pennsylvania in June of 1972, damaging some 430 businesses in the area
(Anderson, 1977). By 8 months after the devastation, internals had engaged in more problem-
solving behaviors as a way of coping rather than emotion-focused coping and did things such
as managing their anxiety, anger, or other emotional reactions. Externals found the whole situ-
ation more stressful than internals did.
Even 3 ½ years later, the businesses of internals were still doing better than the businesses
of externals as indicated by a higher credit rating. The researchers found that business owners
with an internal locus of control took more productive actions during this period which, in
turn, led the owners to become even more internal and to bring their businesses back to their
pre-flood levels of performance. External business owners whose businesses improved became
even more external in the years after the flood (Anderson, 1977). This study illustrates Rotter’s
original contention that locus of control affects performance and that performance also affects
future locus of control beliefs.

THINK ABOUT IT Locus of Control and Physical and Psychological Health

Why do externals fail The belief that they can control what happens to them combined with a greater willingness
to take steps to protect to take action contributes to the overall better physical and mental health of people with an
themselves? internal locus of control (Lefcourt, 1982; Selander, Marnetoft, Åkerström, & Asplund, 2005).
For example, internals have a decreased risk of heart attacks, presumably due to taking pre-
ventative measures like exercising more and eating a healthy diet (Stürmer, Hasselbach, &
Amelang, 2006).
Internals are also more likely than externals to wear seatbelts (Hoyt, 1973), exercise (Nor-
man, Bennett, Smith, & Murphy, 1997), quit smoking (Segall & Wynd, 1990), use birth control
(MacDonald, 1970), keep track of their medications (Hong, Oddone, Dudley, & Bosworth,
2006), and take steps to reduce their risk of breast cancer (Rowe, Montgomery, Duberstein, &
Bovbjerg, 2005). British children with an internal locus of control at age 10 were less likely to
be overweight as adults and to have a lowered risk of obesity, better self-rated health, and less
psychological distress at age 30 (Gale, Batty, & Deary, 2008). Individuals with chronic illness
who had an external locus of control, believing that good health is in the hands of their doctors,
reported more emotional distress (Shelley & Pakenham, 2004).
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 277

People with an internal

locus of control are more
likely to take better care of
themselves, such as regularly
using seatbelts and eating a
healthier diet.

Externals are more vulnerable to anxiety and depression (Benassi, Sweeney, & Dufour,
1988), and are less able to cope with stressful life experiences (Lefcourt, 1983). Adolescent
externals have a greater risk of suicide than internals (Evans, Owens, & Marsh, 2005). People
with an internal locus of control tend to be happier (Lefcourt, 1982; Ye, She, & Wu, 2007).
For example, imagine living in Israel during the Persian Gulf War, when civilians faced
nightly SCUD missile attacks for 5 weeks. Adolescents with an internal locus of control reported
fewer physical symptoms (e.g., headaches, fatigue, insomnia, loss of appetite, etc.), less fear, and
better cognitive functioning under stress (e.g., concentration, memory, decision making) than
those with an external locus of control (Zeidner, 1993).
There is also evidence that individuals handle stressful situations differently depend-
ing on their control beliefs. Across many studies, a consistent finding is that people with an
internal locus of control use more problem-focused coping, looking for possible solutions and
taking concrete steps to make things better. In contrast, externals use more emotion-focused
coping, relieving their feelings of anger, anxiety, or sadness by talking with others, for example
(Ng et al., 2006). In the previous section we saw how this difference in business owners led to
better economic recovery years after a devastating flood (Anderson, 1977).

Locus of Control and Social Behavior

Locus of control even leads to differences in how individuals interact with others. People who SEE FOR YOURSELF
believe that their social relationships are established and maintained as a result of their own For one day, act as if your
efforts are more socially skillful and show greater social sensitivity than people without these social relationships depend
beliefs (Lefcourt, Martin, Fick, & Saleh, 1985). People with an internal locus of control are also on your own efforts. The
more likely to show independence and resistance to social influence than externals (Crowne & next day, act as if they don’t.
Which experience did you
Liverant, 1963). Externals are more vulnerable to persuasion, social influence, and conformity
like better?
pressures (Avtgis, 1998).
Internals participate in more campus activities (Brown & Strickland, 1972) and hold more
campus leadership positions than externals do (Brown & Strickland, 1972; Hiers & Heckel,
1977). Internals are also more likely than externals to opt for a position of power—for example
sitting at the head of the table—when choosing where to sit with others (Hiers & Heckel, 1977).
In accord with where they perceive the rewards to be, internals and externals differ in which
aspects of a situation they pay more attention to. Externals are more sensitive to the social
demands of a situation whereas internals are more sensitive to the task demands of the situa-
tion. In one experiment, externals paid more attention when feedback for their performance
came from the experimenter instead of directly from the task. Internals, of course, preferred to
receive feedback directly from their performance (Pines & Julian, 1972).
However, when interacting with a stranger, externals talked more and looked at their part-
ners more than internals did (Rajecki, Ickes, & Tanford, 1981). Again, we can see that this is due
278 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

to where externals and internals expect to receive their rewards, either from their own behavior
or from the behavior of others.

Cultural Differences in Locus of Control

Believing one has control or not seems to be a human universal in that the basic differences
between internals and externals hold across a variety of cultures. However, differences exist
between cultures in the amount of control people believe they have (Cross & Markus, 1999).
Individualistic cultures, such as in the United States and western European countries, tend to
have a more internal locus of control. In fact, individualistic cultures tend to be so internal that
they are actually vulnerable to an illusion of control where people believe they have control
even in situations where, objectively, they do not (Taylor & Brown, 1988).
In contrast, collectivistic cultures, such as in countries in East Asia, tend to be more exter-
nal. They believe that supernatural forces, fate, or even destiny determine outcomes. For exam-
ple, Japanese students feel less control over both positive and negative events than American
college students do (Heine & Lehman, 1995).
However, John Weisz and his colleagues suggested that there are two ways of taking con-
trol (Weisz, Rothbaum, & Blackburn, 1984). First, people can exercise primary control and
attempt to make themselves feel better or less distressed by changing circumstances. To do this,
of course, one must have an internal locus of control.
THINK ABOUT IT Alternatively, people can choose to exercise secondary control and attempt to fit into,
accommodate, or accept a situation or an event in ways that make themselves feel better, or
Just how much do stan- at least less distressed. This also requires an internal locus of control. They cited an example
dards of psychological of the Japanese cultural value of akirame which means being “at peace with what fate has
health and pathology vary
by culture?
given” (Weisz, Eastman, & McCarty, 1996, p. 67). Similarly, Hinduism places a value on giving
up control and detaching oneself from a situation, which leads to better psychological health
(Berry, Poortinga, Segall, & Dasen, 1992). Evidence suggests that as Americans move from
young adulthood into middle age they show primary control, but then show secondary control
as they move into old age (Schultz, Heckhausen, & Locher, 1991). That is, in the face of being
able to do less, people turn to more cognitive ways of maintaining control rather than admit
that they have no control over a situation.
The crucial difference between an internal and an external locus of control may be that
externals have almost a “victim mentality” in which they feel helpless, act passively and believe
that there is nothing they can do to change their outcomes or reinforcements. These feelings of
helplessness and hopelessness are risk factors for depression, as we shall see later in this chapter.
The notion of primary and secondary control suggests that just because collectivistic cultures

People in collectivistic
cultures, such as in countries
in East Asia, tend to be more
external than people in
individualistic cultures, such
as in the United States.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 279

appear to have an external locus of control, they are not necessarily adapting less well or feeling
more victimized by their circumstances. Rather, they are asserting their control differently than
what Americans do (Sosis et al., 1980). This also suggests that standards of psychological health
and what is considered normal are determined by culture.

Then and Now: Locus of Control

Here is a puzzle for you: Since the time that Julian Rotter first identified the concept of locus of
control young Americans have shown an interesting trend. Do you think college students have
become more internal or external since 1960?
On the one hand, American culture has become more individualistic during this time (recall
our earlier discussion of this finding from Chapter 5). We might expect that along with an empha-
sis on the individual, more people would believe in the power of the individual person as well.
Or, as Twenge, Zhang, and Im (2004) put it, “Modern people are, in theory, strong, independent
individuals in control of their own destinies and free of the confines of social forces” (p. 309).
Objectively, people today do have more control over their environments than we did over half
a century ago. Think about changes like birth control, increased opportunity for travel, a more
diverse and tolerant society, and technological advancements that facilitate shopping, commu-
nication, and entertainment. Does this translate into an increased sense of personal control?
Maybe not. During this same time Americans have also become more cynical, mistrust-
ing, alienated, and litigious (Twenge et al., 2004). In addition, there has been an increase in the
divorce rate, violent crime, and the suicide rate. Perhaps blaming outside forces for our own
troubles might be a way of protecting ourselves from a more dangerous world.
So which hypothesis is correct, the independence model that suggests that Americans have
become more internal, or the alienation model that suggests that Americans have become more THINK ABOUT IT
external? The beauty of locus of control is that because it is one of the most studied personality Which is more important,
variables in the history of personality research, Twenge et al. (2004) were able to graph changes absolute level of locus of
in mean level of locus of control scores over time. They found a correlation of r = .70 between control (e.g., internal or
scores on the Rotter I-E scale and the year the sample was collected for college student samples external) or level relative to
and among children in Grades 4 or 5. Or, to put it another way, the average college student in one’s peers and the society
at large?
2002 scored more externally than 80% of college students in the early 1960s (Twenge et al., 2004).
Twenge et al. (2004) wondered if being moderately external is not as bad as it once was, if
everyone has similar beliefs. That is, which is more important, absolute level of locus of control
(e.g., internal or external) or level relative to one’s peers and the society at large? Perhaps, like
in collectivistic cultures, Americans are turning to secondary control more and more as a way
of maintaining control. This shift toward secondary control is reflected in a more external
locus of control.

College students from the

1960s (left). College students
today (right) have a more
external locus of control than
college students in earlier
times.
280 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

“Whether you think you

can or think you can’t,
Learned Helplessness
you’re right.” Locus of control is not the only consistent difference between people in how they think about
Henry Ford the world. The opposite of having an internal locus of control is not having an external locus
of control; it is feeling helpless in the present and hopeless about the future. It is to this topic of
learned helplessness—of which locus of control is but one part—that we now turn.
At around the same time that Julian Rotter realized the importance of locus of control,
Martin Seligman and his colleagues were trying to figure out why dogs, after being exposed to
inescapable shock, were unable to escape from a later escapable shock (Overmier & Seligman,
1967). The explanation seems obvious to us now—that the dogs had somehow learned that
their responses were useless and gave up trying—but the notion that the dogs had expectations
about future payoffs in a totally new situation flew in the face of years of research evidence on
instrumental conditioning. Yet this is precisely what the dogs had learned!
THINK ABOUT IT Overmier and Seligman (1967) reasoned that when dogs or humans find themselves in
a situation where they are exposed to aversive stimuli that they cannot reduce, eliminate, or
Should use of animals in control in any way, they may experience learned helplessness and come to believe that their
research be regulated the actions will be useless in future situations as well. The authors hypothesized that lack of control
same way an IRB regulates
human research? You’ll be
causes this state of learned helplessness, whereas having control over aversive stimuli prevents
pleased to know that ani- later helplessness. Helplessness leads to loss of motivation, problems in thinking and learning,
mal research must first be and negative emotions such as sadness, depression, and anger (Maier & Seligman, 1976).
reviewed by an Institutional To test the learned helplessness explanation, dogs were randomly assigned to one of three con-
Animal Care and Use Com- ditions (Seligman & Maier, 1967). In the Escapable Shock condition, the dogs first went through
mittee (IACUC) before it can a training phase where they received a shock, but could make the shock stop by touching a panel
be conducted. with their heads. In the Inescapable Shock condition, dogs received shocks for the same amount
of time as dogs in the Escape condition did; the only difference was that there was nothing the
dogs could do to stop the shocks. Researchers call this yoking when a treatment that participants
in one condition receive depends on how participants in another condition behave. In the third,
Experimental Control condition, dogs did not have this training with shocks like the dogs in the
Escape and Inescapable conditions did. The triadic design of this experiment using these three
conditions tests that the controllability of the shock, not the shock itself, causes the helplessness.
After this initial training, 24 hours later
the dogs in all three conditions took part in
the testing phase of the experiment. Here
they were placed in a shuttle box that had
two compartments separated by a wall at the
dogs’ shoulder height. For each trial, dogs
were placed in one side of the box and then
the lights in the box would dim signaling
that they were about to receive a shock. Sure
enough, 10 seconds later the dogs would
receive a shock through the floor of the com-
partment. However, if the dogs jumped over
the wall into the adjacent compartment, the
shock would terminate. Would dogs be able
to figure this out for themselves?
As you can see in Table 10.2, all of the
dogs that went through the Escapable Shock
training figured out rather quickly that they
could escape or even avoid the shock alto-
gether by jumping over the barrier as soon
as the lights dimmed. But most of the dogs
in the Inescapable Shock condition did not.
Having learned in the training phase that
there was nothing they could do to avoid the
Can dogs learn to be helpless? shocks, they did nothing in the testing phase.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 281

They just gave up and passively endured the shocks. However, if Table 10.2 Percentage of Dogs That Were Unable to Escape Shocks
the experimenters forcibly dragged the dogs over the barrier, they in the Testing Phase as a Function of Training Condition
eventually learned that they could escape the shock on their own
(Maier & Seligman, 1976). Escapable Shock 0%
Keep in mind that the shocks were painful enough to make Inescapable Shock 75
the dogs want to avoid them, but not so painful as to harm the Experimental Control Group 12.5
dogs. Generally, researchers do not like using such methods except
where they are unavoidable and have great potential to make a Source: Seligman and Maier (1967).
contribution to alleviate human suffering. Of course, many people
object to using animals in research at all.
The results of this experiment were so surprising that critics suggested many alternative
explanations to learned helplessness. Some suggested that the dogs, rather than learning that
they had no control, instead learned that not responding paid off. Essentially the dogs learned
to be passive, rather than helpless. To test this alternative explanation, experimenters used the
same triadic design and exposed dogs to the same training and testing phases as in the Seligman
and Maier (1967; Maier, 1970) experiments. But this time during the training phase, dogs in
the Escapable Shock condition needed to remain perfectly still to make the shocks stop. In this
way escaping the shocks was still under the dog’s control, but they were controllable only by
being passive. In the testing phase, where dogs were placed in the shuttle box and given escap-
able shocks that they could escape by jumping over the barrier, the experimenters wondered if
the dogs would indeed be passive, because this is what worked in the first part, or if they would
manage to escape the shock.
As predicted by learned helplessness theory, the dogs escaped the shock, albeit a bit slower
THINK ABOUT IT
than dogs in the original experiment, after realizing that keeping perfectly still did not terminate
the shock. The key to avoiding helplessness is not learning that a particular response is effective, Was Elena, the child who
but learning that any response is effective. Dogs who are not helpless will keep moving around, was unable to color, more
like participants in the
trying new behaviors, and eventually hitting on the right response in a given situation.
escapable noise or inescap-
The flip side of helplessness, especially for humans, is personal control. Imagine partici- able noise conditions?
pants in an experiment who are seated at a table in front of a red button (Hiroto, 1974). They
are told, “From time to time a loud tone will appear. When that tone comes on, there is some-
thing you can do to stop it.” Suddenly, they hear an obnoxious, high-pitched tone about as loud
as a chainsaw. How do you think a participant might react?
Most participants immediately hit the button. However, this worked only to terminate the
noise if they were in the Escapable Noise condition. Despite these instructions, in the Inescap-
able Noise condition there was nothing participants could do to terminate the noise. In fact,
they had to endure it for a full 5 seconds. There was also a Control Group that did not go
through this training phase.
Then, participants in all three conditions were seated at a different table with a different
apparatus in front of them: a wooden box that looked like an extraordinarily long shoebox, with
a knob protruding out of the top locked in some sort of a track that ran from one end of the box
to the other. A red light located at the top of the box would go on for 5 seconds and when the
light went off, the same obnoxious noise from the first part of the experiment would come on.
As you probably recognized, this box was the human equivalent of the shuttle box used
with dogs in the early helplessness studies. Participants could stop the noise if they pushed the
knob from one side to the other. Sure enough, just like in the animal studies, human partici-
pants who were trained with the Inescapable Noise were significantly slower at figuring out
how to escape the noise during the testing phase. Participants in the Control Group and the
Escapable Noise conditions were faster at figuring out how to make the noise stop and even
managed to prevent the noise from starting in the first place. Participants in the Inescapable
Noise condition never quite realized that they could prevent the onset of the noise.
Participants in this experiment were also given a measure of locus of control. Based on Rot-
ter’s research on locus of control, the experimenters wondered who would be faster at figuring
out how to make the noise stop during the testing phase of the experiment. True to the belief
that they can control their own outcomes, internals were faster than externals to escape noise
in this human shuttle box.
282 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

In yet another twist to this experiment, some participants were led to believe that termi-
nating the noise involved skill: “What you do is really up to you to figure out. You are poten-
tially in control of the situation.” Other participants were told that the task involved chance:
“The way to stop the tone is up to [the experimenter]. This is a guessing game. If you guess
wrong the tone stays on.” Participants who thought that preventing or stopping the noise was
due to their own skill were faster at the task than were participants who believed the task was
due to chance.
This experiment demonstrated that learned helplessness comes from people’s beliefs about
control, their expectations about a specific task, and their past experiences with uncontrollable
outcomes (Hiroto, 1974). Each one alone is enough to cause helplessness in humans.
Learned helplessness in humans, just like in animals, causes problems in motivation, cogni-
tion, and emotion (Maier & Seligman, 1976). Exposure to inescapable shocks, uncontrollable
loud noises, or unsolvable anagrams causes a state of helplessness that makes people give up
responding (Hiroto & Seligman, 1975). Even if one of their responses should be effective,
helplessness will make it difficult if not impossible for people to recognize that their response
worked (Maier & Seligman, 1976). Helplessness first causes anxiety; then, after continued expo-
THINK ABOUT IT sure, it causes depression (Seligman, 1975).
In both humans and animals, learned helplessness is marked by the same three parts (Peter-
What costs are involved in son, Maier, & Seligman, 1993). First, there must be a noncontingency or disconnect between
believing that something is people’s actions and their outcomes, such that people truly have no control over their outcomes
wrongly due to chance? In
believing that something is
in a given situation. But exposure to uncontrollable outcomes is not enough to cause helpless-
wrongly due to skill? ness; people must also come to expect that their actions will also be ineffective in the future.
Finally, people give up and act passively when they recognize that their actions are fruitless.
However, when they discover that they are helpless, humans, unlike animals, ask them-
selves, “Why am I helpless?” (Abramson, Seligman, & Teasdale, 1978). The way people under-
stand the cause of their helplessness is very important for determining how devastating the
feelings of helplessness will be. This led to a reformulated theory of learned helplessness in
humans (Abramson et al., 1978) which eventually led to the current hopelessness model of
depression. Here, the belief that one lacks control—is helpless in the face of a negative event
in the present—combines with the belief that the helplessness will continue in the future. This
causes a person to lose hope, stop trying, and feel sadness (Abramson, Metalsky, & Alloy, 1989).
Hopelessness depression, like other kinds of depression, causes changes in motivation
(e.g., passivity and giving up), cognition (e.g., failure to perceive an opportunity to control
outcomes), emotions (e.g., sadness, guilt), and lowered self-esteem (e.g., feeling useless and
incompetent; Abramson et al., 1989).
People can feel helpless without feeling hopeless if they anticipate that circumstances might be
different in the future (Abramson et al., 1989). For example, believing that somebody else might

Can humans learn to be

helpless?
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 283

step in to help or that the external circumstances could change for the better (e.g., the task becomes
easier) are hopeful beliefs. The combination of helplessness in the present and the hopelessness that
negative consequences will continue into the future makes people vulnerable to depression when a
bad event occurs or when an important good event fails to occur.

Explanatory Style
An interesting side note to the original learned helplessness experiments with dogs is that “No sense being pessimistic.
Seligman and his colleagues used more than 150 dogs in their experiments (Maier & Seligman, It wouldn’t work anyway.”
1976). Of these, about 33% could not be made to feel helpless, even though they were exposed Phillip Mueller
to inescapable shocks. Also, about 5% of the dogs never learned that they could escape the
shock, even without experience with the inescapable shock. The experimenters wondered, was
there something in the past history of these dogs that taught them to be helpless or immunized
them against helplessness before they even came to the lab?
If you think about it, just like the dogs that were helpless or not helpless before the experi-
ment began, people have a lifetime of experiencing good and bad events. Essentially, the labora-
tory is not the first time or place that a person—or a dog—may have felt that his or her efforts
are useless. After many such experiences, people develop habitual ways of explaining both the
bad and the good things that happen to them in life. This is called explanatory style. How
people differ in explanatory style is an important aspect of personality.
People who view negative events as their own fault (internal) likely to happen again (sta-
ble), and undermining other aspects of their lives (global) are at risk for depression (Peterson
& Seligman, 1984; Sweeney, Anderson, & Bailey, 1986). This is called a pessimistic explanatory
style. In contrast, people with an optimistic explanatory style view negative events as not their
own fault (external), unlikely to happen again (unstable), and limited to just one aspect of their
lives (specific). With an optimistic explanatory style people are faster at bouncing back from a
negative event and are less likely to experience symptoms of depression.
There are also pessimistic and optimistic ways of explaining good events. People with an
optimistic explanatory style believe that they caused the good thing to happen, that they are
able to make it happen again, and that their good fortune makes everything in their life better.
In contrast, people with a pessimistic explanatory style believe that they had little to do with
their good fortune, that good things may or may not happen again, and that the good event
Tis nothing good or bad
affects just one aspect of their lives.
Explanations for events can vary in three ways. As we saw with learned helplessness, when but thinking makes it so.
trying to understand a situation in which they feel helpless, people may think that there is noth- Shakespeare.
ing they can do to remedy the situation (i.e., that they lack control). So one way that explana- From Hamlet, by William
tions can vary is in how internal versus external the cause might be. Shakespeare (Act 2, scene ii)

How might a person with an

optimistic explanatory style
respond to this event?
284 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

For example, imagine that Olivia does poorly on her psychology test. Why might this be? She
could think that the test was difficult (external) or unfair (external), or she might think that she
didn’t study enough (internal), or that she is not smart enough (internal). However, not all expla-
nations are created equal! Some explanations may lead her to feel helpless in the future, whereas
others will actually help her prevent a bad grade from happening again. If she truly believed that
she didn’t study hard enough due to lack of effort—a temporary condition—she could study
harder next time. However, if she believed that she doesn’t have the brain power to do any better
than a D (lack of ability), then why should she bother studying at all next time? The difference
between lack of effort and lack of ability has to do with how permanent or stable the cause is. So,
the second way that explanations can vary is in how stable versus unstable the cause might be.
Consider another situation. Imagine that Tamika just told Jamal that she didn’t want to
SEE FOR YOURSELF
see him again after their first date. Jamal could think that this was because Tamika is extra busy
Think about a recent nega- this semester (external) or that she finds him boring (internal). But even if Tamika finds Jamal
tive event. What caused this boring, this doesn’t mean that other potential dates will find him boring as well. Being boring,
event? Is your explanation although an internal explanation, is also an unstable cause of Jamal’s failure to get a second
more internal or external?
Stable or unstable? Global
date with Tamika. However, suppose Jamal is so devastated by the news that he starts to believe
or specific? that his friends barely tolerate him, he is convinced that he will make a poor impression on a
future employer, and that he will be a failure in life! Here the cause of the breakup is not only
internal and stable, but it affects other aspects of his life as well, not just his chances of dating
again. Jamal’s beliefs about the breakup have broad repercussions in his young life. The third
way that explanations can vary is in how global versus specific the cause might be.
To summarize, when any good or a bad event occurs, people come up with possible expla-
nations to understand what caused the event (see Table 10.3). These explanations differ in
three dimensions, as illustrated by our examples of Olivia and Jamal. Explanations can vary in
locus of control (internal or external), stability (how stable, permanent, or recurrent a cause is
vs. how unstable, temporary, or intermittent it is), and generality (how global, affecting many
aspects of a person’s life, or limited to a specific domain a cause is).
In fact, undergraduates who had either an increase in good events or an increase in opti-
mistic explanatory style for positive events (attributing good events to stable and global factors)
recovered from depression faster, showing fewer depressive symptoms than students with a
more pessimistic style (Needles & Abramson, 1990). In addition, students with an optimistic
style (making stable and global attributions) benefited the most from good events whereas
students who made pessimistic attributions for good events (unstable, specific) didn’t seem to
derive much cheer from the good events in their lives. In addition, an increase in participants’
hopefulness for future success in their career or personal lives was a significant predictor of
recovery from depression.
Optimistic and pessimistic explanatory styles, like locus of control, have been associated with
outcomes in achievement, career and work behavior, physical and psychological health, and social

Table 10.3 Optimistic and Pessimistic Explanatory Styles

Optimistic Style Pessimistic Style
External: “It’s not me” Internal: “It’s me”
Bad events Unstable: “It’s just a Stable: “It’s going to last”
temporary setback”
Specific: “It’s just this one Global: “It’s going to undermine
situation” everything I do”
Internal: “I did it” External: “It happened to me”
Good events Stable: “I can do it again” Unstable: “It’s a one-time thing”
Global: “Life is good” Specific: “It’s just this one situation”
Note: Causal explanations for both good and bad events vary in three dimensions: internal–external, stable–unstable,
and global–specific.
Source: Abramson et al. (1978).
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 285

behavior (Wise & Rosqvist, 2006). An optimistic explanatory style is associated with increased
motivation, achievement, physical health, lower depression, and overall well-being (Buchanan &
Seligman, 1995; Peterson & Steen, 2002; Wise & Rosqvist, 2006). In contrast, a pessimistic explan-
atory style is associated with negative affect, depressive symptoms, lower academic achievement,
poorer physical health, poorer athletic performance, lower marital satisfaction, and even political
losses (Gillham, Shatté, Reivich, & Seligman, 2001). A pessimistic explanatory style is a risk factor
for depression (Gladstone & Kaslow, 1995; Joiner & Wagner, 1995; Sweeney et al., 1986).

Measures of Explanatory Style

How is explanatory style measured? There are basically two different ways: questionnaires and
content analysis (a research method discussed in Chapter 5). The most extensively used ques-
tionnaire is the Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ) (Peterson et al., 1982). The ASQ con-
tains 12 hypothetical good and bad situations. Respondents imagine the situation happening to
them and write down what they think would be one major cause of that situation. Then they
rate each cause on a 1 to 7 scale of internal–external, stable–unstable, and global–specific. The
situations include things such as becoming very rich, getting a raise, getting complimented by a
friend, having a date go badly, giving a bad presentation, and not getting all your work done on
time. Generally, researchers average a participant’s responses on all three dimensions yielding
a score for bad events, for good events, and a composite of the two. Higher numbers indicate
a more pessimistic explanatory style (internal, stable, global for negative events and external,
unstable, specific for good events) and lower numbers indicate a more optimistic explanatory
style. Researchers can also measure a participant’s hopelessness by scoring the two dimensions
of stable–unstable and global–specific for bad events only (Needles & Abramson, 1990).
The ASQ has been revised and expanded (Peterson & Villanova, 1988). There is also an
THINK ABOUT IT
ASQ for use with elderly populations (Houston, McKee, & Wilson, 2000), the Occupational
Attributional Style Questionnaire for work situations (OASQ; Furnham, Sadka, & Brewin, If you could discover the
1992), and the Cognitive Style Questionnaire to measure vulnerability to hopelessness depres- explanatory style of any
person, who would it be
sion (CSQ; Alloy et al., 2000; Haeffel et al., 2008).
and why? Could you use the
The second method of measuring explanatory style is the content analysis of verbatim CAVE technique with him
explanations called the CAVE technique (Peterson, Luborsky, & Seligman, 1983). The technique or her?
works very much like the ASQ. First, one must find a direct quote of a person explaining why
a good or a bad event happened to him or her. The researcher then quotes the event and the
explanation and presents both to trained judges who rate the explanation on the three dimen-
sions of internal–external, stable–unstable, and global–specific using the same 1 to 7 scale as
on the ASQ (Zullow, Oettingen, Peterson, & Seligman, 1988). Ratings are averaged for each
dimension and for good and bad events. Higher scores indicate a more pessimistic explanatory
style, lower scores a more optimistic one.

Using the CAVE technique,

researchers found that teams
with optimistic players
performed better after a loss
than teams with pessimistic
players.
286 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Table 10.4 The CAVE Technique: Sample Events, Explanations, and Ratings
Event Explanation Ratings
Player is in a slump (bad event) “I’ve been putting too much pressure on I/E = 7
myself. Now I’m relaxed” S/U = 3
G/S = 6
“I’m not frustrated” (good event) “Because I have confidence that I/E = 7
I have what it takes” S/U = 7
G/S = 7
Player missed an easy shot (bad event) “My timing was off for a second” I/E = 7
S/U = 1
G/S = 1
Player hadn’t scored for two quarters “They were playing great defense I/E = 1
(bad event) for a change” S/U = 1
G/S = 1
Note: Causal explanations for both good and bad events vary in three dimensions: internal–external (I/E; higher numbers more
internal, lower numbers more external), stable–unstable (S/U; higher numbers more stable, lower numbers more unstable), and
global–specific (G/S; higher numbers more global, lower numbers more specific).
Source: From Rettew and Reivich (1995, Table 10.1 p.175). Reprinted with permission from Rettew, D., & Reivich, K. (1995),“Sports
and explanatory style,” as appeared in G. M. Buchanan & M. E. P. Seligman (Eds.), Explanatory style, pp. 173–185 (Hillsdale, NJ:
Erlbaum). Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.

The power of the CAVE technique is that a researcher can measure the explanatory style
of historical figures, famous people, politicians, athletes—pretty much anybody who has left
behind a sample of his or her words in letters, speeches, interviews, diaries, journals, school
essays, newspaper stories, and other archival material (Zullow et al., 1988).
Table 10.4 illustrates how the CAVE technique might work. Quotations from members of
the 1982–1984 Celtics, Knicks, Bullets, Sixers, and Nets basketball teams were taken from the
weekly journal The Sporting News and from the hometown newspapers of the players. Judges
then rated each explanation on the three dimensions of internal–external, stable–unstable,
global–specific and calculated each player’s explanatory style. Across both seasons, teams with
more optimistic players performed better following a loss than teams with more pessimistic
players (Rettew & Reivich, 1995).
In another study, researchers were able to predict the ups and downs of a patient’s mood
from the kind of explanations he made during a therapy session using the CAVE technique
(Peterson et al., 1983). Mr. Q, as the
patient was called, demonstrated very
Figure 10.2 Means of
attributions for negative events Depression unusual mood swings during therapy
6 (n=4) sessions which often took him and his
before and after Mr. Q’s mood
shifts. Higher numbers indicate therapist by surprise. But as you can see in
a more pessimistic explanatory Figure 10.2, his mood shifts were actually
style (numbers in parentheses preceded by certain types of explanations
5 he made. When he made more pessimis-
Mean Rating-Composite

refer to the number of therapy

sessions on which means tic explanations his mood became more
No change
are based). Source: From (n=3) depressed and his explanations more pes-
Peterson et al. (1983, Figure 1, simistic. But when he made less pessimis-
p. 100). Peterson, C., Luborsky, 4
tic explanations his depression seemed to
L., & Seligman, M. E. P. (1983).
improve and his explanations became
Attributions and depressive
mood shifts: A case study using
more optimistic as the session continued.
the symptom-context method. 3 Depression An optimistic explanatory style as
(n=5) assessed by the CAVE technique has also
Journal of Abnormal Psychology,
92, 96–103. Copyright American been linked to political victory (Zullow,
Psychological Association. 1995), military assertiveness (Satterfield
Reprinted with permission. 2 & Seligman, 1994), and quality of life
while living in a politically free coun-
Before Shift After Shift try (Zullow et al., 1988). For example,
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 287

in 9 out of the 10 U.S. presiden-

“A joint analysis of candidate
tial elections held between 1948
optimism has determined
and 1984, the more pessimistic that, once again, the more
candidate in his nomination hopeful candidate, Barack
acceptance speech lost the elec- Obama, has won an election.
tion, especially if he was prone We believe that hopefulness
to ruminate or dwell on depres- has played a major role in
sive thoughts (Zullow & Selig- this election. When it comes
man, 1990). What about the 10th to celebrating what is good
election? That candidate started about America and to
out optimistic enough during acknowledging our ability to
make lasting positive change
his acceptance speech, but then
in the world, Obama wins out
became much more pessimistic
over McCain. That message
and ruminative as the campaign appeals more to Americans
wore on. What about our current at this time apparently,”
president? Optimism won again! according to Stephen
(See the photo on the right.) Schueller of the Positive
Psychology Center at the
University of Pennsylvania.
Explanatory Style Here, then senator Barack
and Achievement Obama poses in front of
the Superman statue in
Across many different contexts, downtown Metropolis, IL,
people with an optimistic explan- after his 50th town hall
atory style outperform expecta- meeting in Massac County.
tions—and often their pessimistic peers and rival teams—in school and on the playing field
(Gillham et al., 2001; Rettew & Reivich, 1995; Schulman, 1995). In college, optimistic students
achieve at a level beyond what would be expected based on their high school grades, class rank,
SAT scores, or achievement test scores (Schulman, 1995). Optimistic teams and individual
athletes bounce back faster from a loss or a bad performance than pessimistic teams or athletes
(Gillham et al., 2001).

School. Optimistic college students do better in their classes than students with a pessimistic
explanatory style, even after controlling for ability (Metalsky, Abramson, Seligman, Semmel,
& Peterson, 1982; Metalsky, Halberstadt, & Abramson, 1987; Peterson & Barett, 1987). What
leads optimists to outperform expectations? Students with an optimistic explanatory style show
greater motivation and persist longer in the face of adversity, strategies which are related to
higher achievement (Wise & Rosqvist, 2006).
In one study, first-year college students filled out a series of questionnaires measuring
explanatory style, how they coped with academic failures and frustrations, SAT scores, and
grades. Students with a pessimistic explanatory style performed worse in their first year in
college, averaging about a C, compared to students with an optimistic explanatory style who
averaged almost a B-, even when SAT scores were used to control for natural ability (Peterson
& Barett, 1987). Students with an optimistic style remained motivated in the face of setbacks
and, as a result, obtained a higher GPA, whereas students with a pessimistic explanatory style
tended to give up after academic frustrations. Their GPA reflects a lack of motivation rather
than a lack of ability.
Similar results have been demonstrated with elementary school children. Kids with a pes-
simistic explanatory style showed poor achievement on standardized tests and grades in both
the United States (Nolen-Hoeksema, Girgus, & Seligman, 1986) and in China (Yu & Seligman,
2002). In addition, teachers in China reported that students with a pessimistic explanatory style
showed behavioral problems as well, something not measured in the U.S. sample.
However, there are times when a more pessimistic explanatory style—focusing on failure
and discounting success—may work to improve achievement such as when faced with highly
demanding academic programs like law (Satterfield, Monahan, & Seligman, 1997) and mar-
keting (LaForge & Cantrell, 2003). In one study, students with a pessimistic explanatory style
288 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

THINK ABOUT IT (internal, stable, global for negative events and the opposite pattern for positive events) the
summer before starting law school achieved a higher GPA and greater success working on their
When it comes to academic school’s law journal than those with an optimistic explanatory style. Some aspects of the pes-
achievement, is it better to simistic explanatory style, such as taking responsibility for one’s failures to remedy them, may
be optimistic, pessimistic, or
a balance of the two?
be more adaptive and conducive to future achievement than explaining them away as external,
unstable, or specific. Law school programs are intense, and maybe performance in law school
is everything to a faltering law student. Perhaps viewing failures as internal may be a way of
keeping oneself on track or motivated for success. Of course, the authors cautioned, we don’t
know if these pessimists were at greater risk for depression or if these negative attributions
merely served as defenses keeping their expectations low to keep themselves performing their
best (Satterfield et al., 1997).
Pessimistic explanations tend to be self-fulfilling: Students with a pessimistic explanatory
style were less likely to have specific academic goals and less likely to seek academic advising,
symptoms of passive rather than active strategies to school achievement (Peterson & Barett,
1987). In the academic life of a typical student—as many readers of this book can attest—there
are many frustrations, from failed quizzes, difficult problem sets, a lost textbook, a surprise quiz,
an incomplete reading assignment, difficulty starting an upcoming paper, or an unintelligible
lecture, for example, that students must face on a daily basis. Successful students are not neces-
sarily the smartest, but those who are able to cope with these inevitable setbacks and continue
to strive rather than give up.

THINK ABOUT IT Athletics. Even in the sports arena, individuals and teams with an optimistic explanatory
style perform better than those with a pessimistic style (Gillham et al., 2001; Rettew & Reiv-
Can a team be optimistic or ich, 1995; Seligman, Nolen-Hoeksema, Thornton, & Thornton, 1990), especially after defeat
pessimistic?
(Seligman et al., 1990). We saw this earlier with professional basketball teams using the CAVE
technique (Rettew & Reivich, 1995).
In a different study using similar methods with baseball players, teams with more opti-
mistic players won more games the following season than teams with pessimistic players
(Rettew & Reivich, 1995). Explanatory style was just as good a predictor of the next season’s
performance as was the team’s performance in the current season (see Figure 10.3). Optimistic
soccer players also play better after a loss than do players with a pessimistic explanatory style
(Gordon, 2008).
Why does explanatory style have such a strong effect on athletic performance? Researchers
think that the key to a winning athletic performance is the ability to persist despite setbacks.
This was studied more closely in elite male and female swimmers.
For this experiment, the participants were members of the University of California at
Berkeley’s men’s and women’s swim teams, both nationally ranked, in which several members

Figure 10.3 Explanatory style 13

and baseball wins: Average 12.75
explanatory style of players for 12.5 Pirates
negative events during the 1985 12.25
season by percentage of games 12 Braves
won during the 1986 season. 11.75 Expos
CN 1985

Higher numbers indicate a 11.5

more pessimistic explanatory 11.25
Reds
style. Source: From Rettew and 11 Cardinals
Reivich (1995, Figure 10.1, 10.75 Padres
p. 180). Rettew, D., & Reivich, K. 10.5 Cubs Phillies
(1995). Sports and explanatory Astros
10.25
style. In G. M. Buchanan & 10
Giants
M. E. P. Seligman (Eds.), 9.75 Dodgers Mets
Explanatory style (p. 173–185). 9.5
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. 0.35 0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65
Winning Percentage 1986
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 289

at the time held national and world records

and were preparing for the 1988 Olympic
trials. At the beginning of the season, the
swimmers indicated their explanatory
style and their coaches rated how likely the
swimmer was to bounce back after a bad
performance. Then, after every swim meet
during the regular season, coaches rated
whether the swimmer performed better
than expected or worse than expected.
Swimmers with a pessimistic explanatory
style and swimmers who were rated by the
coach as unlikely to bounce back after a
defeat performed worse than expected
over the course of the season (Seligman et
al., 1990).
The researchers hypothesized that
one reason why optimists outperform
pessimists is because they are better able
to bounce back after a defeat. Having a Optimistic swimmers bounce
pessimistic explanatory style, where they back better than pessimistic
believe that bad events are likely to recur, swimmers after a failed
causes pessimists to become helpless after performance.
a failure and give up trying. However,
as you no doubt recognized, this study
merely showed that the two are correlated. We do not know if a bad performance caused
the pessimists, but not the optimists, to give up and try less hard the next time around
(Seligman et al., 1990).
In a second experiment using the same participants, the researchers specifically imposed
defeat on each swimmer and watched what happened to his or her performance. To do this,
after competing in their best event, swimmers were told that they swam at a time significantly
slower than their actual time. Although the times were large enough so that each swimmer
would feel that he or she performed poorly, the times were small enough to be undetected by
the swimmers themselves. After a 30-minute rest swimmers swam the same event again. How
would optimists and pessimists perform after this manipulated failure?
The optimistic swimmers did at least as well on their second swim as they had on the first
swim, but the pessimistic swimmers swam slower. Despite no time difference between the
optimists and the pessimists on the first swim, the difference between the optimists and the
pessimists on the second swim was enough to lose the event if it had been an actual swim meet
(see Figure 10.4; Seligman et al., 1990).
Another study found a similar
effect in professional basketball teams:
Slower Figure 10.4 Swim times of
Teams with an optimistic explanatory
style were more likely than teams with optimists and pessimists after
false failure feedback. Optimistic
a pessimistic style to bounce back from
Pessimists swimmers perform better than
a loss by winning the next game (Rettew pessimistic swimmers after
& Reivich, 1995). When it comes to ath- failure. Source: Seligman et al.
Time

letic performance, it’s like the old saying: (1990).

When the going gets tough, the tough—
the optimists in this case—get going! By Optimists
the way, when the going gets tough the
pessimists go shopping. Or something
like that, as pessimists tend to use avoid- Faster
ance as a way of coping with negative Swim Swim
events (Scheier, Carver, & Bridges, 2001). 1 2
290 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Explanatory Style and Work Behavior

In the United States, as well as in other countries including Greece (Xenikou, 2005) and Australia
(Henry, 2005), with managers, nonmanagers, or laborers and across many types of work includ-
ing hospitals, schools, sales, banking, or information technology, workers with an optimistic
explanatory style are more motivated, persist longer in the face of adversity, perform better,
and experience less burnout and turnover than workers with a pessimistic explanatory style.
When it comes to sales, in particular, an optimistic explanatory style really pays off. Whether
it is insurance, telecommunications, real estate, office products, auto sales, or banking, whenever
persistence is necessary to overcome difficulties, salespeople with an optimistic explanatory style
outsell salespeople with a pessimistic explanatory style by about 20 to 40 percent (Schulman,
1999). Why is this the case? Salespersons often must make “cold calls” where they contact a
potential buyer who is not expecting the call or whom they do not yet know. Understandably,
the likelihood of landing a sale under these conditions is quite slim, so the successful salesperson
must be able to take a rejection and forge ahead with his or her calls.
Imagine two recently hired insurance salespeople, Carlos and Manny, who have just fin-
ished making 20 cold calls and were rejected on every single one. Carlos says to himself: “I made
20 calls without a hint of a sale. What’s wrong with me? I’m just not cut out for this (internal).
I guess I’m not good with people or not very persuasive” (stable and global; Schulman, 1999,
p. 32). With this attitude, how likely will Carlos be to ever pick up the phone again?
THINK ABOUT IT Now consider Manny who says: “That was a tough stretch, but that can happen to the best
of them (external). Maybe they don’t need what I’m selling or were too busy (external). Also,
In what other jobs do work- I’m new at this and it takes time and practice to learn the ropes and sharpen my sales pitch
ers face similar conditions? (unstable and specific). As my boss said, this is a numbers game—you have to make lots of calls
Might people with an
optimistic explanatory style
to find those few customers who are interested enough to buy” (Schulman, 1999, pp. 32–33).
excel there as well? With this attitude, Manny is able to face the next call and even the next rejection.
Obviously, Carlos has a pessimistic explanatory style whereas Manny has an optimistic
one. These two imaginary salespeople are fairly representative of participants in a study of
explanatory style of 104 insurance agents working for the Met Life Insurance Company (Selig-
man & Schulman, 1986). Agents with an optimistic explanatory style sold more life insurance
than agents with a pessimistic explanatory style. They were also less likely to quit or be fired
in the first 2 years of employment. In fact, optimists sold about 35% more insurance than the
pessimists. Pessimists may be more easily overwhelmed by cold calling, and come to avoid it.
They start to lose their confidence in a self-fulfilling prophesy of helplessness, hopelessness, and
pessimism, which may eventually lead to their quitting, if they are not fired first (Schulman,
1999). In contrast, optimists are more likely to see adversity as a challenge or as a puzzle that
they can solve with the right strategy or enough effort. They may spend long hours refining
their interpersonal skills and striving to maintain their confidence after a rejection so that they
can rebound quickly after setbacks, and persist in the face of challenge.
But how can we be so sure that explanatory style caused workers to persist longer leading
to other good outcomes? After all, because none of these studies randomly assigned workers to
explanatory style, it is possible that job success led workers to become more optimistic in their
explanatory style. However, we can randomly assign some workers to a treatment designed to make
them more optimistic and compare them to workers who did not go through the treatment. Will
changing a worker’s explanatory style to a more optimistic one also lead to better outcomes at work?
The answer is a resounding yes! Employees of a major British insurance company that had
just undergone a massive reorganization took part in an intervention designed to help them
develop a more optimistic explanatory style (Proudfoot, Corr, Guest, & Dunn, 2009). Before
the intervention, the reorganization hit employees hard; some 37% of employees experienced
levels of psychological distress high enough to warrant professional help.
For this experiment, half the participants were randomly assigned to participate in a special
training group immediately; the others were placed on a wait-list control and would have the
same exact training but 5 months later. In this way the researchers made sure that both the treat-
ment group and the control group were comparable except for the training. The experimental
group attended weekly 3-hour sessions for 7 weeks. Using a combination of Socratic questioning,
group discussions, self-observation, reflection, and assignments, these sessions used principles
of cognitive behavior therapy to change employees’ work-related explanatory style.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 291

The intervention did more than make employees in the intervention group more optimistic
compared to employees who had not yet experienced the intervention: It also led to positive psy-
chological and work-related outcomes. Both immediately after the intervention and 3 months
later, employees in the experimental group reported greater self-esteem, job satisfaction, and pro-
ductivity compared to before they started the program. They also reported lowered psychological
distress, intention to quit, and job turnover. Employees in the control group also showed these
improvements, but only after they had gone through the training (Proudfoot et al., 2009; see
Figure 10.5).
As you can see, an optimistic explanatory style not only leads to better outcomes at work but it
can also help workers successfully weather the changes and stresses of a corporate reorganization.

Explanatory Style and Physical and Psychological Health

Physical Health. We’ve already seen how a pessimistic explanatory style can be detrimental THINK ABOUT IT
to good psychological health (Peterson & Seligman, 1984; Sweeney et al., 1986), but a pessi-
mistic explanatory style can be bad for one’s physical health as well (Peterson & Bossio, 2001). Why might optimists and
pessimists show differences
An optimistic explanatory style is linked to better immune functioning (Brennan &
in number and quality of
Charnetski, 2000; Kamen-Siegel, Rodin, Seligman, & Dwyer, 1991). People with an optimistic friendships? Could a vicious
explanatory style take better care of themselves, seeking and following medical advice more cycle or self-fulfilling proph-
so than people with a pessimistic explanatory style. They are also more likely to engage in esy be operating here?
healthier behaviors that can prevent illness. Optimists have greater social support—that is,
number and quality of friendships—and more quality personal relationships, both of which
have been shown to bolster immune functioning (Seligman, 1990). College students with an
optimistic explanatory style had fewer illnesses, made fewer visits to the doctor, and were more
confident that they could prevent health problems than their more pessimistic peers (Peterson,
1988; Peterson & De Avila, 1995).
The effects of explanatory style in young adulthood set the stage for good psychological
and physical health later in life. Students with an optimistic explanatory style in college also had
better physical health in middle age (Peterson, Seligman, & Vaillant, 1988). Among men who

Attributional Style Psychological Strain Figure 10.5 Comparison

8 15 of experimental group with
wait-list control group:
t=6.63
6 t=5.88 1 = before intervention for
Score (-21–21)

t=6.75
Average A. S.

Average GHQ
Score (0–30)

10 experimental group; 2 = after

t=4.28 intervention; 3 = 3@month
4
t=4.72 follow-up of experimental
5 group and baseline for control
2 t=4.46 group; and 4 = after control
group intervention. Source:
0 0 From Proudfoot et al. (2009,
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
Figure 2, p. 150). Reprinted
Occasions Occasions
from Proudfoot, J. G., Corr, P. J.,
Job Satisfaction Professional Self-Esteem Guest, D. E., & Dunn, G. (2009),
82 t=2.68 5 “Cognitive-behavioural training
80 t=9.97 t=35.41 t=29.51
to change attributional style
t=3.93 t=6.34
78 4.5 improves employee well-being,
Score (15–105)

Average WSE
Average J.S.

Score (1–7)

76
job satisfaction, productivity,
and turnover,” Personality and
74 4
Individual Differences, 46,
72
147–153. Copyright © 2009,
70 3.5 with permission from Elsevier.
68
66 3
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
Occasions Occasions

Cognitive-Behavioural Training Group Control Group

292 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

had a previous heart attack, those with an optimistic explanatory style had a greater survival
rate (Buchanan, 1995).

Psychological Health: Depression. One of the most robust findings is that a pessimistic
explanatory style is a risk factor for depression in both children (Gladstone & Kaslow, 1995;
Joiner & Wagner, 1995) and adults (Gillham et al., 2001; Robins & Hayes, 1995). That is,
although everybody might feel sad when a bad thing happens or a good thing fails to happen
to them, people with a pessimistic style feel sadder longer and more deeply than people with
an optimistic explanatory style (Peterson & Seligman, 1984). This finding has been demon-
strated in cross-sectional correlational studies, longitudinal studies, field experiments, labora-
tory experiments, and case studies (Peterson & Seligman, 1984). In addition to depression,
pessimists experience more negative emotions such as anxiety, guilt, anger, sadness, despair
and hopelessness in the face of negative events than optimists (Isaacowitz & Seligman, 2003).
The tricky part of proving that a pessimistic explanatory style actually causes depression
THINK ABOUT IT
is that we can’t randomly assign people to one style or the other. Also, it would be unethical to
If a pessimistic explanatory purposely cause bad things to happen to people and see who becomes depressed. As a result,
style causes depression, can much of the evidence for the effect of explanatory style on depression is correlational. However,
attribution therapy prevent the logic behind many of these studies does lead to the conclusion that pessimistic explanatory
or alleviate depression?
style is a risk factor for depression.
For example, much research finds a correlation between explanatory style and depression at
the same point in time. As you recall, this could be because a pessimistic explanatory style causes
depression, depression causes a person to develop a pessimistic explanatory style, or because
some third variable, like Neuroticism, causes both depression and a pessimistic explanatory style.
One way around this problem is to start with a sample of optimistic and pessimistic people
who do not differ in depressive symptoms and then attempt to predict who actually becomes
depressed when a naturally occurring negative event—like failing a test, not getting into the
college of your dreams, being rejected from a highly desirable fraternity or sorority, or having
a heart attack—hits. Many studies have used such naturally occurring negative events to track
explanatory style and depression and do indeed find that a pessimistic explanatory style often
leads to depression after a negative event (e.g., Abela & Seligman, 2000).
College students, for example, regularly face naturally occurring negative events: exams.
Undergraduate students in an intro psychology class took the ASQ and indicated what grade on the
upcoming midterm exam would make them happy or unhappy. Then their mood was measured
right before and right after the dreaded midterm exam. Among students who performed badly
on the midterm exam—by their own definition—students with a pessimistic explanatory style
were more likely to be depressed when they found out their grade than students with an optimistic
explanatory style (Metalsky et al., 1982). Explanatory style was not correlated with exam grades.

Students regularly face

naturally occurring
negative events. However,
students with an optimistic
explanatory style bounce
back better and are less likely
to become depressed after
doing badly on an exam than
students with a pessimistic
explanatory style.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 293

Similarly, undergraduate students in an abnormal psychology class who learned that they
did badly on a midterm exam were understandably upset. However, students with an opti-
mistic explanatory style seemed to bounce back within a day or two, whereas students with a
pessimistic explanatory style still showed symptoms of depression. Pessimistic students with
low self-esteem who failed the exam—a triple whammy of risk factors—continued to show
symptoms of depression up to 5 days after receiving their grades, long after students with high
self-esteem recovered from their failing grades (Metalsky, Joiner, Hardin, & Abramson, 1993).
Even children are vulnerable to depression when bad events happen to them, if they have
a pessimistic explanatory style (Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1986). Third, fourth, and fifth graders
who had a pessimistic explanatory style were more likely to show symptoms of depression both
in the present and a few months later, especially if they experienced negative life events than
children with a more optimistic explanatory style. The children also reported engaging in more
helpless behaviors, an observation verified by their teachers, and showed lower scores on state
achievement test scores. Overall, helpless behaviors and depression were associated with poor
achievement on standardized tests. There was also evidence in this study that depression can
cause a pessimistic explanatory style.
A second strategy researchers may use to effectively demonstrate that a pessimistic explana-
tory style causes depression is to track both explanatory style and depressive symptoms over
time and see how they relate to each other. Studies that have taken this tack do indeed find that
a pessimistic explanatory style predicts increases in depressive symptoms over time (Gillham
et al., 2001). One study found that the greater the number of daily hassles people experienced
over 6 weeks, the more likely they were to experience depressive symptoms, especially if they
had a more pessimistic way of explaining events (Gibb, Beevers, Andover, & Holleran, 2006).
Yet a third strategy is to design a treatment that changes explanatory style and see if this
leads to changes in depression. Of course, it would be unethical to attempt to change an opti-
mistic style to a more pessimistic one, so researchers opt to change a pessimistic style to a more
optimistic one. An even more powerful demonstration would be to compare the intervention
group to a control group of participants who are similar to them in explanatory style and
depression, but who do not receive the intervention. If we see improvements in the experimen-
tal group but not in the control group, it suggests that it was the manipulation of explanatory
style that caused the lessening of depressive symptoms.
Both of these studies have been done (Gillham et al., 2001). Martin Seligman and his col-
leagues at the University of Pennsylvania have devised the Penn Resiliency Program (PRP).
This program was designed to change a pessimistic explanatory style to a more optimistic one.
Indeed, not only do these programs change explanatory style, but they also prevent depression
in both adults (Seligman, Schulman, DeRubeis, & Hollon, 1999) and children (Gillham et al.,
2001). These programs have met with great success in the United States (Gillham, Reivich,
Jaycox, & Seligman, 1995; Jaycox, Reivich, Gillham, & Seligman, 1994) and in China (Yu &
Seligman, 2002). We’ll take a closer look at how these programs work to increase optimism and
lessen depression in The Personality of Everyday Life box later in this chapter.
Another kind of treatment is therapy. As adults successfully progress through cogni-
tive therapy for depression, their explanatory style changes from a pessimistic one to a more
optimistic one (Peterson & Seligman, 1984; Seligman et al., 1988). Conversely, a pessimistic
explanatory style predicts a relapse in depression after termination of therapy (DeRubeis &
Hollon, 1995; Ilardi, Craighead, & Evans, 1997). For example, one study monitored the thought
processes of four patients who were in cognitive therapy for depression after a loss of a loved
one. According to the transcripts of their therapy sessions from the beginning, middle, and end
of therapy, these people showed the most internal stable and global explanations for negative
events at the beginning of their therapy and the least internal, stable, and global explanations
during their last session (Peterson & Seligman, 1984).
However, not all research supports the finding that pessimistic explanatory style is a risk
factor for depression (Gillham et al., 2001; Norem, 2003). A few inconsistent studies find that
explanatory style does not predict changes in symptoms of depression up to one year later
(Bennett & Bates, 1995; Hammen, Adrian, & Hiroto, 1988; Tiggemann, Winefield, Winefield, &
Goldney, 1991). All three of these studies looked at the impact of everyday hassles on depression.
294 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Figure 10.6 Depressive 10 Perhaps everyday stress is not enough to cause

symptoms at 6 months in Optimists 9.47
depressive symptoms in people with a pessimistic
optimists and pessimists on Pessimists
explanatory style.

BDI Score at 6-Month Follow-Up

the Beck Depression Inventory 8 Other studies find that a pessimistic explan-
(BDI) as a function of negative
atory style may be more adaptive in certain
live events. Source: From 6.62 situations. Recall our earlier discussion of how pes-
Isaacowitz and Seligman (2001, 6 6.08
Figure 1, p. 264). Reprinted simistic college students in high-pressure courses
from Isaacowitz, D. M., & of study achieved higher grades than students with
Seligman, M. E. P. (2001), “Is an optimistic explanatory style (LaForge & Cantrell,
4 4.17
pessimism a risk factor for 2003; Satterfield et al., 1997). Because neither of
depressive mood among these studies looked at depressive symptoms, we do
community-dwelling older not know if the higher grades of pessimists came
adults?” Behaviour Research 2
at a psychological cost. However, there is some evi-
and Therapy, 39, 255–272. dence that a pessimistic explanatory style is better
Copyright © 2001, with for the mental health of elderly people (Isaacowitz
permission from Elsevier. 0
No Events Life Events & Seligman, 2001).
In one sample of elders living in the greater
Philadelphia region, those with a optimistic explanatory style showed the least symptoms of
depression 6 months later unless they were faced with a negative event such as the death of a
loved one or deterioration in physical health. In this case, optimists showed the most amount
of depression. Pessimists, regardless of negative events, scored in between these two extremes
on depressive symptoms (see Figure 10.6; Isaacowitz & Seligman, 2001).
Isaacowitz and Seligman (2001) surmised that the optimists’ lifetime habit of viewing
negative events as temporary and changeable is suddenly thrown into doubt when negative
events occur for elders. Whereas for young people failing an exam is temporary, events such
as changes in health status, death of friends, or other lifestyle changes associated with aging
are permanent for elders and in most cases really do impact many domains of their lives. For
elders, attributing bad events to unstable causes may actually increase depression if the causes
turn out to be a permanent part of the elders’ lives.
Similarly, aging may be harder for optimists who apply their typical active problem-
focused coping to unsolvable problems. Pessimists may be more able to accept that some
things happen outside their control. So, even though a pessimistic explanatory style is gener-
ally a risk factor for depression in young people, an optimistic explanatory style may be a risk
factor for elders given the reality of their lives. Realism—however depressing one’s prospects
may be—may be a better coping strategy for elders, just as it may be for law students and
marketing majors.

SEE FOR YOURSELF Explanatory Style and Social Behavior

The next time you are feel- People with optimistic and pessimistic explanatory styles also differ in social behaviors like
ing lonely, consider it a tem- loneliness and marital satisfaction. Just as how people can stave off depression and achieve good
porary situation and think things by blaming negative events on external, unstable, and specific causes—the optimistic
about what you could do, explanatory style—people who make such attributions for their spouses’ behavior feel better
at least in the short term, to about their marriages (Gillham et al., 2001). After all, who would you rather be married to: a
feel better.
cranky, selfish mate or a distracted sweetie who is just going through a rough patch at work?
The kind of attributions we make for our friends and life partners, giving them the attributional
benefit-of-the-doubt, leads to better outcomes, like marital satisfaction 1 year later, the same
way it does for our own behaviors (Fincham & Bradbury, 1993).
People who are lonely, compared to nonlonely people, and those who are depressed, com-
pared to nondepressed people, make more internal, stable, and global explanations for their
loneliness or depression (Anderson & Arnoult, 1985; Anderson, Horowitz, & French, 1983).
Lonely people and depressed people blame their problems in interacting with others on their
own lack of ability or personal defects, attributing interpersonal failures to stable causes in
themselves. In contrast, nonlonely or nondepressed people blame their interpersonal failings
on lack of effort or poor strategies. This suggests that lonely people experience helplessness
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 295

Cultural differences in
explanatory style: Chinese
students tend to be more
pessimistic than American
students.

when it comes to interacting with other people, which if true, also suggests how to cure loneli-
ness: realize that you can take concrete steps, such as reaching out to others, doing volunteer
work, or contacting a friend, to ease your feelings of loneliness (Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008). As
mentioned in the section on physical health, social isolation has been linked to health problems
(Cobb, 1976) and, as we saw in Chapter 6, to negative genetic changes in immune functioning
(Cole et al., 2007).

Cultural Differences in Explanatory Style

As you might expect, given that there are cultural differences in locus of control, there are also
cultural differences in explanatory style (Peterson & Chang, 2003). Recall that people in col-
lectivistic cultures, such as in countries in East Asia, tend to be more external whereas people
in individualistic cultures, such as in the United States, tend to be more internal (Heine &
Lehman, 1995). The same pattern is found for explanatory style: Chinese people tend to have a
more pessimistic and less optimistic explanatory style than Americans (Lee & Seligman, 1997).
Undergraduate students in China and the United States took the ASQ in their native
language. As you can see in Figure 10.7, Chinese students were the most pessimistic, Ameri-
can students the most optimistic, with the Chinese American students falling somewhere in
between. In particular, European Americans were more likely to show a self-serving bias, attrib-
uting good events to themselves and negative events to external factors, than were the Chinese
Americans or the mainland Chinese. Both groups of Chinese students attributed their good
events to circumstances outside themselves, as would be expected in Chinese culture which
values modesty. Across all three samples, pessimism related to lower grades, worse health, and Figure 10.7 Mean composite
less confidence. scores of optimism between
Clearly, there is something about cultural White Americans, Chinese
values that fosters an optimistic or a pessimis- 5 Americans, and mainland
tic explanatory style. What specific aspect of Chinese. Higher numbers
Chinese or American culture might do this? In 4.06 indicate a more optimistic
4
a study of explanatory styles of Asian Ameri- explanatory style. Source:
3.08 From Lee and Seligman
Mean CPCN

can and European American students, those 3 (1997, Figure 1, p. 36). Lee, Y., &
who grew up in families emphasizing submis- 2.46
Seligman, M. E. P. (1997), “Are
siveness—a value important in Chinese cul- 2 Americans more optimistic
ture—were more global in their explanations than the Chinese?,” Personality
for negative events regardless of their cultural and Social Psychology Bulletin,
1
background providing direct evidence that cul- 23(1), 32–40. Copyright ©
tural values, as reinforced by parents as well 1997 by Sage Publications.
0
as by the dominant culture, affect explanatory White Chinese Mainland Reprinted with permission of
style (Kao, Nagata, & Peterson, 1997). Americans Americans Chinese Sage Publications.
296 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Research Methods Illustrated: Field Studies and Natural

Manipulations

I
knew a particularly amazing professor back in graduate school. Ron Mack was a caring
person and a bit of a character around the psychology department. But as a clinical
psychologist, he often felt uncomfortable by the kinds of research done by social and
personality psychologists that involved making people feel bad or sad, distressed them, or
made them fail at seemingly important tasks. His philosophy was simple: There is enough pain
in the world; we don’t need to add to it by putting participants through stressful manipulations
in the laboratory.
Ron Mack was right: There are many naturally occurring tragic events in the world that
challenge people’s beliefs and expectations and even send some into a tailspin of depression.
Because it would be unethical to purposely induce a depression in people or psychologically
distress them, researchers often design experiments or correlational studies around such natural
manipulations using field studies (McGuire, 1967).
A field study is a study that takes place outside the laboratory. Field studies can be
experimental or nonexperimental (Aronson, Ellsworth, Carlsmith, & Gonzales, 1990). When
researchers are unable to control the independent variable or when randomly assigning
participants to conditions that may be harmful or disturbing is impossible or inadvisable (Aronson
et al., 1990), researchers may use nonexperimental methods rather than a true experiment. Designs
that are nonexperimental are often called quasi-experimental or correlational designs. Quasi-
experimental designs strongly suggest a causal link, but, like a correlation, must be interpreted with
caution because they can’t prove one (Aronson et al., 1990).
Because research questions can be investigated in a number of ways researchers must
pick the best method for investigating their hypothesis. Often, this results in a compromise
(Aronson et al., 1990). For example, when studying people who are coping with a catastrophic
event—say a hurricane and a flood—experimenters must sacrifice experimental control and
random assignment to gain insight into a real-world tragedy. Researchers might also apply
different methods so that the shortcomings of one study can be compensated by the strengths
of another (Aronson et al., 1990). This is why many researchers identify causal effects in the
laboratory where they can conduct a true experiment and then attempt to extend their findings
to a field study where they can’t (Aronson et al., 1990). One of the best examples of this is how
researchers investigating learned helplessness first identified the causes of helplessness by doing
laboratory experiments with dogs (Seligman & Maier, 1967) and then they applied the findings to
understand human behavior in naturally occurring situations through quasi-experimental field
studies.
Another advantage of field research, in addition to the ethical advantage, is that
participants may give a more natural response, lessening experimental demand characteristics,
because they are often unaware that they are even in an experiment. At the same time, because
participants are unaware that they are in an experiment there may be invasion of privacy issues
(Aronson et al., 1990).
Both laboratory and field research involves a trade-off between experimental control and
generalizability (Dunn, 1999). Laboratory experiments generally have a lot of experimental
control—so much so that we can identify the causes of an effect—but they have limited
generalizability or applicability to situations that may differ from the strict, controlled conditions
of the laboratory. Conversely, field research has very high generalizability, but lower levels of
experimental control.
In personality psychology, field studies where people are observed and their behavior is
recorded without their knowledge are less common than in social psychology or sociological
research. Personality psychologists often use a blend of laboratory and field methods to study
things like stress and coping with adversity that naturally occur in the world. For example, in this
chapter we talk about research that followed people as they coped with tuberculosis (Seeman
& Evans, 1962), parole (Seeman, 1963), hurricane and flooding (Anderson, 1977), lost swim meets
(Seligman et al., 1990), possible unemployment (Proudfoot et al., 2009), failed exams (Metalsky et al.,
1982; Metalsky et al., 1993), death of a loved one (Peterson & Seligman, 1984), heart bypass surgery
(Scheier et al., 1989), and cancer (Scheier et al., 2001). In none of these studies did experimenters
manipulate or cause these bad things to happen. Instead, researchers looked at how people
handled these distressing situations differently depending on their locus of control, explanatory
style, or dispositional optimism.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 297

Consider the following field experiment,

in which the participants were residents of
a nursing home who didn’t even know they
were being studied (Langer & Rodin, 1976).
The experimenters wondered if part of the
decrements associated with old age is due
to the loss of personal responsibility and
feelings of helplessness rather than failing
health or the natural process of aging.
To test this hypothesis, elderly
residents of two floors of a nursing home
in Connecticut were randomly assigned
to one of two conditions: a responsibility-
induced group and a control group. Note
that the residents were not individually
assigned to condition; instead residents
on entire floor were assigned to the same
condition. Even though not fulfilling the
requirement of random assignment, this
lessened the possibility that residents could Elders who are given
talk with each other and contaminate the responsibility and retain
treatment effects. Because the residents control over aspects of their
on the two floors were similar in physical daily lives show better health
condition, psychological health, and prior than elders who experience
socioeconomic status, and were assigned to loss of control in their lives.
rooms based on availability, the researchers
accepted this compromise in experimental
control to gain the realism and generalizability of their results.
One day, the administrator of the nursing home called a meeting in the lounge of each
floor. To the residents on the responsibility-induced floor, he emphasized that they were
responsible for decorating their rooms, caring for themselves, and deciding how they wanted
to spend their time. Residents of the control floor were reminded of how much the home had
provided for their care and comfort, such as nice rooms, taking care of them, and allowing
them a range of activities. Then, residents in the responsibility-induced group had the option
of choosing a plant, if they wanted, which was theirs “to keep and take care of as you’d like.”
Residents in the control group were told “The plants are yours to keep. The nurses will water
and care for them for you.” Finally, residents in the responsibility-induced group were reminded
that they could choose which of two nights they wanted to see a movie the following week;
residents in the control group were informed that they would be told which night they were
THINK ABOUT IT
scheduled to see the movie.
Though residents of both the experimental and control floors scored similarly on the Imagine that your grand-
dependent variables before the experiment started, there were significant differences between the mother wants to help with
two groups 3 weeks after this treatment. Residents of the responsibility-induced group reported food preparations for a big
greater increases in happiness and activity than the control group. They were also rated by an family dinner on Sunday.
interviewer as being more alert, and by the nurses as engaging in more activities, such as visiting Your mom is concerned that
other residents, talking to the staff, and attending movie nights. Overall, 93% of the responsibility- it may be too much for her.
induced group showed improvements in eating, sleeping, and mood since the study started, whereas Based on this research, what
only 21% of the control group showed these positive changes. In fact, 71% of the control group do you think?
actually became more debilitated despite receiving the same high-quality care provided by the
institution. (Neither the interviewer nor the nurses were aware of which condition a resident was in.)
These differences were still seen 18 months later (Rodin & Langer, 1977). Although the overall
death rate for the facility during the 18 months prior to the original experiment was 25%, the rate
for the two floors in the 18 months after the treatment was strikingly different: 30% in the control
group had died compared to 15% of the residents on the responsibility-induced floor.
The results of this experiment are quite striking, especially in light of what we know today
about learned helplessness and the power of control on people’s physical and psychological
health. Of course, we should still interpret these results with caution because this was not a true
experiment.
That is why researchers always end their papers with the caveat “More research is necessary”!
298 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Twin 1: Hey, let’s get out of

here. This old barn smells
Dispositional Optimism
terrible! In addition to an optimistic explanatory style, another way personality psychologists define
Twin 2: No, wait, with all optimism is closer to what most people believe optimism is: an expectation that things will get
this manure there’s got better (Isaacowitz & Seligman, 2003). Dispositional optimism is a general expectation that
good things will happen in the future (Scheier & Carver, 1985, 1993). People with dispositional
to be a pony around here
optimism approach life with positive expectations—even in the face of adversity—and believe
somewhere! that good things will happen, events and circumstances will work out for the best, and that good
will overcome bad (Carver & Scheier, 2001; Wise & Rosqvist, 2006). People low in dispositional
optimism, whom we might call pessimists, hold negative expectations and believe that things
will not work out and that bad things will happen and continue to happen in the future. As a
result of their belief that things will work out, optimists tend to be confident and persistent. In
contrast, pessimists are doubtful and hesitant (Carver & Scheier, 1998, 2002). These beliefs help
optimists weather challenging experiences as well as everyday stressors better than pessimists.
“When God closes one door Charles Carver and Michael Scheier developed their ideas of dispositional optimism and
He opens another.” pessimism from their early work on self-regulation theory (Carver & Scheier, 2001; Scheier
& Carver, 1988). While striving toward desired goals, people experience positive emotions
(e.g., pride, gratitude, relief) when making progress toward those goals or negative emotions
(e.g., shame, anger, and resentment) when their progress is impeded (Carver & Scheier, 1990;
Scheier & Carver, 1992). But what happens when a person encounters an obstacle that he or
she believes is too great to overcome?
First, if people are forced to abandon their efforts toward a goal they still want very badly,
they may feel helplessness and distress (Carver & Scheier, 2003b). But if they give up on the
goal or give up on their current efforts toward the goal, they could choose an alternative path to
the same goal or even choose a different goal and avoid feelings of helplessness. This new goal
may be more modest, the same, or even bigger than the original goal. Under these conditions,
giving up doesn’t cause helplessness and may actually be adaptive. However, if no adjustment
is made and people give up their commitment toward a goal without choosing an alternative
goal, they might end up feeling aimless and empty (Carver & Scheier, 2003b). Healthy self-
regulation requires persistence in the face of adversity as well as giving up and changing to other,
presumably more likely, goals in the same or in alternative domains (Carver & Scheier, 2001).
People regulate their current behaviors based on their future goals and their beliefs about
their chances of achieving those goals. In this way, confidence (optimism) or doubt (pessimism)
leads to different behaviors in the present and huge differences in achievement, psychological
and physical health, and work behaviors and social behaviors in the future (Carver & Scheier,
2001). These differing expectations of optimists and pessimists become self-fulfilling prophe-
cies: Giving up makes failure a sure thing whereas persistence makes success more likely.
Unlike people with an internal locus of control or an optimistic explanatory style, people
with dispositional optimism do not necessarily need to be in control of their destinies to feel
this confidence. Good things could happen because they are talented, hardworking, blessed,
lucky, have friends in the right places, or some combination of all of these causes (Carver &
Scheier, 2003a).
Rather than sit back and wait for good things to happen, optimists agree with Thomas
Jefferson’s observation: “I’m a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I
have of it.” In the face of difficulties, optimists continue working to find alternative ways to
achieve their goals and believe that they can achieve their goals; pessimists are not so sure.
Dispositional optimism leads to continuing efforts and perseverance whereas pessimism leads
to giving up (Carver & Scheier, 2003a). As a result, optimists and pessimists differ in how they
approach, cope with, and how effectively they prevail over challenges and problems (Carver &
Scheier, 2003a).
As we saw with learned helplessness, people’s actions are regulated by their beliefs about
the likely outcome of their actions (Scheier & Carver, 1987). When people see desired outcomes
as attainable, they will persevere toward that goal even when the going gets tough. But when
people believe that outcomes are unattainable, either due to their own inadequacies or due
to circumstances, they will give up and choose another activity. People’s general expectations
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 299

of what good or bad outcomes will happen

to them is reflected in their dispositional
optimism and pessimism: how likely good
things will happen for them regardless of
the cause. As a result, everyday obstacles
will be less disruptive to optimists.
Both explanatory style and dispo-
sitional optimism start with the belief
that expectations impact people’s actions
and experiences (Carver & Scheier,
2003a). Though they come from different
approaches, both lines of research converge
on two important conclusions. First, hold-
ing negative expectations for the future
leads to giving up, negative emotions,
symptoms of depression, feelings of stress,
slow recovery from stressors, social isola- Is this glass half empty or half
tion, and a shorter life expectancy (Scheier full? People with dispositional
& Carver, 1987). Second, holding positive optimism believe that good
expectations for the future leads to persis- things will happen, events
tence, good morale, positive affect, active and circumstances will work
problem solving, problem-focused cop- out for the best, and that
ing, a long life, social support, and greater good will overcome bad.
well-being (Peterson, 2000). Even though
optimists achieve better outcomes in life,
dispositional optimism is not correlated with intelligence, wealth, or academic achievement
(Aspinwall, Richter, & Hoffman, 2001).
For example, across different populations (e.g., college students, elderly people), and THINK ABOUT IT
among people with varied medical conditions (e.g., cancer, pregnancy, bypass surgery, AIDS
risk, joint replacement, rheumatoid arthritis), and their caregivers (e.g., nurses, family mem- What is the difference
between unrealistic opti-
bers, Alzheimer’s caregivers), dispositional optimism was associated with fewer symptoms of
mism and dispositional
depression and distress, better mood, and higher quality of life before, during, and after treat- optimism?
ment (Affleck, Tennen, & Apter, 2001; Scheier et al., 2001).
The research evidence for optimism is overwhelming: People with dispositional optimism
are better than pessimists at realistically revising their goals and coping with negative events
in their lives (Scheier et al., 2001). However, unrealistic optimism (Weinstein, 1980), wishful
thinking (Peterson, 2000), or overconfidence—which are all different from dispositional opti-
mism—may cause problems if a person is so overly optimistic or optimistic in unproductive
ways that he or she chooses to sit back and passively wait for good things to happen (Scheier &
Carver, 1993). Dispositional optimism is similar to hopefulness (Needles & Abramson, 1990)
or what Martin Seligman and his colleagues call a flexible optimism (Seligman, 1990).
Optimists differ in their expectations about the future, but what about their past and pres- SEE FOR YOURSELF
ent? Undergraduate men and women answered a questionnaire measuring how satisfied they
were with their present lives (e.g., “I am satisfied with my current life”), past lives (“I am satis- Which do you agree with
fied with my life in the past”), and anticipated future lives (“I will be satisfied with my life in the more: Is your life today as
good as it gets or is the best
future”). Both pessimists and optimists saw their lives as becoming more satisfying over time, a
yet to come?
common finding in life satisfaction research. However, as you might expect, optimists reported
more life satisfaction at all three time periods than pessimists (Busseri, Choma, & Sadava, 2009).
There was also an interaction between time perspective and optimism/pessimism, such
that optimists saw their present and future lives as similarly rosy, whereas pessimists antici-
pated a better life in the future—just not as good as the future lives the optimists imagined.
That is, pessimists see their present lives as more similar to their past lives than optimists do
(see Figure 10.8). The researchers concluded that life satisfaction is relative depending on one’s
dispositional optimism: For optimists their present lives are “as good as it gets” whereas for
pessimists “the best is yet to come.”
300 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Figure 10.8 Past, present, 30

and anticipated future life Optimists
satisfaction by optimism/ Moderates
pessimism group. Life Pessimists
27
satisfaction means, plus
and minus one standard
error, are shown on the
24
y-axis. Source: From Busseri
et al. (2009, Figure 1, p. 354).
Reprinted from Busseri,
21
M. A., Choma, B. L., & Sadava,
S. W. (2009), “As good as it gets”
or “The best is yet to come”?
How optimists and pessimists 18
view their past, present,
and anticipated future life
satisfaction,” Personality and 15
Individual Differences, 47, Past Present Future
352–356. Copyright © 2009,
with permission from Elsevier.
Measures of Dispositional Optimism
Individual differences in dispositional optimism and pessimism are measured by the Life Orien-
tation Test (LOT; Scheier & Carver, 1985), now in a revised version (LOT-R; Scheier, Carver, &
Bridges, 1994). The LOT-R has 10 items, 3 for optimism, 3 for pessimism, and 4 that are fillers
to help disguise the purpose of the test. Respondents must agree or disagree with each of the
items on a 5-point scale. Scores from the individual items are combined to form a single score
of optimism, although more recent research suggests that separate optimism and pessimism
scores predict to different outcomes (Isaacowitz & Seligman, 2003; Peterson, 2000). You can see
how optimistic or pessimistic you are by taking the LOT-R for yourself in Table 10.5.

Table 10.5 The Life Orientation Test—Revised (LOT-R)

Read each statement and circle your response. Please be as honest and accurate as you can throughout. Try not to let your response
to one statement influence your responses to other statements. There are no “correct” or “incorrect” answers. Answer according to
your own feelings, rather than how you think “most people” would answer.
A = I agree a lot
B = I agree a little
C = I neither agree nor disagree
D = I disagree a little
E = I disagree a lot
1. In uncertain times, I usually expect the best. A B C D E
2. It’s easy for me to relax. A B C D E
3. If something can go wrong for me, it will. A B C D E
4. I’m always optimistic about my future. A B C D E
5. I enjoy my friends a lot. A B C D E
6. It’s important for me to keep busy. A B C D E
7. I hardly ever expect things to go my way. A B C D E
8. I don’t get upset too easily. A B C D E
9. I rarely count on good things happening to me. A B C D E
10. Overall, I expect more good things to happen to me than bad. A B C D E
Note: Items 2, 5, 6, and 8 are fillers and are not scored. Responses to the optimistic items 1, 4, and 10 are scored: A = 5, B = 4, C = 3, D = 2, E = 1. Responses to the
pessimistic items 3, 7, 9, are reversed scored: A = 1, B = 2, C = 3, D = 4, E = 5. Add up scores for individual items to get the total score for the scale. Higher numbers
indicate more optimism.
Source: From Scheier et al. (1994, Table 6, p. 1073). Scheier, M. F., Carver, C. S., & Bridges, M. W. (1994). Distinguishing optimism from neuroticism (and trait anxiety, self-mastery,
and self-esteem): A reevaluation of the Life Orientation Test. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 1063–1078.
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 301

Dispositional Optimism and Coping

Echoing the findings for locus of control and explanatory style reviewed earlier in this chap-
ter, dispositional optimism is associated with positive outcomes in school and work, physical
and psychological health, and social behavior. However, researchers on dispositional optimism
have taken optimism and pessimism in a slightly different direction and have focused on how
people cope with major life events. When faced with a negative event, people high in disposi-
tional optimism report fewer depressive symptoms, greater use of effective coping strategies,
and fewer physical symptoms than pessimists (Scheier & Carver, 1992, 1993). Dispositional
optimism is associated with greater well-being and better adjustment to life stressors over time
(Scheier et al., 2001).
For example, among middle-aged women who experienced a negative event, those who
were lower in dispositional optimism reported more depressive symptoms (Bromberger &
Matthews, 1996). Similarly, a study following middle-aged women over a 1-year period found
that caregivers were less optimistic and more pessimistic than noncaregivers. However, pes-
simism predicted changes in anxiety, perceived stress, and worsening self-rated health of both
caregivers and noncaregivers (Robinson-Whelen, Kim, MacCallum, & Kiecolt-Glaser, 1997).
Dispositional optimism is also associated with better adjustment to the demands of col- “If every difficult
lege life in medical students, law students, and first-year undergraduates. Optimistic students
experience makes you
showed greater achievement, less loneliness, less stress, fewer symptoms of depression, less
stronger . . . then I should be
chronic anger, and less anger suppression (Scheier et al., 2001).
Men with greater dispositional optimism prior to coronary bypass surgery showed more brilliant . . . amazing . . . and
problem-focused coping and a faster recovery, returning to their regular activities faster than strong as hell after all this.”
pessimists, and reporting a higher quality of life 6 months after the operation (Scheier et al., Christine “Spoon Lady” Miserandino,
1989). 32-year-old lupus survivor and
Overall, optimists cope better, in both the short term and in the long run, than pessimists. founder of www. ButYouDontLookSick
Let’s take a closer look at why this might be (see Table 10.6). .com, November 25, 2009

Optimistic Beliefs and Expectations. Optimists fare better than pessimists when con-
fronted with stressful situations because their beliefs and expectations help them cope, whereas
the beliefs and expectations of pessimists hurt them (Scheier et al., 2001). In the face of stress,
optimism makes people resistant to depression (Carver, 2004), keeps them working toward
their goals (Carver et al., 2005), and improves coping with life-threatening health issues (Carver
et al., 1993; Stanton & Snider, 1993). Like this quote by Christine, optimists are likely to believe
that much can be learned from trying experiences (Carver & Gaines, 1987). Just as civil engi-
neers analyze bridge and building disasters and use this knowledge to build better structures,
optimists embrace failure and are ready to analyze past negative experiences to make things
turn out better next time (Wise & Rosqvist, 2006). “It’s all a learning experience,” you might
hear an optimist declare.
For example, dispositional optimism predicted adjustment to diagnosis and treatment
for cancer. In women with breast cancer, and in men with prostate cancer, optimism predicted
less distress immediately after surgery and up to 1 year afterward. In patients undergoing
radiation treatments, optimism was associated with better adjustment throughout the process
(Scheier et al., 2001). Optimism has been shown to predict better emotional and psychologi-
cal well-being and lower distress in breast cancer patients during and just after diagnosis
(Carver et al., 1993, 1994; Epping-Jordan et al., 1999; Stanton & Snider, 1993) and also up to

Table 10.6 Why People High in Dispositional Optimism Fare Better

1. Optimistic beliefs and expectations are more advantageous than pessimistic ones.
2. Optimists use better strategies to cope in a crisis.
3. Optimists take action, make plans, and engage in healthy behaviors.
4. Optimists are good at judging whether a situation is controllable or not and change strategies accordingly.
5. Optimistic beliefs alter physiological functioning and protect the body from stress.
302 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

13 years after treatment (Carver et al., 2005). Optimists were also able to return faster than
pessimists to the social and recreational activities of their daily lives. These activities, in turn,
lowered their emotional distress and protected them from depression as a result of enduring
cancer treatments (Carver, Lehman, & Antoni, 2003). Pessimistic women did not experience
these benefits.
THINK ABOUT IT In men and women recovering from coronary bypass surgery, dispositional optimists
showed lower levels of hostility and depression than pessimists, and reported more happi-
How can one be optimistic
ness, relief, satisfaction with their medical care, emotional support from friends and family,
while going through cancer
treatment? and higher quality of life immediately after the operation and up to 5 years later (Scheier
et al., 2001).
In women of child-bearing age, dispositional optimism was associated with less anxiety
during pregnancy, fewer depressive symptoms during pregnancy and after childbirth, and bet-
ter adjustment to abortion, whereas dispositional pessimism was associated with distress of
infertile couples (Scheier et al., 2001).
One need not be facing a major life illness to benefit from dispositional optimism. Among
first-year college students, optimists held higher academic expectations than pessimists and
were more energized by the challenges of college, seeing them as opportunities rather than
threats. As a result, they were less stressed, happier, healthier, better adjusted, and achieved
higher grades during their first year of college than pessimists (Chemers, Hu, & Garcia, 2001).
Remember how stressful high school was, especially when it came to thinking about your
future? Among Australian suburban high school students in Grades 8 to 12, those with higher
levels of optimism, compared to students low in optimism, showed more career exploration and
planning, career decision-making certainty, and held more career-related goals. Students with
higher levels of pessimism, compared to students low in pessimism, knew less about the world
of work, used decision-making strategies less, knew less about potential careers, were more
indecisive, and had lower levels of school achievement. Overall, higher optimism in these teens
was also associated with greater psychological health as shown by higher levels of self-esteem
and less reported psychological distress (Creed, Patton, & Bartrum, 2002).

THINK ABOUT IT Optimism and Coping Strategies. Even though optimists and pessimists use different
coping strategies, the strategies of optimists are more effective at managing stress (Scheier &
What are some other ways Carver, 1985). Optimists approach problems head-on, doing whatever they can to improve
of engaging in problem- their predicament, engaging in active problem-focused coping. Problem-focused coping is
focused coping?
when people work to solve their problems or do something concrete to change the source of
the stress. This may involve planning, calling on friends to help fix the situation, focusing on
fixing the problem and ignoring other activities, or engaging in any activity that is aimed at
lessening the stress itself (Carver, Scheier, & Weintraub, 1989). Optimists are especially likely to
use problem-focused strategies when they perceive the stressful situation as controllable. When
things are not controllable, optimists use more adaptive coping mechanisms such as positive
reframing, seeing the best in a situation, learning from a bad situation, accepting what can’t be
changed, realistically revising goals, and using humor. Optimists keep trying whereas pessimists
are more likely to get upset and give up (Brown & Marshall, 2001; Scheier & Carver, 1987).
THINK ABOUT IT Pessimists show more emotion-focused coping, where they attempt to reduce or manage
the negative emotions and distress they feel as a result of the stress (Carver et al., 1989). This
What are some other ways may involve being preoccupied with their emotional distress, accepting the stress, putting a
of engaging in emotion- positive spin on events, denying the stress, turning to religion, or seeking friends for comfort.
focused coping?
Pessimists might also engage in avoidant coping such as giving up on goals, distancing, denying,
escaping, abusing substances, and failing to take constructive steps to fix the situation.
Problem-focused coping works to reduce the threat whereas emotion-focused coping
works to lessen the emotional distress caused by the threat (Scheier & Carver, 1987). People
generally apply a combination of both problem-focused and emotion-focused coping depend-
ing on the circumstances. Often emotion-focused coping reduces the anguish and distress
people feel, allowing them to carry out problem-focused coping.
To study these differences in coping styles, one study asked undergraduate students to
imagine themselves in five hypothetical situations (Scheier, Weintraub, & Carver, 1986). The
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 303

situations were moderately stressful and somewhat controllable, such as managing multiple THINK ABOUT IT
final exams on the same day, and other situations highly relevant to college students. As pre-
dicted, optimists and pessimists differed in their coping strategies, with optimists using more Might the emotion-focused
problem-focused coping and pessimists using more emotion-focused coping. strategy of seeking the
comfort of others be espe-
There is an interesting cultural difference between Asians and Americans in the coping strat- cially useful in a collectivistic
egies of optimists and pessimists (Chang, 2001). Self-identified Asian American college students culture compared to an
(an admittedly broad, heterogeneous category) showed similar amounts of dispositional opti- individualistic culture?
mism as White Americans, but greater pessimism. This greater pessimism was associated with
more avoidance coping and psychological problems (e.g., anxiety, fear, panic attacks, alienation,
feelings of inadequacy, thought disorders, and other symptoms) among Asian Americans as dem-
onstrated in previous studies. But, this pessimism and avoidance coping was not associated with
more depressive symptoms in Asian Americans as it generally is among White Americans. Instead,
among those high in pessimism, Asian Americans use more problem-focused coping than White
Americans. Perhaps this is how Asians can have higher pessimism and yet not be vulnerable to
depression like American college students are. If these pessimistic thoughts are an important
way for Asians to cope, Chang (2001) suggested that therapists of Asian Americans should try
to increase optimistic thoughts in their clients rather than decrease pessimistic thoughts, as is
standard practice with cognitive behavioral therapy (Beck, 1976).

Optimists Take Action. In contrast to pessimists, the direct, active, problem-solving

approach of optimists causes them to act in ways that promote health. Optimists are more
likely than pessimists to seek out information, adhere to medical regimes, eat a healthy diet,
get regular exercise, and regularly engage in behaviors to promote health and reduce risk (e.g.,
engaging in safer sex practices if HIV-positive, or using sunscreen regularly if at risk for skin
cancer; Scheier et al., 2001). Compared with pessimists, optimists take vitamins on a regu-
lar basis, eat healthier lunches, lower their levels of body fat, reduce smoking, reduce alcohol
consumption, exercise, and enroll in cardiac rehabilitation programs more than pessimists do
(Scheier & Carver, 1992). Optimism is associated with fewer physical symptoms in both elderly
people and in college students (Scheier & Carver, 1987).
Part of problem-focused coping involves formulating a plan of action for dealing with a
crisis, and optimists are more likely than pessimists to do this (Scheier & Carver, 1987). In one
study, optimistic coronary bypass patients were more likely to make plans for their recovery by
setting goals for themselves and by getting as much information as possible about the recovery
process. In contrast, pessimists blocked out thoughts of what their recovery might be like. As
a result, optimists showed a faster rate of recovery and fewer signs of complications from their
bypass surgeries.

Optimism and Judging Controllability. As mentioned earlier, optimists are more likely
to change strategies or goals when faced with an uncontrollable situation. The key here is that
optimists appear to be better able than pessimists to judge when situations are controllable or
uncontrollable so they can choose more appropriate strategies (Aspinwall et al., 2001).
For example, in one study students tackled anagrams (scrambled word puzzles) that they “God grant me the serenity
believed tested their verbal intelligence (Aspinwall & Richter, 1999). The students had 20 min-
to accept the things I cannot
utes to solve as many anagrams as they could. Unbeknownst to them, the first 7 anagrams were
change; courage to change
unsolvable. For participants in the No Alternatives condition, this was the only task they were
given. But participants in the Alternatives condition were given two additional sets of anagrams the things I can; and wisdom
that were solvable (of course, the participants didn’t know this). At the same time, half of the to know the difference.”
participants in both conditions were allowed to return to an anagram they missed while the ”The Serenity Prayer” by Reinhold
other half was not. Niebuhr
When participants had no alternative tasks to work on, all participants—both optimists
and pessimists—worked on the puzzles until time was up. But when alternatives were available
and participants couldn’t return to their previously unsolved problems—forcing them to admit
defeat on a test of verbal intelligence—participants high in optimism gave up on the unsolvable
problems 4 minutes sooner than pessimistic participants. Further, they performed better on the
new tasks than pessimistic participants (Aspinwall & Richter, 1999; see Figure 10.9).
304 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

Figure 10.9 Time spent 12 This may remind you of the

Low Optimism

Time in Minutes Spent Working

on unsolvable anagrams as Serenity Prayer. Optimists are better
a function of dispositional 10 High Optimism
able to change the things they can
optimism and whether change, accept the things they can-

on Anagrams
returning to previous 8
not change, and they do seem to have
anagrams was prohibited
6 the wisdom to tell the difference—at
or permitted. Source: From
Aspinwall and Richter (1999). least more wisdom than pessimists
4 do (Aspinwall et al., 2001). Or, in
the words of the legendary vaude-
2
villian comedian W. C. Fields: “If at
0 first you don’t succeed, try, try again.
Returning Prohibited Returning Permitted Then give up. There’s no use in being
Condition
a damn fool about it.”

Optimistic Beliefs and Physiological Functioning. Optimism seems to have a protective

effect on the body’s physiological reactions to stress, preventing stress from doing the kind of
damage it might otherwise cause (Scheier & Carver, 1987). The relationship between optimism
and physical and psychological health persists even after controlling for other personality vari-
ables that are known to be related to health, like neuroticism, anxiety, and depression. This
suggests that there must be other ways that optimism impacts health. One such mechanism
may be the immune system: Optimism seems to make the immune system function better and
protect the body from the harmful effects of stress.
Previous studies have found significant correlations between optimism and immune func-
tioning, but these studies were all correlational. For example, in a sample of HIV-positive men
THINK ABOUT IT
and women, greater optimism was associated with greater immune functioning over time,
Why does a placebo control although this enhanced immune function did not affect disease progression. Greater pessimism
group provide the best evi- was associated with greater disease progression over time but not due to enhanced immune
dence that optimism causes function (Milam, Richardson, Marks, Kemper, & McCutchan, 2004). In another study, opti-
changes in immune system
mistic students showed greater T-cell and natural killer cell activity, two cell types that help
functioning?
fight infection, during times of academic stress than pessimists (Segerstrom, 2001, 2005; Seger-
strom, Taylor, Kemeny, & Fahey, 1998). In
a study of women undergoing breast can-
cer diagnosis and treatment, dispositional
optimism counteracted the usual associa-
tion between high perceived stress and low-
ered activity of natural killer cells (Von Ah,
Kang, & Carpenter, 2007).
The best evidence that optimism causes
changes in the functioning of the immune
system comes from a recent experiment that
used a placebo control group to compare
the effects of dispositional optimism and
stress on immune functioning (Brydon,
Walker, Wawrzyniak, Chart, & Steptoe,
2009). The experimenters manipulated
the psychological stress of healthy male
undergraduates and exposure to illness by
randomly assigning them to one of four
conditions.
Evidence suggests that Vaccines work by physiologically stim-
dispositional optimists have ulating the body into making antibodies to
strong immune systems and
fight an infection. Using a double-blind
are better able to fight colds
technique, where neither the experimenters
than dispositional pessimists.
nor the participants know who received the
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 305

placebo and who received the vaccine, some participants received a typhoid vaccine whereas
others received a harmless saline solution. Then half of the participants rested while the other
half faced two psychologically stressful tasks. One task was the classic Stroop test, where partici-
pants were presented with names of colors displayed in various colored lettering on a computer
screen. Participants had to indicate the color of the lettering, not what the word said (this task
is harder than it looks, and is often used by experimenters to induce stress in participants). For
the second task, participants had to imagine that they were falsely accused of a theft and had
to give a speech defending themselves. They believed that the speeches would be videotaped
and judged.
During these tasks, experimenters measured mood, stress responses, and immune func-
tioning of participants. They were particularly interested in interleukin-6, an inflammatory
cytokine, the level of which increases when the immune system is activated. A short-term
increase in inflammatory response is necessary to help fight infection. But a prolonged inflam-
matory response, which occurs when a person is under chronic stress, can be damaging. A side
effect of interleukin-6 is an increase in tension and anxiety. The experimenters wondered,
would psychological stress (Stroop test and speech) increase interleukin-6, what impact would
a participant’s dispositional optimism have on this immune system response, and would this
response compromise participants’ ability to ward off infection later?
First, when experiencing an immediate stressor—getting a needle in the arm as part of an
experiment—optimists showed a smaller increase in tension and anxiety, indicating a smaller
spike in interleukin-6.
Second, when faced with the anxiety-provoking Stroop test and the possibility of giving
a speech, optimism moderated people’s stress responses. That is, the immune system of opti-
mists showed a steady response to these stressors rather than the five-alarm-end-of-the-world-
all-hands-on-deck immune response of pessimists. This limits long-term inflammation and
preserves the body’s ability to fight infection.
You can see this for yourself in Figure 10.10. At 2 hours after the stressful experience, the
interleukin-6 levels of pessimists were still elevated, whereas those of optimists had dropped Figure 10.10 Optimists’
significantly. This provides direct evidence that when faced with a stressor, dispositional opti- immune systems rebound faster
mism causes better immune functioning. than pessimists’ after a stressful
event. This graph shows the
Third, as a result of this more efficient response to stress, the immune system of optimists
mean change in interleukin-6
is better able to fight physical infection, as reflected in their response to the typhoid vaccine,
at 2 hours poststress in relation
three weeks later. to dispositional optimism
Think of it like this: imagine driving down the highway with your friends in the car and scores, grouped from lowest
suddenly seeing a pothole. Some drivers might scream and swerve sharply to avoid the pothole, (pessimistic) to highest
momentarily loosing control of the car and upsetting their passengers. Everyone may need a (optimism) in five equal-sized
few moments to collect themselves before settling back into an otherwise pleasant road trip. groups. Whereas pessimists
However, other drivers might only gasp instead of scream, swerving a bit more gently to avoid still show an inflammatory
the pothole. Their ability to retain control of the car isn’t as disruptive, making for a safer and response to stress, the levels
more pleasant trip for them and their passengers. In general, stress compromises the body’s of interleukin-6 in optimists
is greatly reduced. Optimism
appears to protect the body
from long-term inflammation
by quickly reducing levels of
1.25
interleukin-6 in the hours after
1 a stressful event. Source: From
Brydon et al. (2009, Figure 2, p.
Log IL-6 Response

0.75 813). Reprinted from Brydon,

L., Walker, C., Wawrzyniak, A. J.,
0.5 Chart, H., & Steptoe, A. (2009),
“Dispositional optimism and
0.25
stress-induced changes in
0 immunity and negative mood,”
1 (low) 2 3 4 5 (high) Brain, Behavior, and Immunity,
⫺0.25 23, 810–816. Copyright © 2009,
Optimism Group with permission from Elsevier.
306 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

ability to fight off infections. However, optimists, perhaps by being not so physiologically reac-
tive to stress, are less vulnerable than pessimists to physical infections.
“Perpetual optimism is a The results of this experiment suggest that optimism protects against the long-term inflam-
force multiplier.” matory effects of psychological stress (Brydon et al., 2009). Interleukin-6 is correlated with
Colin Powell depressive symptoms in healthy people and is elevated in some patients with clinical depression
(Irwin & Miller, 2007). Circulating levels of interleukin-6 are also elevated in some conditions
such as cardiovascular disease, arthritis, pain, and certain cancers, all health conditions under
which optimists have been shown to fare better than pessimists. This experiment suggests
that the reason why appears to be due to optimists having optimal immune system responses.
Smaller long-term interleukin-6 responses in optimists may protect them against stress-related
depressive illness. Optimism acts like an antioxidant—think of chocolate, green tea, berries,
spinach—to help protect the body from long-term inflammation after a stressful experience!
“Optimism is the foundation In sum, the expectations, beliefs, coping strategies, readiness to spring into action, and
of courage.” immune systems of optimists combined with an ability to size up their chances of achieving
Nicholas Murray Butler their goals and a willingness to change strategies serve them well, especially in times of stress,
protecting them and fostering both psychological and physical health. So, what can you do if
you are not so high in dispositional optimism? Read the The Personality of Everyday Life box
for a description of how psychologists have been able to change people’s thoughts for the better.

The Personality of Everyday Life

Making people more optimistic
Can we make people more optimistic—both in their explanatory style and in their dis-
positional optimism—by changing their thoughts? Two methods have proven successful
in making people more optimistic: cognitive behavioral therapy (Carver & Scheier, 2002)
and attributional retraining (Miserandino, 1998; Peterson, 2000; Proudfoot et al., 2009).
Both of these principles were taught to children in a special program called the Penn
Resiliency Program (PRP) through comics, stories, videos, role-playing, games, and dis-
cussions (Jaycox et al., 1994).
The program was based on the ABC model of Albert Ellis (Ellis, 1962) and the cogni-
tive behavioral therapy of Aaron Beck (Beck, 1976). When adversity hits (A), it stirs up
beliefs (B) which have consequences (C) for how we feel. The children learned that some-
times negative thoughts occur automatically (e.g., “I’m no good at anything”) much like
how a song gets stuck in our heads. By learning to dispute the automatic negative thoughts
(step D, added to the ABC model by the facilitators; Seligman, 1975) and evaluating if the
negative feelings go up or down (step E for energization of negative feelings) children can
start to choose thoughts to make themselves feel better and dispute thoughts that make
them feel bad.
The children followed the adventures of Hopeful Holly and Hopeful Howard. This
optimistic pair would regularly challenge the negative thinking and pessimistic explana-
tory styles of Gloomy Greg and Pessimistic Penny and help them find ways to cope with
their problems. Children were encouraged to act like Sherlock Holmes—and not his caus-
tic counterpart Hemlock Jones—using steps ABCD and E to think about alternatives,
rather than believing their automatic thoughts, which were often internal, stable, and
global explanations for a negative event (Seligman, 1995).
Before the program, 24% of these fifth- and sixth-grade children in both the wait-list
control and prevention groups had moderate to severe symptoms of depression. Immedi-
ately afterward, whereas children in the control group still showed symptoms, children in
the prevention group had fewer symptoms. By 2 years after the program ended, children
in the prevention group were half as likely to be depressed as children in the control group
(Gillham et al., 1995; Seligman, 1995). Children in the prevention group were less likely
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 307

to attribute negative events to stable causes, becoming slightly more optimistic in their
explanatory style. They were also less likely to show behavioral problems at home and at
school.
The PRP is successful in many settings including inner cities, suburban, and rural
schools and with European American, African American, and Latino children and ado-
lescents’. Comparable programs in Australia and China were similarly effective. The PRP
significantly reduces depression, prevents anxiety, prevents behavioral problems, and
leads to a more optimistic explanatory style, less helplessness, fewer automatic thoughts,
increased self-esteem, and better coping with adversity and problem-solving skills (Brun-
wasser, Gillham, & Kim, 2009; Gillham, Brunwasser, & Freres, 2007).

Chapter Summary
In this chapter on cognitive approaches to psychology we witnessed the power of words: how
Study and Review
our thoughts, beliefs, and expectations lead us to see and experience the world differently and
on mysearchlab.com
become self-fulfilling prophesies in our lives.
One very important belief is in one’s own power to bring about important outcomes. Some Go online for more
people, those with an internal locus of control, believe that they can control their own destinies. resources to help you
Others, those with an external locus of control, believe that what happens to them is due to luck, review.
chance, powerful others, fate, or any number of causes outside their control. Generally an inter-
nal locus of control is related to responsibility for one’s actions, higher achievement, greater
success and satisfaction on the job, better physical and psychological health, and greater social
sensitivity. People with an internal locus of control cope better with stressful events. People
living in individualistic cultures tend to be more internal than people living in collectivistic “Where there is room for
cultures. American college students have become more external since 1960. Locus of control is doubt, people should fill the
measured by questionnaires. gap with hope.”
A sense of control is so important that when people, dogs—or small children, as in the Christopher Peterson (2000, p. 51)
story of Elena with the crayons which opened this chapter—discover that they are unable to
control important outcomes or prevent negative events from happening, they become helpless.
Learned helplessness causes problems in motivation, cognition, and emotion, and may be a risk
factor for hopelessness depression.
Over a lifetime of interacting with the world and being socialized by parents, teachers, coaches,
and the media, people may develop habitual ways of explaining why things happen to them. These
explanations can vary in three dimensions: internal or external, stable or unstable, and global or
specific. People with an optimistic explanatory style see good events as internal, stable, and global;
people with a pessimistic explanatory style see good events as external, unstable, and specific.
People with an optimistic explanatory style see bad events as external, unstable, and specific. People
with a pessimistic explanatory style see bad events as internal, stable, and global.
As a result of these beliefs, people with an optimistic explanatory style persist despite set-
backs and achieve more at school, in athletic competitions, and on the job, compared to people
with a more pessimistic explanatory style. An optimistic explanatory style is related to better
physical and psychological health; a pessimistic explanatory style is a risk factor for depression
and loneliness. Like locus of control, there appear to be cultural differences in explanatory
style: people living in collectivistic cultures tend to be more pessimistic than people living in
individualistic cultures. Explanatory style can be measured through questionnaires or through
a content analysis of people’s words.
Much of the research on locus of control, explanatory styles, and how people cope with
adversity comes from field studies and natural manipulations. Researchers may study people
outside the laboratory and often in real-world predicaments to see how they cope with heart
disease, cancer, tuberculosis, hurricanes, unemployment, and other tragedies that cannot be
308 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality

purposely manipulated or controlled, and where participants cannot be randomly assigned to

condition. Researchers will turn to quasi-experimental designs when a true experiment cannot
be done for ethical or practical reasons. While a quasi-experimental design can suggest how
a potential cause and an effect may be related, it cannot prove cause and effect the way a true
experiment can.
Finally, people can differ in their general expectations that things will get better or worse
for them in the future. Dispositional optimism, like locus of control and explanatory style, is
related to achievement and better physical and psychological health. When the going gets tough,
optimists have the coping skills and persistence to rise above their challenges and not give up.
Dispositional optimism is measured through questionnaires.
Throughout this chapter, the research evidence is strong and clear that our thoughts and
“When I started, I was like beliefs have a huge impact on how we experience life and cope with negative events: Optimists
Pessimistic Penny. I always fare better. The real good news of this chapter is that explanatory style and dispositional opti-
felt really crummy and mism can be changed either through cognitive behavioral therapy or special workshops that
thought that I always messed challenge automatic pessimistic thoughts and foster a more optimistic explanatory style or
even an online intervention conducted by a computer therapist, as we saw in the study that
things up . . . . The people
opened this chapter. These programs have successfully immunized children and adolescents
from Penn came to our
from depression and anxiety. If, according to the cognitive approach, you are what you think,
school and helped us be less then this chapter ought to give you something to reflect on. For, to paraphrase the words of
gloomy all the time.” Thomas Paine, “The real optimist smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows
Seligman (1975, p. 129) brave by reflection.”

Review Questions
1. Describe the Seligman et al. (2005) online study where participants went through 1 of 6
possible interventions for depression. Which two treatments were the most effective?
2. What is locus of control? How is it measured? What are some important differences
between people who are more external or more internal in their locus of control when
it comes to achievement, work behavior, physical and psychological health, and social
behavior? Are there cultural differences in locus of control? Have American college students
changed in locus of control over time?
3. What is learned helplessness? Describe the Seligman and Maier (1967) triadic design study
where some dogs failed to learn how to escape shocks. What happens to humans who are
placed in a similar situation? What is the hopelessness model of depression?
4. What is explanatory style? What three dimensions determine a person’s explanatory style?
What kind of attributions do people with an optimistic explanatory style make? What kind
of attributions do people with a pessimistic explanatory style make? In what two ways is
explanatory style measured? What are some important differences between people who are
more optimistic or more pessimistic in their explanatory style when it comes to achieve-
ment in school and athletics, work behavior, physical and psychological health, and social
behavior? Are there cultural differences in explanatory style?
5. What is a field study? What are some advantages and trade-offs of field research?
6. What is dispositional optimism? How is it measured? Why do people high in dispositional
optimism cope better with major life events?
7. Is it possible to train people to think more optimistically?

Key Terms
Field-dependent Illusion of control Learned helplessness
Field-independent Primary control Yoking
Locus of control Secondary control Triadic design
 Chapter 10 Cognitive Foundations of Personality 309

Hopelessness model Stable versus unstable Quasi-experimental design

of depression Global versus specific Dispositional optimism
Explanatory style Attributional Style Problem-focused coping
Pessimistic explanatory style Questionnaire (ASQ) Emotion-focused coping
Optimistic explanatory style CAVE technique Avoidant coping
Internal versus external Field studies Double-blind technique
This page intentionally left blank
CHAPTER
11 GENDER
AND PERSONALITY
BELIEFS ABOUT PERSONALITY SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN
RESEARCH METHODS ILLUSTRATED: EFFECT SIZE AND META-ANALYSIS
PERSONALITY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN: FACT OR FICTION?
Gender Similarities and Differences in the Five-Factor Model
Gender Differences in Other Aspects of Personality and Social Behavior
Aggression
Risk Taking
Gender Differences? It Depends
Empathy
Emotions
Anxiety
Helping Behavior
Leadership
Influenceability
Self-Esteem and Self-Confidence
WHAT CAUSES GENDER DIFFERENCES?
Evolution
Social Context
Social Role Theory
Social Construction
Biopsychosocial Model
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: GENDERED BELIEFS ABOUT PERSONALITY:
Read the Chapter on WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?
mysearchlab.com THEN AND NOW: DEFINITION AND ASSESSMENT OF GENDER
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS

311
312 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

I
magine that you woke up tomorrow morning as a person of the other sex. What would
be different in your life? Would you dress differently? Would you be friends with the same
people? Would you have the same college major? Hairstyle? Would you still be the same
person inside? Would you have the same personality?
This is the basic question of this chapter: How does gender—including genetics and physi-
ology as well as cultural and societal expectations—make us who we are? Or, to put it differ-
ently, if we view personality as a consistent way of behaving, are men and women consistent
in behaving differently? Certainly, there are biological and physical differences between men
and women, but are there psychological differences as well? Are these gender differences real
or in the eye of the beholder? If real, where do these differences come from? Are they a result
of biological and evolutionary forces that are resistant to change or are they a result of social
and cultural forces that can change?
To illustrate why gender differences and where they come from are important take, for
example, a commonly held belief that men are better than women at mathematics. This turns
THINK ABOUT IT out to be a myth, something we’ll explore in more depth later in this chapter. However, it is
true that men are better than women when it comes to one type of mathematical ability: spatial
Are gender differences in reasoning. In fact, the difference between men and women on mental rotation, one aspect of
mathematics more innate
or more learned?
spatial reasoning where participants have to mentally rotate a figure (see Figure 11.1), is one of
the largest gender differences in cognitive ability.
Where does this gender difference in mental rotation come from? Given that differ-
ences in mental rotation can be seen in infants as young as 3 to 5 months of age (Moore
& Johnson, 2008; Quinn & Liben, 2008), psychologists assume that this difference was
somehow hard-wired into the biology of men and women as a result of our evolution.
After all, it takes more visual spatial ability to judge the distance of a quarry and to gauge
how fast and how far to throw a weapon to take down a potential meal than is involved in
the birthing and raising of children. Are differences in spatial rotation a legacy of how men
and women have evolved?
Until recently, this is what many people thought. However, researchers gave undergradu-
ate men and women 10 hours of training on either a 3-D puzzle video game or a 3-D action
video game that required them to aim and shoot at targets (Feng, Spence, & Pratt, 2007). As
a result of the training, not only did participants get better at their respective games, as you
would imagine, but those who played the action game (but not the puzzle game) improved
their performance on a mental rotation task. Surprisingly, women benefited more from the
training than did men. Even more impressive, the difference in mental rotation abilities between
men and women—something once thought to be an innate gender difference and impossible
to change—was greatly reduced so that women who trained on the action game caught up to
the spatial ability level of the average man without this special training (see Figure 11.2). These
results suggest that some gender differences that were once thought to be fixed may actually
be changeable as a result of life experiences, opportunities, preferences (girls generally do not
enjoy playing action video games), or expectations, rather than set in stone and due to innate
differences. The catch is that we can’t always know which kind of gender difference—inborn
or socialized—we are dealing with!

Figure 11.1 A sample mental rotation task. Participants choose

which two of the four pictures shown on the right portrayed
an object identical to the one shown on the left, when
rotated. Source: Feng et al. (2007, Figure 1b, p. 851). Reprinted
from Feng, J., Spence, I., & Pratt, J. (2007),“Playing an action
video game reduces gender differences in spatial cognition,”
Psychological Science, 18(10), 850–855. Used with permission.
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 313

Some gender differences,

such as spatial rotation
abilities, once thought to be
evolutionarily programmed
can be eliminated with
certain opportunities and
experiences.

In this chapter we consider the question: Are there personality differences between men “People do not have to be the
and women? To answer this question, we attempt to sort out facts from fiction about actual same to be equal.”
gender differences, evaluate the size of gender differences, debate where these gender differences Psychologist Diane Halpern (2004),
might come from, consider the impact of gender beliefs, and take a look at how the definition researcher on gender differences in
and assessment of gender has changed through the years. cognitive abilities

Beliefs About Personality Similarities THINK ABOUT IT

Do you think that men
and Differences Between Men and Women and women have different
personalities?
According to some psychologists, the American majority culture is so taken with gender dif-
ferences that differences between
Action Game Puzzle Game
men and women are seen as large,
unchangeable, present from birth
Percentage of Correct Responses

M
(if not sooner), and part of the
very essence of what it means to be
a man or a woman (Zurbriggen & 3
F M
Sherman, 2007).
We tend to believe that men and
women differ in personality, social
roles, physical attributes (in addition 2 F
to the obvious reproductive ones),
Training

Training

emotional experience and expres-

sion, and even the way we think (see
Table 11.1). Beliefs about what men Pre Post 5 Months Pre Post 5 Months
and women are like are remarkably
stable and consistent across many Figure 11.2 Performance on a mental rotation task
cultures, both in the United States after training with an action video game (left panel) or
and abroad: Women are believed to nonaction puzzle video game (right panel). Means are
be more concerned with nurturing shown for males (M) and females (F) before training
(“Pre”), after training (“Post”), and 5 months after training
whereas men are more concerned
ended. Source: Adapted from Feng et al. (2007, Figure
with actions and accomplishments 3, p. 853) Feng, J., Spence, I., & Pratt, J. (2007), “Playing
(Kite, Deaux, & Haines, 2008; Wil- an action video game reduces gender differences in
liams & Best, 1990). spatial cognition,” Psychological Science, 18(10), 850–855.
Men and women are also Copyright © 2007 by Sage Publications. Reprinted by
believed to pursue different careers permission of Sage Publications.
314 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Table 11.1 Traditional Stereotypes of Males and Females

Category: Men Are: Women Are:
Agentic and Instrumental Expressive and Communal
Personality active, competitive, independent, self-confident emotional, gentle, understanding, devoted
Social Roles leaders, financial providers, head of households caregivers, provide emotional support,
homemakers
Physical Attributes athletic, brawny, broad-shouldered, physically strong dainty, pretty, soft-voiced, graceful
Emotional Experience anger, pride more emotionally expressive, experience a
wider range of all other emotions
Cognition good at abstract thinking, problem solving good at verbal reasoning, artistic
Source: From Kite et al. (2008).

as well as hobbies and favorite activities (Twenge, 1999). Traditional masculine occupations
include auto mechanic, carpenter, jet pilot, and civil engineer. Traditional feminine occupa-
tions include nurse, art teacher, and social worker. Men are presumed to spend their free time
working on computers or playing chess; women shopping.
Overall, these beliefs suggest that women are concerned with other people and the social
group, being interdependent, and feeling connected with others and with the group. In contrast,
men focus on the individual and feelings of self-protection and self-assertion. These contrasting
ways of approaching the social world have been called communion and agency (Bakan, 1966)
and reflect traditional feminine and masculine socialization (Eisenberg & Lennon, 1983).
No doubt you recognize these as stereotypes of what men and women are like. A stereotype
is a generalization about a group of people, in this case men or women, in which attributes are
assumed to be true of all members of the group regardless of the actual variation among group
members (Aronson, Wilson, & Akert, 2001). Gender stereotypes describe traits and behaviors
that people believe occur more frequently in one gender or the other (Best & Williams, 2001).
They describe what men and women are like as well as what they should be like (Kite et al.,
2008). Often, these stereotypes reinforce traditional sex roles (Best & Williams, 2001).
Is there any truth to these beliefs? We know what “people” and the media say, but what
does the psychological research say about differences in personality between men and
women? Luckily, gender and gender differences are among one of the most studied topics in
psychology. To compare findings across studies we will need to understand something called
effect size.

A young Indian couple during

their wedding ceremony.
Gender stereotypes are
amazingly similar around the
world, but is there any truth
to them?
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 315

Research Methods Illustrated: Effect Size and Meta-Analysis

S
ay that you are making salsa (Doherty, 2004). You will need tomatoes, peppers, onions, cilantro,
lime juice, salt, and perhaps a few other ingredients. But suppose you are in the middle of
preparations for a dinner party and discover that you are out of lime juice. With guests due
in 15 minutes, would you quickly run to the store to get some or would you just go without? Many
cooks would just do without; after all, lime juice adds very little to the final flavor of salsa. However,
suppose you discovered that you forgot to buy tomatoes. Can you make salsa without tomatoes?
No way! It just wouldn’t be salsa without the tomatoes.
This analogy can help us understand the concept of effect size (Cohen, 1988). Just as how
tomatoes and lime juice each have a different impact on the final flavor of salsa, effect size tells us
the impact or importance of a variable to the overall observed effect. Whereas significance tests,
such as a t-test or an ANOVA, tell us whether there is a significant difference in average scores
between men and women, for example, effect size tells us the size of that difference.
We can calculate the effect size within an individual experiment, but the real power comes
from conducting a meta-analysis (Hyde, 2005, 2007; Johnson & Boynton, 2008; Ozer, 2007;
Roberts, Kuncel, & Viechtbauer, 2007). Here, researchers combine the individual results of different
experiments to calculate an estimate of how large an effect is across many different participants,
samples, experimenters, methods, and measures. Meta-analysis and effect size can help us
understand just how large a gender difference is and to evaluate if the difference is real or if it is due
only to a particular sample or measure.
Effect size is estimated using the statistic d:
Mm - Mf
d =
s
where Mm is the average score for males and Mf is the average score for females and s is the average
standard deviation of the male and female scores (Hyde, 2004, p. 93). You can see from this formula
that when males score higher than females on average, then d will be positive. When females score
higher than males on average, then d will be negative. When there is no significant difference
between the genders on this variable, then d will be close to zero (see Table 11.2).
Figure 11.3 graphically illustrates various effect sizes. As you can see in the left part of
Figure 11.3, when an effect size is small there is huge overlap in the distributions of the scores of
men and women. Even though a small difference between men and women may be statistically
significant, it does not necessarily have practical significance. A d of 0.2 is often too small to be
noticeable in everyday life and would be only detectable in a controlled research study with lots of
participants. By the same logic, a moderate difference of 0.5, the middle graph in Figure 11.3, will
probably be noticeable in everyday life. When differences reach 0.8 or greater people are generally
already aware of the difference between men and women on this variable (see the right graph in
Figure 11.3; Lippa, 2005a).
That men and women differ on some characteristic is not nearly as important as
understanding the size of that difference. After all, people vary across all sorts of variables. The
formula for d expresses the difference between the averages of two groups in relation to the
amount of variability in each distribution. This means that where there is a lot of variation in a
characteristic among individuals (e.g., height) it will take a larger difference between men and
women to make a significant gender difference. But where people don’t vary so much (e.g., scores
on a 1 to 7 scale) smaller
differences in averages can be
significant. When doing a meta-
Table 11.2 Meta-Analysis: How Large a Difference?
analysis we are trying to see
Range of d Size of Effect
if—on average—there is more
variation between the genders - 0.1 to 0 and 0 to +0.1 Trivial
than among individuals within a -0.11 to -0.35 and +0.11 to +0.35 Small
gender.
- 0.36 to -0.65 and +0.36 to +0.65 Medium
Consider Figure 11.4, which
shows the distribution of spatial - 0.66 to -01.0 and +0.66 to +1.0 Large
ability scores in men and women. Greater than 1.0 Very large
Is the difference between
the genders greater than the Note: Positive numbers mean males scored higher than females. Negative
difference within a gender? As numbers mean females scored higher than males.
you can see, the average of the Source: Effect size interpretations from Hyde (2007), after Cohen (1988).
316 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Number of Cases

Score Score Score

(a) d = 0.2 (small) (b) d = 0.5 (medium) (c) d = 0.8 (large)

Figure 11.3 A graphic illustration of small, moderate, and large effect sizes. For example, a small difference, d = 0.2,
is the difference between men and women in self-esteem (left). A medium difference, d = 0.5, is the difference
between boys and girls in activity level (middle). A large difference, d = 0.8, is a bit larger than the difference
between men and women in knowledge of sports (right). Notice that in all cases there is substantial overlap between
the curves. Source: Lippa (2005a, Figure 14, p. 8). Lippa, R. A. (2005). Gender, nature, and nurture. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum and Associates.

men is greater than the average of the women, but there is substantial overlap between the two
curves. The area that is shaded represents those women who scored higher than the average man,
which is about 23% of the women. So even though there is a large gender difference, it does not
mean that every man scored higher than every woman on this variable.
Like any type of review, a meta-analysis is only as good as the data that go into it. Ideally,
researchers should identify and compile all of the studies ever conducted on a topic. As a general
rule, the larger the number of studies that are combined into an effect size estimate—especially
of different experimenters and various methods—the better our estimate of the true gender
difference will be. However, if all of the studies that went into a meta-analysis used the same
dependent variable then the resulting effect size estimate may have limited generalizability and
not apply to other measures. Researchers will often include a table describing all of the studies
they combined into their effect size estimate, including the methods, measures, sample size, age,
gender, and so on of each one. This allows researchers to generate and test specific hypotheses
about what might account for an observed gender difference.
Finally, keep in mind that one-item measures, such as willingness to help or conformity
as measured in many experiments on social behavior, may underestimate the true effect size
(Lippa, 2005a). To the extent possible, this chapter reviews the findings on gender similarities and
differences based on meta-analyses and review articles and not on single studies.
Now that you are familiar with effect size, we can evaluate just how large—and how
important—gender differences are compared to individual differences (see Table 11.2). Because of
variability in individual differences there will always be some overlap in the distributions of men

Figure 11.4 The distribution 60

of scores of males and females
on a test of spatial ability.
The difference between the
two curves represents a large
gender difference: d = 0.73.
40

20

0 70 85 100 115 130

 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 317

and women. That’s why our estimate of effect size d is calculated as a ratio of difference between
genders compared to individual variability within a gender. For every single personality variable that
was been studied, there is overlap in the distributions of scores of men and women. Just how much
overlap? Read on to find out!

“[M]en and women are

Personality Differences Between Men especially alike in their
beliefs about their own
and Women: Fact or Fiction? differences. To the extent
Men and women are thought to be different in social behavior, physical attributes, emotional that males and females
experiences, cognition, occupations, interests, moral reasoning, sexual behavior, and person- share expectations regarding
ality, but are we really? We can attempt to answer this question by considering the size of intrapsychic and behavioral
gender differences, the consistency of these differences, and possible interpretations of these
differences between the
differences.
In a very careful and strict summary of meta-analytic research on gender differences, sexes, the expression of such
including some very extensive national studies, Janet Hyde (2007) found that 78% of the effects differences constitutes a sex
reported were small (48%) or nonsignificant (30%). To give you a sense of what the research similarity.”
she reviewed looked like, consider Table 11.3. Rhoda K. Unger (1979, p. 1086)

Table 11.3 Summary of Meta-Analyses of Gender Differences

Variable Type of Variable % Non-overlap d Effect Size
Height (2.60) Physical 2.6
2.5
2.4
2.3
Throwing velocity (2.18) Physical 81.1% 2.2
2.1
Throwing distance (2.0) Physical 2.0
1.9 Very Large
1.8
1.7
1.6
1.5
1.4
People–things dimension (1.35) Occupations 1.3
1.2
1.1
Desire realistic occupation (1.06) Occupation 55.4 1.0
Technology knowledge (1.04) Interests
Electronics knowledge (0.98) Interests
Throwing accuracy (0.96) Physical 51.6 0.9
Masturbation (0.96) Sexuality Large
Number of ideal partners in a lifetime (0.87) Sexuality
Aggression measured by projective tests (0.86) Social behavior 47.4 0.8
Aggression measured by fantasy (0.84) Social behavior
Attitude toward sex in a casual relationship (0.81) Sexuality
Sports knowledge (0.75) Interests 43 0.7
Mental rotation (0.73) Cognitive

(Continued)
318 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Table 11.3 (Continued)

Variable Type of Variable % Non-overlap d Effect Size
Extraversion: assertiveness (0.67) Personality
Grip strength (0.66) Physical 38.2 0.6
Jealousy over sexual vs. emotional infidelity (0.64) Social behavior
Aggression measured by peer reports (0.63) Social behavior
Aggression, physical (0.60) Temperament Medium
Science knowledge (0.58) Interests
Desire physical attractiveness in mate (0.54) Sexuality
Knowledge of general information (0.51) Interests 33 0.5
Activity (0.5) Social behavior
Attitude toward sex in a committed relationship (0.49) Sexuality
Spatial perception (0.44) Cognitive 27.4 0.4
Attitudes toward sex when engaged (0.43) Sexuality
Aggression measured by self-reports (0.40) Social behavior
SAT math (earlier than 2004) (0.39) Cognitive
Arousal to erotic material (college students) (0.38) Sexuality
Surgency (0.38) Temperament
Helping behavior (0.34) Social behavior
Self-esteem at ages 15–18 (0.33) Personality 21.3 0.3
Activity (0.33) Temperament
Homosexuality (0.33) Sexuality
SAT math (2004) (0.31) Cognitive
Arousal to erotic material (0.31) Sexuality
High-intensity fun (0.30) Temperament Small
Number of sexual partners (0.25) Sexuality
Self-esteem at ages 11–14 (0.23) Personality 14.7 0.2
Self-esteem (overall) (0.21) Personality
Empathy (less than 0.20) Social behavior
Justice reasoning (0.19) Moral reasoning
Self-esteem at ages 19–22 (0.18) Personality
Self-esteem at ages 7–10 (0.16) Personality 7.7 0.1
Mathematics (0.16) Cognitive
Spatial visualization (0.13) Cognitive
Self-esteem at ages 23–59 (0.10) Personality
SAT verbal (0.06) Cognitive
Desire for conventional occupations (0.06) Occupations
Extraversion: activity (0.01) Personality
Openness: intellect/ideas (0.00) Personality
Pride frequency (ns) Emotion
Pride intensity (ns) Emotion
Guilt frequency (ns) Emotion
Ideas-data dimension (ns) Occupations
Literature knowledge (ns) Interests
Business knowledge (ns) Interests
Arts knowledge (ns) Interests
Leadership effectiveness (0.03) Social behavior 0 0.0 Trivial
Self-esteem at age 60 + (- 0.03) Personality
Balance (- 0.09) Physical
GPA (- 0.04) Cognitive
Arousal to erotic material (adults) (- 0.04) Sexuality
Anger frequency (- 0.05) Emotion
Sexual satisfaction (- 0.06) Sexuality
Extraversion: gregariousness (- 0.06) Personality
Guilt intensity (- 0.07) Emotion
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 319

Table 11.3 (Continued)

Variable Type of Variable % Non-overlap d Effect Size
Openness (- 0.07) Personality
Reading comprehension (- 0.09) Cognitive
Neuroticism: impulsiveness (- 0.10) Personality
Verbal ability (in studies done after 1973) (- 0.10) Cognitive
Verbal ability (- 0.11) Cognitive
Fearfulness (- 0.12) Temperament 7.7
Conscientiousness: order (- 0.12) Personality
Contentment frequency (- 0.13) Emotion
Negative emotions frequency (- 0.14) Emotion
Anger intensity (- 0.14) Emotion
Conscientiousness (- 0.14) Personality
Extraversion (- 0.15) Personality
-0.1 Small
Joy frequency (- 0.16) Emotion
Sadness frequency (- 0.16) Emotion
Symptoms of depression (- 0.16) Emotion
Fear frequency (- 0.17) Emotion
Contentment intensity (- 0.18) Emotion
Self-disclosure Social behavior
Positive emotions frequency (- 0.20) Emotion 14.7
Democratic leadership (- 0.22) Social behavior
Agreeableness: trust (- 0.22) Personality
Positive emotions intensity (- 0.23) Emotion
Verbal ability (in studies before 1973) (- 0.23) Cognitive
Influenceability (- 0.26) Social behavior
Joy intensity (- 0.26) Emotion
Fear intensity (- 0.26) Emotion -0.2
Affection intensity (- 0.25) Emotion
Negative emotions intensity (- 0.25) Emotion
Neuroticism: anxiety (- 0.25) Personality
Care reasoning (- 0.28) Moral reasoning
Sadness intensity (- 0.28) Emotion
Affection frequency (- 0.30) Emotion 21.3 -0.3
Agreeableness (- 0.32) Personality
Conformity in the Asch paradigm (- 0.32) Social behavior
Medical knowledge (- 0.32) Interests Medium
Perceptual sensitivity (- 0.38) Temperament 27.4 -0.4
Smiling (- 0.40) Social behavior
Food and cooking knowledge (0.48) Interests
Emotional stability (- 0.49) Personality
33 -0.5
Desire for social occupation (- 0.62) Occupation 38.2 -0.6
Desire for artistic occupation (- 0.63) Occupation
Desire ambitiousness in mate (- 0.67) Sexuality
Desire status in mate (- 0.69) Sexuality
43 -0.7
47.4 -0.8
Agreeableness: tender-mindedness (- 0.92) Personality 51.6 -0.9 Large
55.4 -1.0
Key:
d = The average difference between males and females in standard deviation units.
+ Positive numbers mean that males score higher than females on this variable.
- Negative numbers mean that females score higher than males on this variable.
Source: Compiled from various sources.
320 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Table 11.3 summarizes the results of many meta-analyses (e.g., Feingold, 1992, 1994;
Hyde, 2005, 2007; Lippa, 2005a, 2007) including some not reviewed by Hyde (2005, 2007).
The first column lists the variable and gives the exact effect size d in parentheses. The second
column classifies that variable into type of variable (e.g., social behavior, physical attributes,
emotional experiences, cognition, occupations, interests, moral reasoning, sexual behavior,
and personality). The third column lists the percentage of overlap between the distribution
THINK ABOUT IT of males and females on that variable. The fourth column lists the effect size (d) of the
difference between males and females. The last column groups effect sizes by size: trivial,
What personality character- small, medium, large, and very large according to the guidelines used by Hyde (2007; see
istics do you think men and
women differ the most in?
Table 11.2).
The least in? There are a number of things to notice about Table 11.3. First, and most obvious, is that
there are many characteristics that have been studied! This table represents the results of over
1,500 studies compiled into a single table by effect size. Can you think of any characteristic
that is missing from this table? Second, how large are the vast majority of these effects? As you
can see, almost half of the effects are trivial. In fact, if you were to eliminate the small and non-
significant correlations from the table, that would eliminate the vast majority of effects. What
kinds of variables are represented among these trivial effects?
Next, take a close look at the categories that are represented at the extreme of large and
very large effects. Be sure to look at both ends where women score higher than men (the
negative numbers) and where men score higher than women (the positive numbers). What
kinds of variables account for the largest differences? Finally, even where there are significant
differences, remember to consider the percentage overlap between men and women. For many
of these variables, there is considerable overlap in the performances of men and women.
Table 11.3 doesn’t claim to represent every single study that has ever been done, but
it does summarize some of the major meta-analyses that have been conducted by psy-
chologists. The results of the many effect size analyses summarized here suggest that men
and women are the most different when it comes to physical attributes such as height and
strength (Easton & Enns, 1986; Thomas & French, 1985); some aspects of sexuality (Oliver
& Hyde, 1993; Petersen & Hyde, 2010), such as reported pornography use, frequency of
masturbation, and attitudes toward casual sex; and qualities desired in a potential mate
(Feingold, 1992; Sprecher, Sullivan, & Hatfield, 1994). The largest gender differences in
personality and social behavior between men and women parallel the largest sex differences
between males and females.
Men and women differ in ways you might expect and yet are similar in ways you might
not. Table 11.4 highlights some of these interesting effects. As you can see here and in
Table 11.3 there are effect size differences between men and women in occupational prefer-
ences. Men prefer realistic occupations more so than women. These occupations involve
working with machines, equipment, and inanimate objects. Instead, women prefer people-
oriented occupations that involve managing and interacting with other people. There are
no gender differences in preference for occupations that require creative thought and intel-
lectual effort; routine data-oriented occupations; or conventional occupations that involve
following set procedures and routines such as office manager and secretarial positions
THINK ABOUT IT (Lippa, 2005a).
There is also no gender difference in general intelligence (Halpern, 2000; Halpern &
Do you find any of these
LaMay, 2000), but there are some differences on specific types of mental abilities. Though
results surprising? Why?
traditionally people think that women show greater verbal ability than men, the difference
is rather trivial (d = -0.11) and has been narrowing over time (Hyde & Linn, 1988). Simi-
larly, there is no gender difference in mathematical ability (d = -0.05) (Hedges & Nowell,
1995; Hyde, Fennema, & Lamon, 1990). However, there is a slight (d = 0.12) difference in
performance on word problems (Hyde & Linn, 2006). But as you can see in Figure 11.5, the
far greater problem is that both American boys and girls lag far behind children in other
countries in mathematics performance! Globally, girls and boys show comparable perfor-
mance in mathematics in wealthier countries where women are better educated, and hold
a proportional share of seats in parliament and in research positions (Else-Quest, Hyde, &
Linn, 2010).
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 321

Table 11.4 Yes, No, Maybe So?: Gender Similarities and Differences in Personality and Social Behavior
There are no gender differences in these characteristics
Neuroticism: impulsiveness
Extraversion
Extraversion: gregariousness
Extraversion: activity
Openness
Openness: intellect
Conscientiousness
Conscientiousness: order
General Intelligence
Mathematics ability
Verbal ability
Leadership effectiveness
Self-confidence
There Are Gender Differences in These Characteristics
Agreeableness: sympathy
Extraversion: assertiveness
Sexuality
Nonverbal behavior
Aggressiveness
Risk taking
Occupational preferences
Mental disorders
Leadership style
There May Be Gender Differences in These Characteristics
Empathy
Emotions
Anxiety
Helping behavior
Influenceability
Self-esteem
Spatial ability

However, as we discussed earlier, there are slight differences in spatial ability (Linn &
Petersen, 1985; Voyer, Voyer, & Bryden, 1995). When it comes to spatial visualization, like find-
ing hidden figures in a picture, there is a small difference between men and women (d = 0.13;
Linn & Petersen, 1985). But there are large gender differences in spatial perception of true verti-
cal or horizontal (d = 0.44; Linn & Petersen, 1985) and mental rotation (d = 0.73 according
to Linn & Petersen, 1985, but 0.56 according to Voyer et al., 1995). Figure 11.5 Cross-national
and gender differences in math.
20 Differences in fifth-graders’
performance on word problems
are larger between countries
15 than between genders. Boys’
scores are shown in orange;
Math Score

girls’ scores are shown in

10 yellow. Source: Hyde and Linn
(2006, p. 600). Reprinted with
permission from Hyde, J. S.,
5
& Linn, M. C. (2006), “Gender
similarities in mathematics and
0 science,” Science, 314(5799),
U.S. Taiwan Japan 599–600. Permission conveyed
through the Copyright
Boys Girls Clearance Center.
322 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

When it comes to mental disorders, there seem to be some differences in the number of
males and females affected depending on the disorder (Hartung & Widiger, 1998). Substance-
related disorders (e.g., alcohol, drugs), childhood disorders (e.g., mental retardation, reading
disorders, autism), and sexual and gender identity disorders (e.g., sexual masochism, fetish-
ism, pedophilia) are more frequent among men than women. However, mood disorders (e.g.,
panic disorders, bipolar disorder, anorexia and bulimia), and depression (Nolen-Hoeksema
& Hilt, 2009) are more frequent among women. Some personality disorders (e.g., schizotypal
personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, compul-
sive personality disorder) occur more among men whereas others (e.g., borderline personality
disorder, histrionic personality disorder) occur more among women.
Although interesting, none of these characteristics are, strictly speaking, personality. Are
there differences in the personality of men and women? Let us turn now to a discussion of some
of the differences in personality and social behavior.

Gender Similarities and Differences in the Five-Factor Model

That men and women differ in sexuality and physical attributes is not surprising, given the dif-
fering reproductive roles of males and females. What is surprising to most people is the number
of similarities between men and women in personality (Hyde, 2005, 2007). Take the traits of
the five factors (see Table 11.5). This table includes data from an extensive study of observer
ratings of personality in 50 cultures, including the United States, using the NEO Personality
Inventory—Revised (NEO-PI-R; Costa & McCrae, 1992). Neuroticism shows the largest gen-
der difference, with women averaging higher Neuroticism scores than men across all samples.
Openness shows the smallest difference, where the genders are virtually identical. Across all
cultures, women tend to be only slightly higher than men in Conscientiousness, Extraversion,
and Agreeableness.

Table 11.5 Gender Similarities and Differences in The Five-Factor Model

Factor and Facets: d Trivial Small Medium Large
Neuroticism -0.49 ¸
Anxiety -0.25 ¸
Impulsiveness -0.10 ¸
Extraversion - 0.15 ¸
Gregariousness - 0.06 ¸
Assertiveness 0.67 ¸
Activity 0.01 ¸
Openness - 0.07 ¸
Ideas 0.00 ¸
Agreeableness -0.32 ¸
Trust - 0.22 ¸
Tender-Mindedness -0.92 ¸
Conscientiousness -0.14 ¸
Order - 0.12 ¸
Note: Meta-analysis of the five-factor model from observer ratings of the NEO-PI-R in adults from 50 cultures (N = 10,690;
Meta-analysis of the facets from self-ratings combined across 4–8 different personality tests in 8 samples of U.S. Adults
(N = 19,546; Feingold, 1994). Positive numbers mean males scored higher than females. Negative numbers mean females
scored higher than males. Sources: Feingold (1994); McCrae et al. (2005a).
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 323

Recall our caveat that when it comes to effect size estimates multiple measures give the
most generalizable estimate. Whereas this study looking at the five-factor model in 50 cultures
included thousands of participants, all participants were measured using the same dependent
variable. What evidence do we have that these gender differences are not somehow due to
something about the NEO-PI-R questionnaire?
An earlier meta-analysis looked at possible differences in the five-factor model by summing
results from many personality questionnaires including the NEO-PI-R, the revised Eysenck
Personality Inventory, and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI; Hathaway
& McKinley, 1940), which were given to various samples of adults (see Table 11.5). Because
each test measured different aspects of personality, the researchers were able to calculate effect
sizes for only those variables of the five-factor model that were measured on more than one THINK ABOUT IT
personality test. This limits the conclusions we can draw—data comparing men and women
on all of the facets is frustratingly absent—but the effect estimates are more reliable and have Where might gender differ-
ences in assertiveness and
greater generalizability.
tender-mindedness come
As Table 11.5 shows, there are large differences in the facets of assertiveness (men score from?
higher) and tender-mindedness (women score higher). Further, there are only small differ-
ences in anxiety, trust, and order, with women scoring higher in all three facets than men. The
remaining facets that have been studied with multiple measures—impulsiveness, gregarious-
ness, activity, and openness to ideas—show only trivial differences. The bottom line: When it
comes to personality, men and women are more similar than different (Hyde, 2005).

Gender Differences in Other Aspects of Personality

and Social Behavior
Aggression. One of the most consistent findings, both within the United States and in
other countries, is that men are more aggressive than women (Archer, 2004; Bettencourt
& Miller, 1996; Eagly & Steffen, 1986; Hyde, 1984, 1986; Knight, Fabes, & Higgins, 1996;
Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974). However, recall that one of the benefits of meta-analysis is that
if the sample and range of studies is large enough we can test specific hypotheses. It turns THINK ABOUT IT
out that men are more physically aggressive than women (d = 0.40), but only slightly more Why do men and women
verbally aggressive (d = 0.18; Eagly & Steffen, 1986)—unless women have been directly show no difference in
threatened. Then there is no difference in aggression between men and women (Bettencourt aggression when provoked
& Miller, 1996). but a medium difference in
unprovoked aggression?
Bettencourt and Miller (1996) found that gender differences are most apparent under
experimental conditions of unprovoked aggression (d = 0.43) but disappear when people have
been directly threatened (d = 0.06; Bettencourt & Miller, 1996). Overall, men are more likely
than women to resort to physical aggression whether provoked (d = 0.21), or not (d = 0.48).
But when provoked, women are slightly more likely than men to respond with verbal aggres-
sion (d = -0.11). What kinds of situations do people find threatening enough to respond with
physical or verbal aggression? Men and women respond equally aggressively to a physical attack,
an insult, or a negative evaluation. Men are more likely than women to respond aggressively to
frustration (d = 0.17) or an insult about their intelligence (d = 0.59).
Most of these studies focused on aggression in the laboratory, when experimental par-
ticipants are no doubt on their best behavior. In fact, the gender difference in aggression
is even larger than these early meta-analyses suggested according to a more recent meta-
analysis of field studies conducted in the United States and nine other countries including
India, Japan, Australia, and Canada (Archer, 2004). Men were indeed more aggressive than
women in physical and verbal aggression, with ds for overall aggression ranging from 0.42
to 0.57 across peer, teacher, observer, and self-reports. Gender differences across all kinds
of aggression were the greatest during young adulthood, ages 18 to 22 (d = 0.66) and then
decreased with age. Men were particularly higher than women in physical aggression, rang-
ing from a low of 0.39 for self-reports to a high of 0.84 for observer reports. However, dur-
ing late childhood and adolescence, girls engaged in more indirect or relational aggression
324 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

than boys (d = -0.74). Observational studies found that girls were more likely than boys
to purposely hurt others by rejecting or excluding them, turning others against them, or
spreading gossip about them.
In sum, the evidence across multiple meta-analyses, ages, cultures, types of aggression, and
conditions of aggression is that boys and men are more aggressive than girls and women. This
gender difference plays out daily where men are more often the perpetrators of violent crime
than women are, both in the United States and in other countries (Daly & Wilson, 1988). This
is not to say that all men are aggressive or that all men are more aggressive than all women.
As Lippa (2005a) noted, most people—regardless of their gender—do not assault or murder
others (Bussey & Bandura, 1999).

Risk Taking. Are there gender differences in risk taking? Men are higher in impulsive
sensation-seeking, like bungee jumping while on vacation (Zuckerman & Kuhlman, 2000),
but they are only slightly more likely than women (d = 0.13) to engage in risky behaviors
that may have undesirable or dangerous outcomes in their daily lives, like speeding or run-
ning yellow lights (Byrnes, Miller, & Schafer, 1999). The size of the gender difference in risk
taking depends on the context, the type of risk involved, and to some extent, age (Byrnes et
al., 1999). As you can see in Table 11.6, the effect sizes, although small to medium, consis-
tently show that men take more risks than women. Gender differences are the greatest in the
amount and kind of risky behaviors people have actually engaged in and least when it comes
to attitudes toward risky activities.
The largest gender differences occur for volunteering for experiments with a chance
of physical or psychological harm; engaging in games of physical skill under high stakes,
like shuffleboard or ring toss; and intellectual risk taking, where one’s lack of skill might be
uncovered. Differences are smaller for self-reported risk taking while driving (e.g., damage
to one’s vehicle, physical injury, traffic tickets), gambling (playing chance games with little
or no skill involved), observed driving (e.g., making a left turn in front of oncoming traffic,
gliding through a stop sign rather than coming to a complete stop), and engaging in physical
activities that involve the potential for physical harm such as climbing a steep embankment,
playing in the street, trying out gymnastics equipment (e.g., a balance beam), and taking a ride
on an animal (e.g., a donkey). Gender differences are trivial for engagement in self-reported
risky behaviors like smoking, drinking, drug use, and sexual activities.

Table 11.6 Gender Differences in Risk Taking

Task Mean d Value Trivial Small Medium Large
Self-reported Behavior
Smoking - 0.02 ¸
Drinking/Drug use 0.04* ¸
Sexual Activities 0.07* ¸
Driving 0.29* ¸
Observed Behavior
Physical activity 0.16* ¸
Driving 0.17* ¸
Gambling 0.21* ¸
Risky experiment 0.41* ¸
Intellectual risk taking 0.40* ¸
Physical skills 0.43* ¸
Note: Positive numbers mean males scored higher than females. Negative numbers mean females scored higher than males.
Asterisks (*) indicate effects which are significantly different from zero. Source: Byrnes et al., (1999).
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 325

Men are more likely than

women to engage in risky
behaviors.

Even though there were significant gender differences across all age groups, from childhood
to adulthood, what was considered risky tended to vary by age. For example, men showed a
sharper increase in drinking and drug use from high school to college than women. Women
were more likely to smoke in college than men. Yet after college, the drinking and drug use of
women increased, surpassing that of men.
Another interesting gender difference is that boys and men tended to take more risks
even when it was a bad idea to do so. Girls and women tended toward the opposite: avoiding THINK ABOUT IT
risks even in situations where risk might have paid off, such as the intellectual risk taking
that is involved on practice SATs, for example. Byrnes et al. (1999) surmised that males may Why do you think these
gender differences in risky
encounter failure or other negative consequences more often than females, but the risk-averse
behaviors are lessening over
strategy of females may inadvertently hold girls and women back from achieving success in time?
many areas.
Finally, these gender differences in risky behaviors may be lessening over time. The mean
effect size for studies conducted from 1964 to 1980 (d = 0.20) was larger than for those con-
ducted from 1981 to 1997 (d = 0.13). Has this trend continued into the present day? That
question will have to wait for the next round of meta-analyses.

Gender Differences? It Depends

Let’s take a closer look at some of the gender differences in personality and social behavior.
When we say “it depends,” what does that mean?

Empathy. As we saw, one of the largest personality differences—in an area with many trivial
and small differences—is that women show more empathy and sympathy than do men. Tender- THINK ABOUT IT
mindedness, a facet of Agreeableness, shows the largest gender difference in all 50 cultures
studied to date, including the United States (d = -0.39 for observer ratings; d = -0.28 for What does it suggest when
men and women differ in
self-ratings; McCrae et al., 2005), and in a meta-analysis using various measures of tender-
self-reports but not in actual
mindedness (d = -0.92; Feingold, 1994). This would suggest that women are indeed more behavior?
empathic and sensitive to the plight of others than men are.
326 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

But this isn’t the whole story. These findings were all based on self-report measures of feel-
ings, rather than actual performance or accuracy in understanding another person’s emotions
(Feingold, 1994; McCrae et al., 2005).
In many studies of empathetic accuracy, participants view a videotaped interaction between
two people and try to identify what one of the people in the scenario is feeling. In some experi-
ments, participants estimate how accurate they think they were whereas in other experiments
responses are scored as correct or incorrect. According to one meta-analysis, women reported
greater accuracy at judging emotions than men did (d = -0.56). However, there was no dif-
ference between men and women in their actual performance (d = -0.04; Ickes, Gesn, &
Graham, 2000). The researchers surmised that women present themselves as more empathic
in self-reports than men do, perhaps in keeping with gender role stereotypes.
This finding echoes the results of an earlier meta-analysis looking at empathy across
many types of tasks including emotional responsiveness after hearing about or viewing pic-
tures of others, physiological measures, observation of facial expressions, tone of voice, and
self-reported empathy (e.g., “Seeing people cry upsets me”; Eisenberg & Lennon, 1983). The
researchers noted inconsistent results across the seven types of measures studied. However,
one clear effect emerged: Females showed more empathy than males on self-reports or other
measures obviously related to empathy, but there was no gender difference on unobtrusive
measures of empathy like facial expressions or physiological distress. Again, the pattern suggests
that there is a demand characteristic operating such that participants act differently—and in
line with gender roles—when they know that their empathy is being monitored (Eisenberg &
Lennon, 1983).
Women are also more likely to feel the emotions of people around them according to a
self-report measure of emotional contagion (Doherty, 1997). The scale included items such as
“If someone I’m talking with begins to cry, I get teary-eyed” or “I tense when overhearing an
angry quarrel.” Women reported that they felt the emotions of happiness, fear, anger, or sad-
ness while being around people who were experiencing these emotions more often than men
reported catching these emotions from others.
This greater responsiveness of women to what another person is feeling is reflected in
women’s greater nonverbal perceptiveness (Hall, 1978, 1984, 2006b). Women are better at read-
ing other people’s body language and facial expressions (d = -0.43) and recognizing faces
(d = -0.34). Women are also better at expressing emotions nonverbally (d = -0.52), par-
ticularly in the face (d = -1.01), and they engage in more eye contact when interacting with
others than men do (d = -0.68).

Emotions. Are women more emotional than men? Are men less emotional than women?
Gender differences in emotions depend more on cultural factors, situational influences, gen-
der role pressures, and the measures used rather than differences in the actual experience of

Men and women both feel

empathy for others; however,
men may be more reluctant
to show nonstereotypical
masculine behavior when
they know they are being
monitored.
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 327

emotion (e.g., Brody, 2000; Ickes et al., 2000; LaFrance & Banaji, 1992; Shields, 1995; Wester,
Vogel, Pressly, & Heesacker, 2002). The problem is compounded by the lack of a single measure
of emotion (LaFrance & Banaji, 1992). For example, researchers might measure emotional
intensity, frequency, duration, range, onset, accuracy, and congruence among different modes
of expression (e.g., body, face, voice, words, etc.; LaFrance & Banaji, 1992). Or, researchers might
use measures of experienced emotion, nonverbal expressions, or physiological reactions, which
each tap different aspects of emotional experience and expression. THINK ABOUT IT
For example, there are no gender differences in women’s and men’s physiological experi- Why might men and
ence of emotions. However, women report more emotion if asked directly, using self-reports, women differ in self-
about an emotion that is readily observable and that involves other people. Women also report reported emotional
more emotion if asked about general emotion rather than about a specific emotion (LaFrance experiences?
& Banaji, 1992).
Women report more intense feelings of sadness, depression, and being in a bad mood than
do men (Brody & Hall, 2008). Men report more intense feelings of pride, confidence, guilt, and
excitement than do women (Brody, 1993). Finally, gender differences in shame (Brody, 2000),
anger, contempt, guilt, and loneliness (Brody & Hall, 2008) are inconsistent, depending on the
situational context and the methods used.
These findings suggest that differences in men’s and women’s self-reported emotions
parallel gender role expectations. In keeping with the expectation that admitting vulnerability,
sadness, or self-consciousness is seen as unmanly, men report feeling negative emotions like
disgust, sadness, fear, anxiety, hurt, shame, and embarrassment less than women do (Brody,
1999, 2000). Similarly, women find it less appropriate to express any emotion that might
threaten a social relationship such as pride and lack of guilt or remorse. Instead, women feel
social pressure to express emotions that protect and foster relationships like warmth, support,
and cheerfulness (Brody, 2000). Is this truly a gender difference in the experience of emotion,
or have men and women internalized appropriate gender roles?
Women and men in many countries feel similar pressures to adhere to gender expectations
about emotional expression. In one study involving participants from 37 countries, women
reported expressing emotions more publicly, feeling emotions more intensely, and experienc-
ing emotions for a longer period of time, than men within their own culture did (Fischer &
Manstead, 2000).
How large are these differences? There is no easy way to say, as the methods and measures
vary greatly. In fact, no one has been able to conduct a meta-analysis combining individual
effects from across these varied studies. However, a more recent study of undergraduates in 41
countries did try to estimate the size of the gender difference in emotion (Brebner, 2003). They
asked participants how frequently and how intensely they felt four positive emotions (affection,
contentment, joy, pride) and four negative emotions (anger, fear, guilt, sadness).
To help interpret their results, the researchers calculated the effect size of the difference
between men and women in self-reported intensity and frequency of the eight emotions. Recall
that effect size summarizes multiple effects in the case of meta-analysis, or single effects, as in
the case of one study. We can compare the size of the effect in this study to other gender effects
discussed in this chapter.
As you can see in Table 11.7, the effects are in the trivial to small range (Brebner, 2003).
If anything, we would expect these effects based on self-reports to exaggerate the difference
between the genders in the experience of emotion (LaFrance & Banaji, 1992). Until more
research—and meta-analyses comparing effects across multiple methods and measures—is
conducted, we can safely conclude that gender differences in emotional experience may have
more to do with gender role expectations or experimental methods than a dispositional differ-
ence between men and women.

Anxiety. Which gender is more anxious? According to meta-analyses, women are more
anxious (d = -0.30). However, this is based on self-report (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974). Are
women really more anxious than men or are they just more willing to admit to being more
anxious—because it’s more socially acceptable for a woman to publicly admit vulnerability?
When researchers actually observe the reactions of men and women to stressful events there
328 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Table 11.7 Effect Sizes for Gender Differences in Emotions

Emotion Frequency Intensity
Positive Emotions -0.20 - 0.23
Affection - 0.30 -0.25
Joy -0.16 -0.26
Contentment -0.13 - 0.18
Pride ns ns
Negative Emotions - 0.14 -0.25
Fear -0.17 -0.26
Anger -0.05 - 0.14
Sadness - 0.16 - 0.28
Guilt ns - 0.07
Note: Positive numbers mean males scored higher than females; negative numbers mean females scored higher than males;
ns indicates that the difference between males and females was not significant.
Source: Brebner (2003).

SEE FOR YOURSELF are no gender differences in anxiety (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974). Other studies have shown that
men are actually more physiologically reactive than women, showing greater heart rate, skin
What image comes to mind conductance, and breathing when anxious (see Gottman, 1993, for a review).
when you picture a “hero”?

Helping Behavior. Meta-analyses show that, overall, men engage in more helping behavior
than women (d = 0.34), especially if onlookers are present and the participant knows that he
or she is being watched (d = 0.74; Eagly & Crowley, 1986). But if there are no witnesses, this
gender difference disappears (d = -0.02)! Consider, too, that men and women may not dif-
fer in the amount of helping but in the kind of helping they provide. Women are more often
the primary caregivers of children and elderly parents, but men are more often rescuers and
heroes, especially where conditions rely on physical strength (Eagly, 2009a; Eagly & Crowley,
1986). Women’s helping behavior is more communal, often taking place in close relationships,
whereas men’s is more agentic, taking place with strangers (e.g., bystander intervention), a
type of helping most often studied in social psychological experiments (Eagly, 2009a; Wood
& Eagly, 2010).

Leadership. Similarly, there is no gender difference in leadership effectiveness (d = 0.03).

However, women and men tend to have different styles of leadership (Eagly, Karau, & Makhi-
jani, 1995). The effect size for democratic leadership (d = -0.22) suggests that women tend
to share the power whereas men tend to be more autocratic (Eagly & Johnson, 1990). The
difference is one of style rather than effectiveness (Eagly & Johannesen-Schmidt, 2001; Eagly,
Johannesen-Schmidt, & van Engen, 2003; Eagly & Johnson, 1990). Other studies echo this find-
ing, with men more likely to emerge as leaders in situations involving task leadership, where
getting the task done and maintaining productivity is the most important (d = 0.33). Women
are more likely to emerge as leaders in situations involving social leadership, and where work-
ing well together and maintaining the integrity of the group is important (d = -0.21; Eagly
& Karau, 1991).

Influenceability. Consider the social behavior of influenceability, or how likely people are
to go along with others. Meta-analyses show that women are somewhat more influenceable
than men (d = -0.26) (Eagly, 1978; Eagly & Carli, 1981). Women are more easily swayed by
the conformity pressure of peers—think of the classic Asch line length experiment—especially
if they must respond in front of others (d = -0.32). Women were also more easily persuaded
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 329

Men and women have

different but equally effective
styles of leadership. Here,
then U.S. secretary of state
Madeleine Albright meets
Russian Orthodox patriarch
Alexy II at the Danilov
Monastery in Moscow,
February 1997.

than men to change their attitude when interacting with another person who holds a different
position on a topic (d = -0.16; Eagly & Carli, 1981).
As you might expect, women conform and change their attitudes more than men when the
stimulus materials involve traditionally masculine topics such as sports, military, or technology.
For example, the topic showing the greatest gender difference in influenceability is football
(d = 1.05). At the same time, males are more easily swayed when it comes to traditionally
female topics like social work, education, health habits, day care, domestic issues, abstract art,
or judgment of artistic creativity. Men are particularly influenced when it comes to judging
birth control (d = -0.75). There are no gender differences in conformity or attitude change
if the subject matter is gender-neutral (Eagly & Carli, 1981).
Curiously, Eagly and Carli (1981) also found that women were more swayed than men in
experiments conducted by males (d = -0.28). There was no gender difference in influence-
ability in experiments by female authors. At the time of this meta-analysis some 79% of the
conformity and persuasion studies they summarized were conducted by men. The authors
wondered if the impact of author gender might be due to a bias of male authors in choice of
topic used in experiments or to not mentioning insignificant gender differences.
Overall, the difference between men and women in influenceability is small to medium.
As we said earlier, a meta-analysis is only as good as the research that goes into it, and there are
many unanswered questions on the topic of gender and influenceability. For example, we don’t
know the extent to which these effects carry over outside of psychology experiments to the real
world and everyday situations of social influence (Becker, 1986). We don’t know if these results
apply to a non-college-aged population, or if they still apply today, considering many of these
studies were done well over 30 years ago. Finally, we don’t know how long lasting the attitude
change of men and women might be (Becker, 1986).
330 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Figure 11.6 Effect size of Effect Size of Self-Esteem Over the Life Span
self-esteem over the life 0.8
span. Source: Kling et al., 1999. 0.7

0.6

0.5

Effect Size d
0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1

-0.1

-0.2
7–10 11–14 15–18 19–22 23–59 60+
Age Range

Self-Esteem and Self-Confidence. Perhaps the most interesting gender difference is the case
of self-esteem. Based on the combination of 216 studies, men have slightly higher self-esteem
(d = 0.20) than women, but this difference varies—getting higher or lower—depending on age
(see Figure 11.6). The gender difference in self-esteem occurs in White participants (d = 0.20),
but not in African American samples (d = -0.04).
Recall that self-esteem is a general evaluation about one’s self. This is different from self-
confidence, or belief that one will be successful at a task. Though early reviews found that
women have less self-confidence than men (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974) a more recent review
concluded that under certain conditions women may merely appear less confident than men
depending on the specific task involved, the availability of performance feedback, and the
emphasis placed on social comparison with others (Lenney, 1977).
These findings were borne out in a later experiment. First-semester undergraduate women
and men predicted what GPA they expected to achieve that semester either out loud to another
student who was conducting the experiment or written privately and sealed in an envelope so
the student-experimenter wouldn’t be able to see it. Participants’ estimates were later checked
against their actual GPAs. Women predicted significantly lower estimates than men, showing
an underconfidence, but only in the public condition. The estimates of women and men did
not differ in the private condition (Heatherington et al., 1993).
In a second experiment, using similar methods, women gave lower estimates of their GPA
in front of a weaker student. Interestingly, there was no gender difference in the participants’
actual GPAs in either of these experiments. The researchers surmised that women underes-
timate their GPAs to appear modest or out of concern for another person’s feelings. That is,
what appears as a difference in self-confidence is really a difference in modesty or sensitivity
to others.
Subsequent research has discovered that the difference is due as much to men overesti-
mating their chances of success as women underestimating their chances of success. Men may
be a bit overconfident, even as women may be a bit underconfident (Beyer, 1999; Mednick &
Thomas, 1993). We should be sensitive to how our interpretation of the data unnecessarily
projects female deficit or nonconsciously sets male behavior as the standard (Hyde, 2004).

What Causes Gender Differences?

Perhaps men and women are more similar than you thought; after all, many psychological
gender differences are trivial. The reality is that medium and large differences do exist so
we should be careful not to embrace a simplistic conclusion that men and women are the
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 331

same or that men and women are different (Lippa, 2006). The real questions for researchers “When examining the
is why do these gender differences exist and where do they come from, so that we can start multifaceted topic of gender,
to untangle the biological and social forces that generate these similarities and differences it may be useful to remember
(Lippa, 2006).
that human males and
By now, from our discussion of gender similarities and differences, you probably have some
females are, after all, only
idea of what causes men and women to develop the kind of personalities that we do. For the
most part, psychologists have proposed variations of the nature and nurture question to explain slightly variant forms of the
gender differences. Let’s briefly review some of these explanations (see Table 11.8). same animal species. By this
First, at the nature extreme, are biological explanations. These explanations suggest that we mean that anatomically
the differences between the genders are innate and due to biological causes like hormones, and physiologically, males
genetics, and evolution. One study of families, including identical and nonidentical twins, esti-
and females are much
mated that 25% of the variance in gendered behavior for teenage males and 38% for females
more similar than they are
was due to genetic influences (Cleveland, Udry, & Chantala, 2001). The remaining 75 and
62% was due to nonshared environmental influences, like differential treatment by parents, different, and as a result,
and measurement error. Also, psychologists are now discovering the extent to which prenatal they are for the most part
hormones as well as daily fluctuations in testosterone (in males), monthly fluctuations in interchangeable with regard
estrogen (for females), and even lifetime exposure to estrogen (in females) affect cognitive to social behaviors and
abilities (Halpern, 2004).
roles—childbearing being the
Or, consider the recent finding that when under stress, the sympathetic nervous system of
major exception.”
females releases oxytocin in addition to epinephrine and norepinephrine. Oxytocin leads to a
Deborah L. Best and John E. Williams
“tend-and-befriend” response in women under stress. In contrast to men, where testosterone
(1993, p. 215)
interacts with norepinephrine to increase the “fight-or-flight” response, women seek out com-
pany and become more maternal, taking care of others (Taylor et al., 2000). In a double-blind
study, men performed better at a test of nonverbal sensitivity when they had been given oxy-
tocin compared to when they had a placebo (Domes, Heinrichs, Michel, Berger, & Herpertz,
2007). Oxytocin could well account for the sex difference in tender-mindedness and nonverbal
sensitivity.
At the nurture extreme are social explanations. Social learning theory, for example, suggests THINK ABOUT IT
that differences between the genders are not innate, but are socialized in us from our parents
or learned from peers, teachers, or society via the media (Bandura, 1977; Mischel, 1966). For Do sex hormones account
for all gender differences?
example, many supposed cognitive differences between males and females turned out to have
been socialized. These have been reduced or eliminated altogether due to educational opportu-
nities and changing social expectations (Halpern, 2004). For example the gender difference in
mathematics is due to girls’ choices (Ceci & Williams, 2010), such as opting out of mathematics
courses in high school (Hyde, 1993), and not to an innate deficit in ability.
However, toy preference and color preference—characteristics thought to be a product
of gender socialization—may actually be innate (Hurlburt & Ling, 2007). Infant girls 3 to 8
months old showed greater visual interest in a pink doll over a blue truck, whereas boys pre-
ferred the truck to the doll (Alexander, Wilcox, & Woods, 2009). Female and male monkeys

Table 11.8 Possible Explanations for Gender Differences

Explanation Example
Biology Aggressiveness, nonverbal sensitivity
Genetics Physical characteristics
Evolution Sexuality
Socialization Spatial ability
Social context Helping behavior
Social role theory Extraversion: assertiveness
Feminist theory Empathy
Social construction Emotions
Biopsychosocial model Personality
332 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

show similar toy preferences (Alexander & Hines, 2002; Hassett, Siebertand, & Wallen, 2008).
That these sex differences occur in monkeys and that they occur in infants so young makes it
hard to argue that socialization is responsible for gender differences in toys and colors.
Alexander (2003) believed that humans have evolved sex differences in color and form
preferences that prepare them for their adult reproductive roles. Females, whether human
or monkey, prefer pink objects which cue nurturing behavior. Males prefer objects which
signal movement and location. Further, there is evidence that the hormone androgen, which
stimulates and controls the development of masculine characteristics, also affects the struc-
tures of the visual system including the visual cortex. Androgens may be responsible for
sex differences in color naming and spatial perception, in addition to color and function
preferences.
THINK ABOUT IT Then there are theories that fall somewhere in between these two extremes. Some dif-
ferences between men and women are due to the social situation or context in which the
If men and women were to behavior occurs, as we saw in our discussion about emotional expression, anxiety, and self-
occupy different social roles,
confidence. What appears to be a gender difference may change or disappear under different
would some gender differ-
ences disappear? circumstances. Other social explanations suggest that differences between men and women
reflect the different roles they hold in society. Feminist theories question the status quo nature
of these roles.
According to feminist views, too often gender differences become translated into value
judgments of females as inferior to males (Halpern, 1997; Unger, 1979). Halpern (1997) noted
that we all know that men’s and women’s genitals differ, so to ask if one set is superior to the
other doesn’t make sense. Yet, this is often what happens when it comes to psychological dif-
ferences between the genders.
Feminist perspectives also point out how the power differential between men and women
in our society colors the kind of questions researchers pursue. For example, instead of focus-
ing on differences between men and women in reproduction—a deterministic view held by
evolutionary psychologists—researchers should explore broader questions about women and
sexuality beyond reproductive role (Hyde & Oliver, 2000).
Finally, psychologists are recognizing that the answer to the question of what causes gen-
der differences may not be as simple as biology or social forces. Instead, some have proposed
a biopsychosocial model, where biologi-
cal and psychosocial forces influence each
other (Halpern, 2004).
Others are realizing that the answer to
the puzzle of what makes women and men
the way they are may be a combination of
all these explanations (Sternberg, 1993; see
Halpern et al., 2007, for an extensive review
of how all these theories can be applied to
understanding the gender gap in science
and mathematics). The trouble is, we may
never know for sure which variables and in
what precise combination explain a given
gender difference. Table 11.9 presents psy-
chology’s best guess for documented gen-
der difference in light of current research
evidence.

Evolution
There are many possible According to evolutionary psychology,
explanations for gender humans have evolved certain character-
differences. Is this woman a
istics to solve adaptive problems, that is,
doctor or a nurse? Why do you
how to adapt to and survive under various
think that?
biological and environmental conditions
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 333

Table 11.9 Gender Differences in Personality and Social Characteristics Revisited: Possible
Explanations
Characteristic Current Best Explanation
Sexuality Evolution
Aggressiveness Evolution
Risk taking Evolution
Toy preferences Evolution
Pink–blue color preference Evolution
Nonverbal behavior Biological (oxytocin)
Agreeableness: tender-mindedness Biological (oxytocin)
Mental rotation Socialization
Occupational preferences Socialization
Leadership style Socialization
Extraversion: assertiveness Social role theory
Mental disorders Biopsychosocial
Note: These explanations are based on current research findings and represent psychology’s best guess in light of the
evidence. Some explanations are open to debate and may change as more evidence emerges.

(Buss, 2004, 2005). To the extent that all humans must face similar challenges, such as finding SEE FOR YOURSELF
adequate food or shelter for survival, men and women will develop similar characteristics (for
example, taste preferences for high-caloric sweet and fatty foods). However, when men and Which would upset you
women face different adaptive problems—as they do for reproduction—then gender differ- more, discovering that your
partner is having a sexual
ences are likely to emerge. Those characteristics which lead to reproductive success are more
relationship or an emotional
likely to be passed on to successive generations (Buss, 1995a). How do we know that a charac- relationship with another?
teristic has been selected? We look for similarities across time and cultures. Particularly valuable
characteristics will appear as universal gender differences across many different environments
and cultures (Kenrick & Trost, 1993). Differences between men and women in physical attri-
butes (e.g., height), aggressiveness, sexuality, and in qualities desired in a mate are hypothesized
to exist due to the different adaptive problem each sex must face to successfully reproduce
(Buss, 1995b, 2003).
How do sex differences in reproduction lead to different dating and mating strategies in
men and women? For females, reproduction involves a tremendous investment of time and
energy. The opportunity for reproduction occurs only once a month, they must carry the
embryo for 9 months, and then feed and care for a relatively helpless creature for an additional
amount of time. Above all, females need to secure resources to carry them and their offspring
through times when food might be scarce and their mobility might be limited due to pregnancy
or birth. In contrast, reproduction for males is less costly. As a result, different mating strategies
have evolved to solve these differing adaptive problems (Buss, 1995b).
Females have evolved to be more particular about whom they mate with, seeking a mate
who has the resources to invest in them and their progeny to help their genes survive. This is
why, according to evolutionary psychologists, women are much less in favor of casual sex and
value status and ambitiousness in a potential mate (Buss, 1995b).
In contrast, males have evolved strategies to increase their chances of passing on their
genes through aggression and risk taking to beat out the competition for a female; casual sex;
desire for multiple partners in a lifetime; and the valuing of physical attractiveness (as a gauge
of health and fertility) in a potential mate (Buss, 1995b).
In addition, whereas both males and females experience jealousy over a partner’s emotional
infidelity and sexual infidelity, there is a large effect size difference between the importance
women and men place on each that follows from their differing reproductive strategies (Con-
fer et al., 2010). Across all cultures studied, women’s jealousy is triggered more by emotional
334 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

infidelity whereas men’s jealousy is triggered more by sexual infidelity (d = 0.64; Hofhansl,
Voracek, & Vitouch, 2004, cited in Confer et al., 2010). This difference in jealousy has been
documented using self-reports and physiological measures (Buss, Larsen, & Westen, 1992) and
is not easily explained by other theories (Buss, Larsen, & Westen, 1996).
Similarly, according to evolutionary psychology, males develop better spatial skills because
these skills were required by successful hunters who lived to reproduce, thus passing on these
crucial genes to the next generation. However, one could argue that traditional female skills
like weaving or fitting objects together such as required in sewing, quilting, or housekeep-
ing require spatial skills more so than traversing large distances or throwing spears (Halpern,
2004; Pontius, 1997). Psychologists have proposed alternatives to evolutionary explanations of
sex differences and the evolutionary perspective of human behavior is not without its critics
(Confer et al., 2010).

THINK ABOUT IT Social Context

Why should gender differ- Gender differences in the characteristics discussed earlier—helping behavior, leadership,
ences depend on the social anxiety, empathy, and influenceability—all depend on the context in which they occur or in
situation in which they are how they are measured. For example, people may behave differently—often more in line with
measured?
social expectations for gender—if other people are present or if assessed using self-report.
Are men really more interested in sex than women, or do women feel uneasy admitting this
on surveys? Are women really more sensitive to others or do they feel they need to appear
so? That these differences in the behavior of men and women change depending on the situ-
ation suggests that these differences have more to do with the social context than with any
important difference between men and women (Yoder & Kahn, 2003). We will never be able
to answer the ultimate question and truly understand the essence of what a man is and what
a woman is until social influences are minimized. This is why it is important to consider
what causes gender differences. For example, the norms of a given situation may change
how people behave, or, as we saw in Chapter 5, people may change their behavior to present
themselves in a certain light.
For example, for years psychologists and others thought that the gender difference in spa-
tial ability was “hard-wired” into the brains of males and females. However, the experiment
that opened this chapter demonstrating that practice with certain video games can actually
eliminate this gender difference in mental rotation suggests otherwise (Feng et al., 2007). Even
something as simple as stimuli (human figures vs. abstract figures; see Figure 11.7; Alexander
& Evardone, 2008) or task instructions can eliminate gender differences on a mental rotation
task (Sharps, Price, & Williams, 1994; Sharps, Welton, & Price, 1993). When a mental rotation
task was described as “an evaluation of some of your spatial abilities, of your abilities to reason

Figure 11.7 Examples of human figure stimuli. Both males and females
perform better on a mental rotation task when human figures are used
and the gender difference between men’s and women’s performance was
reduced by half.
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 335

20 Figure 11.8 Performance in

Females mental image rotation task as a
18

Number Correct on Mental Image

Males function of participant gender
16 and instructional set. Men and
14 women perform equally well on
a mental rotation task when it

Rotation Task
12 is not labeled as a test of spatial
10 ability. Source: Sharps et al.
(1993).
8
6
4
2
0
1 2
Spatial Task Nonspatial Task

and solve problems regarding physical objects in space. Such abilities are involved in mechanical
skills, and in navigation, map reading, and work with tools” we see the standard gender differ-
ence in spatial abilities, with men performing better than women. But when the same task was
described as “an evaluation of some of your mental abilities, of your abilities to reason and solve
problems” without any mention of the spatial nature of the task, men and women performed
equally well (see Figure 11.8).

Social Role Theory

Social role theory suggests that men and women have developed differences due to the different
roles they hold in society (Eagly, 1987; Eagly & Wood, 1999). What appears to be a gender differ-
ence may really be a power or status difference, due to the greater value placed on men and more
power afforded to men in a patriarchal society. For example, perhaps the reason why women
are more nurturing is because they do much of the caregiving in our society. If men did more
caregiving, the reasoning goes, they would develop more empathy. Similarly, if women were
better represented among the Fortune 500 CEOs and positions of political power, or earned
salaries equal to what men in similar positions earned, they would develop more confidence,
competitiveness, and business acumen, and stereotypes of what makes a good leader would
start to change (Eagly & Sczesny, 2009).

Social role theory of gender

differences suggests that men
and women develop different
aspects of their personality
because of the different social
roles they occupy in our
society. By changing these
roles, we may eliminate some
gender differences.
336 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Society’s division of labor between the two sexes provides both opportunities and restric-
tions that cause males and females to develop differently. This leads to a concentration of men
and women in differing roles. Historically, men have ended up in roles with greater power,
status, and wealth, particularly as societies have become more complex, with sex differences
traditionally favoring men. From accommodating these roles, men develop dominant behav-
ior and women develop subordinate behavior. Dominant behavior is assertive, controlling,
autocratic, and may involve sexual control. Subordinate behavior is more yielding to social
influence, less overtly aggressive, more cooperative, and may involve a lack of sexual autonomy
(Eagly & Wood, 1999). From accommodating these roles, men and women develop role-related
skills and characteristics. Social role theory explains how men and women develop their typical
agentic or communal characteristics, respectively (Eagly & Wood, 1999).
For example, one experiment found that men and women assigned to a supervisory
role showed more dominant behaviors, but when these same participants were assigned
to the underling role they acted more submissive. When the roles were reversed, the same
participants showed completely different behaviors. That is, the former supervisors became
more submissive and the former underlings became more dominant (Moskowitz, Suh, &
Desaulniers, 1994).
Social role theory does explain some gender differences in nonverbal communication. For
example, that men tend to interrupt others more may be a function of dominance or men’s
higher social status (Hall, 2006a). However, dominance or status doesn’t explain all the gender
differences in nonverbal communication.
Another way to see if gender role might be causing differences in personality between men
and women is to eliminate the gender role and see if this eliminates the difference in behavior. To
test this, researchers took advantage of a social phenomenon called deindividuation (Zimbardo,
1969). Deindividuation is when people feel unaccountable and not responsible for their actions.
When people are anonymous and part of a group, they stop feeling like individuals and experi-
ence a loosening of ordinary social norms and social roles. When deindividuated, people act in
nonnormative, often antisocial and aggressive ways. Because part of the social role of being a
man is to act aggressively and for a woman to inhibit her aggressiveness, would loosening these
social roles reduce gender differences in aggression?
Male and female participants played a video game in which they could attack their oppo-
nents by dropping bombs. In the individuated condition, the experimenter first introduced
them to the other participants, gave them large name tags, and had them answer personal
questions about their background and interests out loud. In the deindividuated condition,
participants were part of a small group, no introductions were made, no names or name tags
were used, and no personal questions were asked. How did these conditions affect later behavior
in an aggressive video game?

Figure 11.9 Aggressive 2

responding as a function Individuation
1.9
Amount of Aggressive Responding

of deindividuation and Deindividuation

participant sex. This graph 1.8
shows a significant interaction 1.7
between participant sex and
deindividuation. Females were 1.6
more aggressive when the 1.5
social role prohibiting female
1.4
aggressiveness was weakened.
Source: Lightdale and Prentice 1.3
(1994). 1.2
1.1
1
Male Participants Female Participants
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 337

As you can see in Figure 11.9, females dropped fewer bombs than males in the individu- SEE FOR YOURSELF
ated condition but not in the deindividuated condition. When the pressure to adhere to gender
norms was eliminated through deindividuation women became more aggressive and the usual Imagine yourself as married
gender difference in aggression disappeared! Just in case you were thinking that maybe these with children. Do you see
yourself more as a home-
participants were somehow going along with what they thought might be expected of them in
maker or as a provider?
an aggressive game or when deindividuated, a previous experiment verified that undergraduates What qualities are impor-
are unaware of how deindividuation might affect their later aggressiveness. tant for your future mate?
Social role theory also proposes an alternative explanation for some of the differences in
reproductive strategies like the qualities desired in a potential mate. Men and women must
choose partners and potential mates who fit in with society’s sexual division of labor in marital
roles. Because women lack status, power, and wealth they must choose a mate who can provide
these resources. Indeed, in a study of 37 cultures, women in cultures with greater gender equity
were less likely to prefer an older man, or a potential mate with high earning capacity. Men
in these cultures were less likely to prefer a younger woman, or to choose future mates based
on domestic skills. Gender differences in these mating preferences decreased in cultures with
greater gender equity. However, the gender difference for men preferring an attractive mate
more than women still held regardless of the gender equity of the culture. Perhaps the emphasis
on physical attractiveness is driven by evolution but other mating preferences are driven more
by social roles (Eagly & Wood, 1999).
To test this alternative explanation for mate selection, male and female college students
imagined themselves as married with children in either a homemaker role, a provider role, or
a control condition where they imagined themselves in whatever role came to mind (Eagly,
2009b). Both women and men who imagined themselves as future homemakers rated status,
ambition, career focus, and salary as important in a future mate. However, women and men
who imagined themselves as a future provider rated good cook, good with children, and good
housekeeper as important in a future mate. Notice that the qualities these participants desired
in a future mate depended on the role they saw themselves in and not on their gender. This
study suggests that some gender differences, like some aspects of mate preference, may be more
a function of social role than of biological sex (Eagly, 2009b).

Social Construction
Imagine the following scenario:

Chris was really angry today! Enough was enough. Chris put on the gray suit,
marched into work, and went into the main boss’s office and yelled: “I’ve brought
in more money for this company than anybody else and everyone gets promoted
but me! You hand out promotions like candy!” The boss saw Chris’s fist slam
down on the desk. There was an angry look on Chris’s face. They tried to talk but
it was useless. Chris just stormed out of the office in anger.(Beall, 1993, p. 127)

While reading this passage, did you imagine Chris as a man or woman? Perhaps the part
THINK ABOUT IT
about choosing the gray suit made you think of a woman, putting care into her appearance.
Perhaps the part about the fist slamming down on the desk made you think Chris was a man, How do our beliefs about
his aggressiveness coming to the fore. Go back now and reread the passage imagining Chris dif- what men and women are
like color our perceptions of
ferently than you had before. If you look carefully, there is nothing in this paragraph to indicate
people?
gender—except your own expectations.
The idea that we define or construct our own reality is at the heart of social construction-
ism. According to Gergen (1985), we construct our perceptions based on our cultural back-
ground. Some constructions, like stereotypes about gender, may persist because they support
the current social order or rationalize differential treatment of groups (Beall, 1993). Social
construction explanations claim that gender differences have more to do with people’s beliefs
about gender than any innate differences between men and women. This view suggests that
gender is in the eye of the beholder.
338 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

For example, in one study, male

and female undergraduates watched
a short video clip of a 9-month-
old infant reacting to various toys,
including a jack-in-the-box (Con-
dry & Condry, 1976). The infant’s
response to the jack-in-the-box
was ambiguous. At first the infant
appeared startled when Jack popped
up. Then the infant became more
and more agitated and started to cry.
Later, the infant screamed when Jack
popped up, and then dissolved into
tears. Participants watched the same
video, but were randomly assigned
What emotion is this baby to believe that they were watching
feeling and what does gender a boy (“David”) or a girl (“Dana”).
have to do with it? They judged what emotion the baby
was feeling and how intensely he or
she was feeling it.
Despite watching the same infant, participants judged the emotion of the infant very differ-
ently depending on whether they thought they were watching a girl or a boy (see Figure 11.10).
Both male and female participants thought that “David” was equally angry or afraid of the
jack-in-the-box but that “Dana” was more afraid and less angry at the toy.
Many studies have been done manipulating the ascribed (assigned) gender of infants, chil-
dren, and even adults and the common finding is that the way people see emotions (Condry
& Condry, 1976), choose toys (Seavey, Katz, & Zalk, 1975; Sidorowicz & Lunney, 1980), judge
physical attributes (Vogel, Lake, Evans, & Karraker, 1991), rate aggression (Condry & Ross,
1985), and a host of other variables depends on the gender of the person participants believe
they are watching and not on the target’s actual sex.

Biopsychosocial Model
When it comes to understanding gender differences, the biological and the social influence
each other (Halpern, 2004). As we saw in Chapter 6, nature and nurture work together to
make us who we are. A biopsychosocial model suggests that gender differences are caused by
a combination of social forces acting on biological processes and, in turn, biological processes

Figure 11.10 Gender is in 5

the eye of the beholder. While Anger
4.5
watching the same videotape Fear
of an infant playing with a jack- 4
in-the-box, participants who 3.5
Emotional Intensity

believed they were watching

a girl viewed her as less angry 3
and more afraid of it. The boy 2.5
was judged as equally likely
2
to be angry or afraid. Source:
Condry and Condry (1976). 1.5
1
0.5
0
“David” “Dana”
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 339

operating on psychological and social process (Halpern, 2004; Sternberg, 1993; Wood & Eagly,
2002).
For example, boys and girls may seek out different experiences based on their interests and
abilities, thus further developing these abilities (Halpern, 2004). What appears to be a biologi-
cally determined sex difference in ability might really be a gender difference in interests, an
active genotype–environment correlation, or a reactive genotype–environment correlation if
people provide certain opportunities to children on the basis of their sex alone (you may want
to review these concepts from Chapter 6). If kids naturally gravitate toward, or avoid pursuing,
certain activities, that would be one thing. However, if some children are discouraged from SEE FOR YOURSELF
pursuing activities they like or forced to engage in activities they don’t like, then this would
What image comes to
be an example of social forces changing a genetic predisposition. This example suggests how
mind when you picture a
hard it is to separate out the effects of nature (genetics) from nurture (social forces) in trying scientist?
to explain gender differences.
For example, take the gender differences in mental rotation. Though this difference occurs
in very young infants (Moore & Johnson, 2008), we saw how the difference between college
students can be eliminated by framing the task as gender appropriate (Sharps et al., 1993) or
by providing women with special training (Feng et al., 2007). Even if this difference turns out
to be innate and biological, the gender difference as it exists is not large enough to account for
the finding that women earn only 10% of bachelor degrees in engineering in the United States
(Hyde, 2004).
Why is this so? Women might not see themselves as fitting the stereotype of a scientist
(Thomas, Henley, & Snell, 2006) or computer programmer (Cheryan, Plaut, Davies, & Steele,
2010) or they may find the demands of a science career unappealing (Cheryan et al., 2010).
Overwhelmingly, both male and female college students picture “a scientist” as male (Thomas
et al., 2006; see Figure 11.11). Among undergraduates, women found majoring in computer
science or even learning a computer language far less interesting than men when sitting in a
computer science classroom decorated with Star Trek posters, video game boxes, computer
parts, technical books, and junk food. However, when the same classroom contained nature
posters, water bottles, general interest books, and healthy snacks—objects not considered
stereotypical of computer science majors—women’s interest in computer science increased
and was equivalent to the men’s interest in this as a possible career (Cheryan et al., 2010; see
Figure 11.12).
What was it about the environment that turned the women off to the field of computer
science? Later studies confirmed that regardless of decisions the participants were asked to
make (choose a major, join a work team, work for a generic company, or work for a web design
company), or the gender representation of a work group (majority male, entirely female, or
gender balanced), women avoided the stereotypical environment, which was viewed by both
men and women as masculine. The masculine work environment discouraged women, even
when gender proportion, salaries, work hours, and job descriptions were identical across the
masculine and neutral environments (Cheryan et al., 2010).
These findings were echoed in a recent report by the American Association of University
Women which found that the reason why there are so few women in science, technology, engi-
neering, and mathematics has little to do with biology or innate sex differences in mathematics
but everything to do with the social environment (Hill, Corbett, & St. Rose, 2010). Equality
requires that we provide equal opportunities to all people; it makes no promises about equal
outcomes from those opportunities.
Perhaps the most curious examples of how a biopsychosocial model can apply to gender
differences are recent cross-cultural studies of personality (Costa, Terracciano, & McCrae,
2001; Guimond, 2008; Schmitt, Realo, Voracek, & Allik, 2008). Which kind of culture do you THINK ABOUT IT
think has greater gender differences in personality: countries with a poorer standard of living Which kind of culture
and far less gender equity or more affluent cultures with equality, prosperity, and health? If do you think has greater
you’re thinking that social and economic equality would make the genders more similar— gender differences in per-
sonality: countries with less
think again. Men and women in more affluent countries have more resources to pursue their
gender equity or countries
own interests and talents and, strangely enough, this actually increases the personality differ- with more gender equity?
ences between the genders (Schmitt et al., 2008).
340 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

Figure 11.11 After a field

trip to the Fermilab proton
collider in Batavia, Illinois,
where students met with three
physicists (a White male, a White
female, and an African American
male) who explained the tools,
methods, and applications of
Fermilab science, including
cancer therapy, seventh graders
changed their views of what a
scientist was like. The image on
the left is what Amy thought
“a scientist” looked like before
the tour. On the right is her view
afterwards. Source: From http://
ed.fnal.gov/projects/scientists/
amy.html.

Cultures with a higher standard of

living and greater gender equity show
Figure 11.12 Reported 1 the largest differences in personality
interest in computer science (McCrae et al., 2005a). In both self-
Interest in Computer Science (Standardized)

by women (N = 22) and men reports and observer-reports, Asian and

(N = 17) when sitting in a room African cultures show the smallest gen-
with objects stereotypically
der differences in personality whereas
associated with computer
science or not stereotypically
European and American cultures show
associated with computer the largest (Costa et al., 2001; McCrae,
science. Source: Cheryan (2010, 0 2002; Schmitt et al., 2008). For example,
Figure 1, p. 1049). Cheryan, S., Figure 11.13 shows sex differences in the
Plaut, V. C., Davies, P. G., & Steele, five factors across 50 cultures grouped
C. M. (2010). Ambient belonging: by region (Schmitt et al., 2008). This
How stereotypical cues graph shows that gender differences in
impact gender participation in personality decrease as one moves from
computer science. Journal of Western to non-Western cultures.
Personality and Social Psychology, When Schmitt et al. (2008) tried
97(6), 1045–1060. Copyright 1 to figure out what accounted for this
American Psychological Stereotypical Nonstereotypical
Association. Reprinted with Environment
effect, they discovered that gender dif-
permission. ferences correlated with men’s person-
Men Women ality but not women’s. This suggests
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 341

Figure 11.13 Magnitude

0.70
Extraversion of sex differences (d) in
Agreeableness Extraversion, Agreeableness,
Conscientiousness Conscientiousness, and
0.60 Neuroticism Neuroticism, across the
10 major world regions of
the International Sexuality
0.50 Description Project (ISDP).
Gender differences in
Sex Difference (d) in Personality

0.40
personality decrease as one
moves from Western to non-
Western cultures (from left to
0.30 right). Source: Schmitt (2008,
Figure 1, p. 175). Schmitt,
D. P., Realo, A., Voracek, M., &
0.20 Allik, J. (2008). Why can’t a
man be more like a woman?
0.10
Sex differences in big five
personality traits across 55
cultures. Journal of Personality
0.00 and Social Psychology, 94(1),
168–182. Copyright American
Psychological Association.
⫺0.10 Reprinted with permission.

⫺0.20
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that as countries become more affluent, men’s personalities are changing more than women’s.
Specifically, men are becoming less similar to women, showing less Neuroticism, more Intro-
version, less Agreeableness, and less Conscientiousness. Affluence allows men and women to
pursue their individual interests, which brings out and develops their innate temperament
and—in the case of men—seems to make them more agentic and less communal in the process.
Schmitt et al. (2008) surmised that genetics and environment work on personality differ-
ences in a way similar to height, our example from Chapter 6. Once the environment is enriched
for everybody, then differences between people are caused by the only variable that can still
vary: genetics. Gender differences in personality start to appear once the environment is good
enough so that people can choose their activities, careers, and mates and develop aspects of
their personality in the process.
This finding that gender differences are greater in more affluent cultures suggests that
the differences between men and women are exaggerated in Western or affluent cultures, the
very same cultures in which psychologists have been looking for gender differences. Have we
artificially exaggerated the differences between the genders by looking for gender differences
within Western cultures (Guimond, 2008)? With affluence, men become less neurotic, more
introverted, less agreeable, and less conscientious, all characteristics of the universal masculine
stereotype (Williams & Best, 1990).
There’s a saying, The answer you get depends on the question you ask. This is particu-
larly true of the research on gender differences (Sternberg, 1993). Psychologists once framed
questions about gender as questions about whether gender differences were due to biology or
342 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

The Personality of Everyday Life

Gendered beliefs about personality: What difference does it make?
Certainly there are differences between men and women, but these differences have
become magnified and obscure the many similarities and commonalities that we share.
Why is this important? There are many reasons. First, by seeing men and women as
“opposites” or as enemies in a “battle of the sexes” we do ourselves and each other a
disservice. This view makes it hard to see people as individuals instead of as represen-
tatives of their gender. It also sets us up for competition with each other instead of
cooperation.
Second, stereotypes establish standards and norms for behavior and attitudes. Society
does not take kindly to people who do not fit in, especially when it comes to norm viola-
tions for sex and gender. For example, women who do not fit the norm of being nurturant
may face problems with evaluation in the workplace (Eagly, Makhijani, & Klonsky, 1992;
Rudman & Glick, 1999).
Third, gender stereotypes may become self-fulfilling prophecies. When people hold
beliefs about what another person is like based on their sex, whether true or false, it influ-
ences how they act toward that person. This causes the man or woman to act consistent
with those gendered beliefs, making the original gendered expectations come true (Jussim,
1986; Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968).
For example, parents, teachers, and even kids themselves hold expectations that
boys are likely to do better academically than girls (Bhanot & Jovanovic, 2005; Jussim &
Eccles, 1992; Yee & Eccles, 1988). Adults may prevent girls from ever having the oppor-
tunity to improve their skills, and as a result, the false belief of academic inferiority
becomes a reality. Similarly, how will a man ever develop insight into his own emotions
or sensitivity to the emotions of others if we don’t expect a man to be in touch with his
emotions?
Fourth, focusing on gender differences, especially those which are trivial or nonexis-
tent, may take the attention away from more serious gender issues. For example, with an
emphasis on the lower self-esteem of girls we may be disregarding boys who, contrary to
the stereotype, are also at risk for self-esteem problems (Kling, Hyde, Showers, & Buswell,
1999). Similarly, talented girls may be overlooked if parents and teachers expect girls to
be bad at mathematics (Hyde, 2005; Lummis & Stevenson, 1990).
Finally, stereotype threat, as you’ll remember from Chapter 5, is when a person experi-
ences distress when faced with a stereotype that threatens him or her, causing the person’s
performance to suffer thereby confirming the very stereotype he or she felt threatened by
(Aronson et al., 1998; Aronson & Rogers, 2008; Spencer, Steele, & Quinn, 1999; Steele et
al., 2002). For example, when faced with a challenging math problem, an otherwise capable
woman might choke under the combined pressures of wanting to get the right answer and
not wanting to be just another woman who is bad at math.
For each person to develop his or her own unique talents and to thrive in life we
need to allow people to be their true selves without limitations set by stereotypes, society,
expectations, or even our own self-inflicted limitations.

due to the environment. As you’ve realized by now, there is no simple answer to this question:
Both biology and the environment influence each other, and the impact of each varies over
time and place (Sternberg, 1993). As we pose the question of gender in more complex ways,
our answers—and the psychological research on which they are based—get more advanced.
By now, you’ve become more sophisticated as well during this process and have gained an
appreciation of the biological and social mechanisms that affect similarities and differences
between the genders.
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 343

“Consider a rainbow. Given

the full spectrum of color, we
perceive red and magenta
as being similar. If, however,
we eliminate all other hues,
red and magenta are now
perceived as being different.
But the price of emphasizing
this difference is the loss of the
rest of the spectrum. Similarly,
relationships relevant to both
sexes have been obscured by
the limitation of research to
the difference between them.”
Rhoda K. Unger (1979, p. 1093)

Then and Now: Definition and Assessment of Gender

Are you: male or female? (circle one) “Experimental results are
If you are male then you are masculine and if you are female then you are feminine, right? based on group averages, and
Maybe not. Traditionally, psychologists assumed that people developed a set of personality no one is average.”
traits depending on their biological sex: males are masculine and females are feminine. Today, Psychologist Diane Halpern (2004)
we have a richer and broader definition of gender that takes into account biological sex as well
as personal feelings and social experiences.
Let’s start with the basics. Sex refers to a biological classification depending on a person’s
combination of chromosomes and hormones. Gender refers to a social classification (Unger,
1979). Psychologists generally use the terms male and female to refer to biological sex and
masculine and feminine to refer to social gender (of course, it’s not always easy to decide if a
difference is due to biology or social role). In the early days of personality measurement, gender THINK ABOUT IT
was measured as a typology, meaning that people would be one type or the other—masculine
Do definitions of masculin-
or feminine—as if being placed in a box. Further, it was assumed that a person’s gender was ity and femininity change
the same as his or her sex: males are masculine and females are feminine. Any deviation from over time? Why?
this norm was considered problematic.
Psychologists soon recognized the limitations of a gender typology and combined mascu-
linity and femininity into a single bipolar (two-ended) dimension of masculinity–femininity:
The more masculine a person is, the less feminine that person is. Like the earlier typology
model, this unidimensional model was also limiting, as people could either be masculine or
feminine but could not display aspects of both.
A personality test that illustrates gender as a single dimension is the Minnesota Multipha-
sic Personality Inventory (MMPI; Hathaway & McKinley, 1940), of which a 1989 revision, the
MMPI-2, is used today (Butcher et al., 1989). Both versions consist of 10 different scales, one THINK ABOUT IT
of which is the masculinity–femininity scale. On the MMPI, if a man scores too high on the Is measuring gender like try-
masculinity scale (indicating more femininity) or if a woman scores too low (indicating more ing to hit a moving target?
masculinity) this is a sign of pathology.
By the 1970s personality psychologists started to realize that a unidimensional scale did
not fully capture the possible range of people’s gendered behavior (Constantinople, 1973).
Why couldn’t a woman be gregarious and assertive? Why couldn’t a man be self-sufficient
and nurturing? Psychologists started thinking of masculinity and femininity as two separate
unidimensional scales. A person could be high or low on one or both of the scales. That
is, a person could be high in both stereotypically masculine traits such as leadership and
analytical thinking, and in stereotypically feminine traits such as being affectionate and
compassionate. Two scales, the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ; Spence, Helm-
reich, & Stapp, 1974, 1975) and the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI; Bem, 1974) measure
gender in just this way. Both the PAQ and the BSRI yield very similar results and correlate
344 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

with each other (Spence, 1991). Further, there is no correlation between the masculinity
and femininity scales of each test, suggesting that these are separate dimensions (Spence &
Helmreich, 1979).
In the PAQ, respondents use a 5-point scale to rate which of a pair of statements best
describes their personalities (see Table 11.10). The masculinity items measure goal-oriented
and instrumental attributes. The femininity items measure interpersonally oriented and expres-
sive attributes. Even though the masculine items tend to be stereotypically more characteristic
of men and the feminine items stereotypically more characteristic of women, all attributes were
rated as being equally desirable in men and women. Undergraduates imagined—back in 1975
at least—that the ideal man or woman would possess these attributes (Spence et al., 1975).
In the BSRI, respondents rate each of 60 adjectives on a 7-point scale from 1 (never or
almost never true) to 7 (almost always true). Responses for the 20 feminine and the 20 masculine

Table 11.10 The Personal Attributes Questionnaire

1. Not at all aggressive A B C D E Very aggressive
2. Not at all independent A B C D E Very independent
3. Not at all emotional A B C D E Very emotional
4. Very submissive A B C D E Very dominant
5. Not at all excitable in a major crisis A B C D E Very excitable in a major crisis
6. Very passive A B C D E Very active
7. Not at all able to devote self completely to A B C D E Able to devote self completely to others
others
8. Very rough A B C D E Very gentle
9. Not at all helpful to others A B C D E Very helpful to others
10. Not at all competitive A B C D E Very competitive
11. Very home oriented A B C D E Very worldly
12. Not at all kind A B C D E Very kind
13. Indifferent to others' approval A B C D E Highly needful of others' approval
14. Feelings not easily hurt A B C D E Feelings easily hurt
15. Not at all aware of feelings of others A B C D E Very aware of feelings of others
16. Can make decisions easily A B C D E Has difficulty making decisions
17. Gives up very easily A B C D E Never gives up easily
18. Never cries A B C D E Cries very easily
19. Not at all self-confident A B C D E Very self-confident
20. Feels very inferior A B C D E Feels superior
21. Not at all understanding of others A B C D E Very understanding of others
22. Very cold in relations with others A B C D E Very warm in relations with others
23. Very little time for security A B C D E Very strong need for security
24. Goes to pieces under pressure A B C D E Stands up well under pressure
Note: The items above inquire about what kind of person you think you are. Each item consists of a pair of characteristics, with the letters A–E in between. Each pair describes
contradictory characteristics—that is, you cannot be both at the same time, such as very aggressive and not at all aggressive. The letters form a scale between the two extremes.
You are to choose a letter that describes where you fall on the scale. For example, if you think you are not at all aggressive, you would choose A. If you think you are aggressive,
you might choose D. If you are only somewhat aggressive, you might choose C, and so forth.
To score, assign numbers based on the letter you circled: A = 0, B = 1, C = 2, D = 3, E = 4. Based on the responses you circled, enter the appropriate numbers for the
remaining items in the spaces to the left of the items. To compute your score on the femininity scale, add up the numbers next to items 3, 7, 8, 9, 12, 15, 21, and 22. To compute
your scores on the masculinity scale, add up the numbers next to items 2, 6, 10, 16*, 17, 19, 20, and 24. Note that item 16 must be reverse scored so that a 4 is scored as a 0; 3
as a 1; 2 as a 2; 1 as a 3; and 0 as a 4.
Source: Spence and Helmreich (1978).
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 345

items are averaged. The remaining 20 are applicable to either gender and are not scored. Then
using their masculinity and femininity scores, researchers classify respondents into one of four
categories (see Table 11.11).
Women who score high in femininity and low in masculinity are classified as feminine
sex-typed. Men who score high in masculinity and low in femininity are classified as mas-
culine sex-typed. Women and men who score high in both masculinity and femininity—
possessing attributes of both males and females—are called androgynous (from the Greek:
andro = male and gyn = female). People who score low in both masculinity and femininity
are undifferentiated. However, women who score high in masculinity (and low in feminin-
ity) and men who score high in femininity (and low in masculinity) are considered cross
sex-typed (Bem, 1977).
Since the BSRI was designed and validated on a sample of college students from Stan-
ford University in the 1970s, society has changed a lot. For one, undergraduates have become
more androgynous over time (Twenge, 1997). That is, it has become more acceptable for
men to be expressive and for women to be instrumental. A replication of Bem’s original
study with students at Franklin and Marshall college in 1999 discovered that both men and
women found it more acceptable for a woman to demonstrate certain masculine traits like
assertiveness and athleticism and to avoid feminine traits like being soft-spoken and not
using harsh language (Auster & Ohm, 2000). Second, Sandra Bem, the originator of the
scale, recognized that the test and the theory that it was built on suggested that androgyny
was somehow better than being sex-typed or undifferentiated and that being cross sex-typed
was particularly problematic, which was never her intention (Bem, 1981, 1993). Her uto-
pian goal had been to create a climate in which gender matters only where it is biologically
relevant (Bem, 1993). Recognizing that this may be impossible, she now advocates omitting
gender categorization altogether and letting people be fluid in their biological sex, social
gender, and sexual desires (Bem, 1995).
On both the BSRI and the PAQ women have become more masculine over time, show-
ing an increase in the extent to which they say that stereotypical masculine traits apply to
them and eliminating the difference between men and women on these scales. However, even
though cultural changes from the 1970s to the 1990s have encouraged the development of
instrumental traits in women, there has not been a similar increase in the acceptability of
expressive and communal traits in men (Twenge, 1997). Perhaps the expectations for gender
behavior, at least for women, are less strict today than they were when the BSRI and the PAQ
were developed.
The idea of being sex-typed or androgynous comes from gender schema theory (Bem, 1981,
1984, 1993). Bem found that for those people who scored as sex-typed on the BSRI, gender was a
highly salient and important organizing principle or schema for them, which they used to make
judgments about themselves and the world. For example, sex-typed participants were more likely
to organize words by gender when recalling them on a memory test (Bem, 1981). They were also
faster at judging sex-congruent traits (e.g., female–sensitive; male–competitive) as descriptive of

Table 11.11 Gender as Two Dimensions: The Personal Attitudes Questionnaire and the Bem Sex Role
Inventory
Low Masculine High Masculine
Low Feminine Undifferentiated Masculine sex-typed (if male)
Cross sex-typed (if female)
High Feminine Feminine sex-typed (if female) Androgynous
Cross sex-typed (if male)
Note: Participants are classified as scoring high or low depending on whether they are above or below the median of their
peers. People who are undifferentiated have a lower self-esteem than people in the other categories, which echoes our earlier
discussion of self-esteem and self-concept clarity from Chapter 5.
Sources: Bem (1977); Spence et al. (1975).
346 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

themselves than sex-incongruent traits (e.g., female–forceful, male–loves children) (Bem, 1981).
The BSRI may be a better measure of cognitive orientation or the strength of one’s schema for
gender than a measure of gender itself (but see Spence, 1993).
Today, there is a trend among researchers to define gender using not just one or two dimen-
sions, but multiple dimensions (e.g., Twenge, 1999). For example, Janet Spence and her col-
leagues have suggested that masculinity and femininity (or instrumental and expressive traits)
as measured by the PAQ or the BSRI is but one such dimension of gender identity. She suggested
that our gender identity, a psychological sense of our own maleness and femaleness, like our
self-concept, is established early in life (Spence, 1993; Spence & Sawin, 1985). Recall from our
discussion in Chapter 5 that gender identity is one of many possible social identities (Wood
& Eagly, 2009). Adult men and women reported that their gender identity included physical
attributes, such as appearance, movements, and speech; social roles; interests and hobbies; social
behavior; biological sex; and sexuality, in addition to instrumental and expressive personality
traits (Spence & Sawin, 1985). People display only modest consistency in their gender-typical
behavior across many aspects of their lives, from toy preference to careers, to preferred relation-
ship partners to activity preferences (Egan & Perry, 2001). A multidimensional view of gender
identity accounts for people’s experiences of themselves as male or female better than either
one- or two-dimensional models.
In two studies, the gender identity of middle school students was related to their psy-
chological and social adjustment over the course of the school year (Carver, Yunger, & Perry,
2003; Egan & Perry, 2001). Researchers hypothesized that gender identity was made up of four
dimensions:

1. Membership Knowledge. Knowledge of membership in a gender category: male, female.

2. Gender Compatibility. Felt compatibility with one’s own gender compared to the other
gender. Self-perceptions of how typical a person feels for his or her gender. Contentment
with one’s gender assignment, emerging sexuality, and sexual orientation.
3. Gender Conformity Pressure. The extent to which participants feel compelled to engage
in gender-appropriate activities and to avoid gender-inappropriate activities and fearing
punishment or ridicule from teachers, parents, peers, or themselves, instead of feeling free
to explore a wide range of activities regardless of gender appropriateness.
4. Intergroup Bias. Attributing positive qualities to one’s own sex and negative qualities to
the other sex, such as showing favoritism for own sex and a bias against the other sex, or
exaggerating the positive aspects of own sex and the negative aspects of the other sex.

Both studies found that these four dimensions were not strongly related to each other,
supporting a multidimensional view of gender identity, and that all were related to psycho-
logical and social adjustment. Children showed better adjustment as measured by self-esteem,
social competence, and acceptance from peers if they felt secure in themselves as typical for
their gender and yet free to explore cross-sex behaviors when they wanted to. Poor adjustment
was related to feeling greater pressure to conform to gender expectations and showing greater
intergroup bias. Interestingly, boys had higher scores than girls on gender typicality, gender
contentedness, and felt pressure, which goes along with other findings that suggest that boys
are more sex-typed than girls and experience more pressures to act in accord with expecta-
tions for their gender. In addition, felt pressure to behave in accord with one’s gender led to
reduced agentic behaviors (e.g., assertion, daring, competitiveness) in girls and less communal
behaviors (e.g., cooperation, maintaining of harmony, showing of fear or weakness) in boys
(Carver et al., 2003).
As a final note, the results of both studies suggest that masculinity and femininity are
indeed two ends of a single bipolar dimension: The more masculine one feels the less feminine
one feels or the more expressive one is the less instrumental one is. So, when it comes to the
measurement of gender, researchers have come back to thinking of masculinity and femininity
as aspects of a single scale and not as two separate scales. But as these two studies show, there is
more to our gender identity than the single dimension of masculinity–femininity.
 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality 347

Chapter Summary
Are there personality differences between men and women? People in Canada, the United “I’m just a person trapped
States, and around the world hold amazingly consistent notions about what men and women inside a woman’s body.”
are like. People believe that men and women differ in personality, social roles, physical Comedian Elayne Boosler
attributes, emotional experience, emotional expression, cognitive skills, careers, hobbies,
interests, and activities. Women are seen as communal, focusing on nurturing and feel-
ing connected to others. Men are seen as more agentic, focused on individual actions and
accomplishments.
Meta-analysis, a way of statistically combining results across methods and measures to
Study and Review
estimate an average effect size (d), can help us evaluate if there are gender differences in these
on mysearchlab.com
characteristics and estimate how large and how consistent gender differences are. Based on
meta-analysis, there are many similarities and a few differences between males and females. Go online for more
Most of the differences tend to be physical or sexual; most of the similarities are in personality. resources to help you
Men and women are the same when it comes to impulsiveness, Extraversion, gregariousness, review.
activity, Openness, ideas, Conscientiousness, order, intelligence, mathematical ability, verbal abil-
ity, leadership effectiveness, self-confidence, and many more traits. Men and women are different
when it comes to tender-mindedness, assertiveness, sexuality, nonverbal behavior, aggressiveness,
risk taking, occupational preferences, and in the incidence of certain mental disorders. Other
differences in personality and social behavior depend on the context in which they occur, how
they are measured, and how they are defined. For example, men and women may not differ in
empathy, emotions, helping behavior, leadership style, anxiety, and self-esteem. Differences in
spatial ability can be eliminated by practice and how the task is presented to participants.
What causes gender differences? Psychologists have suggested that sex and gender differ-
ences may be due to biology, genetics, hormones, evolution, socialization, the social situation
in which the behaviors occur, social construction, social roles, and biopsychosocial theory.
What difference do gendered beliefs make? When we judge people based on how we think
they ought to behave for someone of their gender we fail to see them as individuals. Our ste-
reotypical beliefs may become norms for behavior and we may negatively evaluate or even
shun people who don’t follow norms for sex or gender. Beliefs about gender can lead to a self-
fulfilling prophesy in the behavior of others, take attention away from more serious gender
differences, cause people to perform badly because of stereotype threat, and to wrongly think
of men and women as opposites.
Finally, definitions of gender have become more sophisticated, moving from single-
dimensional measures, to two-dimensional measures, to multidimensional measures. Gender
identity is much richer than a single dimension of masculinity–femininity and includes bio-
logical sex, gender compatibility, gender conformity pressures, and intergroup bias.
Recall our thought experiment that opened the chapter. Would you answer differently now?
Would you be the same person inside? Would you have the same personality? I suspect that
most of us would have the same personality, but perhaps we would express it differently. Just as
the facets of a diamond can look different depending on the light and the setting, perhaps men
and women are not quite alien species to each other after all. Let’s focus on our commonali-
ties while celebrating—and not exclusively focusing on—our differences. Whatever male and
female differences there are, we are not the opposite of each other (Lippa, 2005a). Ideally, gender
and gender roles should fit comfortably like a favorite pair of jeans rather than uncomfortable
hand-me-downs that pinch and restrict in places.

Review Questions
1. Is spatial rotation skill learned or innate? What does this suggest about the cause of the
gender difference between men and women in this skill?
2. What do people believe men and women are like? Are these stereotypes different depending
on culture?
348 Chapter 11 Gender and Personality

3. What is effect size? How is it measured? How can we interpret effect sizes? What questions
about gender differences can a meta-analysis help answer?
4. What kinds of variables show the largest gender differences? What kinds of variables show
the smallest gender differences? When it comes to the factors and facets of the five-factor
model, are men and women more similar than different or more different than similar?
5. Are there gender differences in aggression and risk taking? Are there gender differences
in empathy, basic emotions, helping behavior, leadership effectiveness, anxiety, influence-
ability, self-esteem, or self-confidence? Explain your reasoning.
6. What are some possible explanations for gender differences put forth by psychologists?
Explain how each of these explanations can account for gender differences.
7. What impact on ourselves and people around us does holding gendered beliefs about
personality have?
8. How have definitions and assessments of gender changed over time?

Key Terms
Communion Evolutionary psychology Unidimensional model
Agency Social role theory Feminine sex-typed
Stereotypes Deindividuation Masculine sex-typed
Effect size Social constructionism Androgynous
Meta-analysis Biopsychosocial model Undifferentiated
Gender socialization Self-fulfilling prophecies Cross sex-typed
Feminist theory Bipolar scale Gender identity
CHAPTER
12 SEXUAL
ORIENTATION:
AN INTEGRATIVE
MINI-CHAPTER
MYTHS AND MISPERCEPTIONS ABOUT SEXUAL ORIENTATION
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: THE HETERONORMATIVITY OF AMERICAN LIFE
WHAT IS SEXUAL ORIENTATION?
HOW MANY PEOPLE ARE GAY, LESBIAN, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL?
WHAT DETERMINES SEXUAL ORIENTATION?
Biological Explanations of Sexual Orientation
Evolution
Genetics
Brain Structures
Prenatal Factors
Environmental Theories
Interactionist Theories
The Exotic Becomes Erotic
The Biobehavioral Model of Love and Desire: Accounting for the Experiences
of Women
CHAPTER SUMMARY
Read the Chapter on REVIEW QUESTIONS
mysearchlab.com KEY TERMS

349
350 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

I
n December 2010 Barbara Walters interviewed the legendary Oprah Winfrey about what
“The important thing is not
she would do after ending her long-running daytime talk show. As part of the interview,
the object of love, but the Walters asked Oprah if she was gay. Rumors seemed to abound speculating about her rela-
emotion itself.” tionship with her best friend Gayle King and questioning why she never married her love of
Gore Vidal many years, Stedman Graham.
The fact that this bold question made national news is pretty astounding. After all, what
business is it of ours what celebrities do in their private lives? Indeed, many people also won-
der about the sexual orientation of comedienne Wanda Sykes, Sex and the City actress Cynthia
Nixon, Drew Barrymore, Angelina Jolie, Lady Gaga, Ellen DeGeneres, Anne Heche, and Portia
De Rossi, in addition to that of Oprah. Why are people not similarly confused about the sexual
orientation of male celebrities? Is sexual orientation different in men? Perhaps sexual orienta-
tion is just that important, either because it tells us something fundamental about a person’s
personality or else because American society thinks a person’s sexual orientation is important.
Either way, sexual orientation is an interesting question from a psychological standpoint and a
politically charged topic from a societal standpoint.
What makes a person straight, bisexual, gay, or lesbian? Is it something you choose or
“Labels? Okay, fine. I’m
something you just know? Sexual orientation is an affinity, attraction, leaning, or longing toward
bisensual. Heteroflexible.
one sex or the other or both. We can think of sexual orientation as partner orientation (Dia-
And life-curious. That about mond, 2003b). Psychologists once thought that sexual orientation was pretty much set around
covers it.” puberty and stayed constant throughout one’s life. However, now we are realizing that people
Morgan Torva can vary in just how set or fluid their sexual orientation is (Diamond, 2008b).
For example, the traditional labels of gay/lesbian, heterosexual, or bisexual may not accu-
rately describe the sexual orientation of many people. As you will soon see, defining sexual
orientation is not so easy. There is often a mismatch among a person’s attractions, behaviors,
and identity, suggesting that labels may be an oversimplification of how we experience our
sexuality.
For women, in particular, the traditional labels of lesbian, heterosexual, or bisexual
seem to be especially misleading. One study tracked the gender identity of 18- to 25-year-
old lesbian and bisexual women over the course of 10 years. Every 2 to 3 years they were
interviewed in person and asked, “How do you currently label your sexual identity to your-
self, even if its different from what you might tell other people? If you don’t apply a label to
SEE FOR YOURSELF your sexual identity, please say so” (Diamond, 2008a, p. 8). About two thirds of the women
in this study changed their identities at least once and 36% changed their identities more
How do you currently label than once over the course of the study. Surprisingly, “unlabeled” was the most common
your sexual identity to identity adopted. These women may think of themselves as unlabeled as a way of indicating
yourself, even if its different
a questioning of their current sexual orientation, an openness to future changes in sexual
from what you might tell
other people? orientation, or a not-quite-exclusive same-sex attraction that defies traditional lesbian or
bisexual categories (Diamond, 2008a).
For a while, people thought that many women experienced a temporary state of same-sex
attractions, but this is not so (Diamond, 2003a). In a study of nonheterosexual women who
were interviewed over a period of 8 years, from late adolescence into their young adulthood,
Lisa Diamond identified three distinct groups of women. Some women were consistent in
how they labeled themselves, either as lesbian (stable lesbians) or not (stable nonlesbians).
Note that these stable nonlesbians were behaving as bisexuals, experiencing attraction to
women and men, but were not labeling themselves as such. However, a third group, which
Diamond called fluid lesbians, alternated between the two identities, sometimes identifying
themselves as lesbians and sometimes not using a label at all, despite having attractions to
THINK ABOUT IT women and men. Table 12.1 shows the percentage of participants who changed their identity
Is sexual orientation best over time.
thought of as one dimension To illustrate, one participant reported that at the start of the study she was lesbian and
(sameness or otherness of 100% attracted to women. However, after 2 years she reported being lesbian and only 90%
partner) or two dimensions
attracted to women. By the fifth year, she was reluctant to label herself as anything and reported
(sameness or otherness of
partner and flexibility)? that her attraction to other women was about 70%. By the eighth year of the study, she was only
50% attracted to women and refused to label herself.
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 351

Table 12.1 Sexual Identity Transitions of Young Women

Category Defections Adoptions
Lesbian 25% 19%
Bisexual 33 23
Unlabeled 33 37
Heterosexual 10 21

Sources: From Savin-Willams (2007, Table 2.2, p. 41); data from Diamond (2003a). Savin-
Williams, R. C. (2007). The new gay teenager. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Stable nonlesbians and fluid lesbians—people who are behaving in a bisexual manner
or having bisexual attractions but not labeling themselves as bisexual—were more likely
to agree with the statement: “I’m the kind of person that is attracted to the person rather
than their gender” (Diamond, 2003a, p. 126). In light of how women’s attractions shifted
over time and how the women themselves avoid labels, Diamond (2005) suggested that
the sexual categories of lesbian and bisexual do not account for nonheterosexual women’s
experiences and should be abandoned. Instead, Diamond (2003a) recommended that we
think of sexual orientation and flexibility, what she called fluidity, as two separate dimen-
sions of individual difference.
This fluidity of sexual orientation explains the seemingly contradictory behavior of celebri-
ties like Wanda Sykes, Cynthia Nixon, Drew Barrymore, Angelina Jolie, Lady Gaga, and others
whose sexual orientation defies labels. Compare the stability of Ellen DeGeneres’s lesbianism
with that of her two recent partners, Anne Heche and Portia De Rossi, who were exclusively
heterosexual at one point in their lives. Women with a fluid sexual orientation are capable of
experiencing a wider range of erotic experiences and feelings than the label lesbian, bisexual,
or heterosexual implies (Diamond, 2008b).
In this chapter, we discuss what sexual orientation is, difficulties with identifying how many
people are gay, lesbian, straight or bisexual, and what determines sexual orientation. Though
psychologists from all different areas—biology, genetics, neuroscience, social, developmental—
have weighed in on this question, we are a long way from understanding one of the most inti-
mate and interesting areas of our lives: our sexuality.

Myths and Misperceptions About “The trouble with people is

not that they don’t know but
Sexual Orientation that they know so much that
ain’t so.”
Before we get started, perhaps it’s best if we establish what we know and—merely think we
American humorist Josh Billings
know—about sexual orientation. Consider the statements in Table 12.2. In fact, read them now
(1818–1885)
before you go any further.
Though all of them may seem reasonable—no doubt you know people who believe some
of these things—all of them are, in fact, false.
We saw in Chapter 11 that sex is biologically determined, that gender is socially defined,
and that people have a psychological sense of their own maleness or femaleness called gender
identity. We can add to this an additional dimension: sexual orientation. So, although a gay
man may fall in love with other men, this in no way compromises his masculinity or sense of “There’s this illusion that
himself as a man or means that he would rather be a woman. By the same token, if a particular homosexuals have sex and
lesbian woman does not care about shopping, makeup, or wearing the latest clothes, this does
heterosexuals fall in love.
not make her masculine or imply that she would rather be a man. Gay men and lesbian women
That’s completely untrue.
vary in their masculinity and femininity—and indeed, in all characteristics—in the same way
that heterosexual men and women do. Because who we feel sexual desire and emotional attach- Everybody wants to be
ment for is a fundamental part of who we are, it cannot be changed, it cannot be faked, it cannot loved.”
be taught, and we cannot convert others to our lifestyle. Boy George
352 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Table 12.2 Myths and Misperceptions About Gays, Lesbians, and Bisexuals
1. Gay men really want to be women.
2. Sexual orientation can be corrected with the proper intervention.
3. Gay and lesbian teenagers are militant activists.
4. Gays and lesbians are at higher risk for suicide, alcoholism, and other problems than the gen-
eral population.
5. Same-sex sexuality is a mental illness.
6. Gay men are likely to be child molesters.
7. Being gay or lesbian is just a phase.
8. Bisexuality is just a phase.
9. All gay men will die of HIV/AIDS.
10. Gay men are only interested in sex and do not care about long-term relationships.
11. Gay men are feminine.
12. Lesbians are masculine.
13. Bisexual people are confused.
14. Bisexuals are more promiscuous than straight people and cannot remain faithful or
monogamous.
15. Very few people have feelings for a person of the same sex.
16. Homosexuality doesn’t exist in nature.
17. Gay men and lesbians should not be allowed to teach in elementary or high schools because
they will try to convert their students to a gay lifestyle.
18. Gay men are more similar to women than to other men.
19. Lesbians are more similar to men than to other women.
20. You can tell who is gay or lesbian by the way they dress and look.
21. People become gay, lesbian, or bisexual because of childhood sexual abuse.
22. Gay parents raise only gay children.
23. Gay and lesbian people are inherently areligious and immoral.
24. Bisexuality is just a transitional phase on the way to being gay or lesbian.
25. Gay men frequently rape straight men, or want to.
26. Lesbians really want to be men.
27. Gays, lesbians, and bisexuals should not be considered a protected minority because they
could just act straight in public.
Note: Every one of these statements is false.

The Personality of Everyday Life

The heteronormativity of American life
It is not easy to be a nonheterosexual person in the world today. Most, if not all, cultures
view heterosexuality as the natural, correct, and normal way to be (Berlant & Warner,
1998; Herek, 2010). This view is called normative heterosexuality or heteronormativity.
Heterosexuality is taken for granted and provides people with distinct legal, political, and
social advantages in American society (Herek, 2010).
For example, unmarried partners are not allowed in emergency rooms during a
life-and-death emergency because they have no legal rights to be present at the bedside
of a loved one, nor can they make important health decisions if their partner is inca-
pacitated. Marriage gives husbands and wives a number of legal rights in many states,
such as inheritance, social security, health insurance, next-of-kin rights, and access to
private health status information of a partner. Some religions and moral convictions
condemn same-sex sexuality, but is it fair to deny civil rights to people based on their
sexual orientation?
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 353

Of course, partner rights and same-sex marriage laws are working to change all this,
and there is evidence that the attitudes of Americans are becoming less antihomosexual,
more tolerant, and increasingly accepting of same-sex relations. According to a poll by the
National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago, the percentage of
Americans who believe that sexual relations between adults of the same sex is always wrong
dropped from 74% in 1973 to 55% in 2002. Still, nonheterosexuals face social rejection,
prejudice, and discrimination (Davis, Smith, & Marsden, 2010).
As a result, adolescents and adults who are not heterosexual face greater challenges and
difficulties including higher levels of depression, anxiety, substance use, and suicidality than
their heterosexual peers (Meyer, 2003). However, there is evidence that this is changing and that
young people today are less concerned with labeling their sexuality and instead are living not
as a “gay person” but as a person who happens to be gay or lesbian, facing the same challenges
about dating, friends, classes, and parents as their peers (Savin-Williams, 2007).

“You know what, I am

What Is Sexual Orientation? gay, but my sexuality has
Until the sex researcher Alfred Kinsey came along in the 1940s, people thought that a person’s never been my defining
sexual orientation could be classified into one of two or maybe three (at most!) boxes: hetero- quality. . . . It’s just a fact. My
sexual, homosexual, and bisexual. From interviewing 5,300 males (Kinsey, Pomeroy, & Martin, life is defined by my friends
1948) and 5,940 females (Kinsey, Pomeroy, Martin, & Gebhard, 1953) about their sexual history,
and by my interests, and
Kinsey and his researchers realized that sexual behavior occurred more on a continuum, from
exclusively heterosexual at one end to exclusively homosexual at the other (Kinsey et al., 1948, I happen to be passionate
1953; see Figure 12.1). about good design.”
Before Kinsey conducted this research, people believed that a person’s sexual orientation Thom Filicia, designer on the
followed from his or her personality: People assumed that a feminine man was gay and that a Bravo TV show Queer Eye for the
masculine woman was lesbian. Though there is a slight correlation between sexual orientation Straight Guy as quoted in Finn
and masculinity–femininity and gender-related interests (Lippa, 2005b), personality, or gender (2004, p. B2)
identity more specifically, is a separate dimension from sexual attraction and desire. That is,
being a feminine man or a masculine woman doesn’t make a person gay or lesbian; these are THINK ABOUT IT
unfortunate stereotypes that persist today.
Although Kinsey conducted his sexual history interviews with great care and precision, What’s the difference
using an elaborate coding system to protect the identities of his participants, he was guilty between classifying sexual
orientation as a box or as a
of biased sampling. He often recruited people with unusual sexual practices to become continuum?
part of his study. Given the times—he collected data between 1938 and 1949—the kind

Same-sex marriage gives gay

and lesbian couples the same
legal rights as heterosexual
couples including making
health decisions, inheritance,
social security, health
insurance, and next-of-kin
rights.
354 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Heterosexual

Homosexual
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Ratings

Figure 12.1 The Kinsey Heterosexual-Homosexual Scale. Alfred Kinsey and his researchers used
this scale to rate participants on what proportion of his or her psychological reactions and/or overt
behavior was heterosexual and homosexual:
1 = Largely heterosexual, but with incidental homosexual history
2 = Largely heterosexual, but with a distinct homosexual history
3 = Equally heterosexual and homosexual
4 = Largely homosexual but with a distinct heterosexual history
5 = Largely homosexual but with incidental heterosexual history
6 = Entirely homosexual
Source: Kinsey et al. (1948, Figure 161, p. 638). Reprinted with permission from Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy,
W. B., & Martin, C. E. (1948), Sexual behavior in the human male, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University
Press. Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.

of people who were willing to talk about their sexual histories were probably more open
about sexuality than the average person. As a result, many researchers believe that Kinsey’s
estimates of how often same-sex sexuality occurs in the general population is probably an
THINK ABOUT IT overestimate (Pomeroy, 1972).
Kinsey was correct in realizing that sexual orientation occurs on a continuum; however, it
Can one have a sexual is much more fluid and far less fixed than his system suggested. As we saw in the opening study
orientation without having
a sexual experience?
of this chapter, the sex drive of women is more flexible than men’s (Baumeister, 2000), and
women may shift their sexual orientation over the course of their lives (Diamond, 2007, 2008a).
Another criticism of the Kinsey scale is that sexual orientation includes more than behav-
ior. After all, a person has a sexual orientation even if he or she has yet to have a sexual experi-
ence. Sexual orientation has many aspects, encompassing thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and
identity. For example, Klein, Sepekoff, and Wolf (1985) measured sexual orientation through
sexual attraction, sexual behaviors, sexual fantasies, emotional preferences, social preferences,
self-identifications, and lifestyles across a person’s past, present, and ideal life. Researchers today
define sexual orientation as the prevalence of erotic arousals, feelings, fantasies, and behaviors
one has for males, females, or both (Savin-Williams, 2006). Sexual orientation may be expressed
in sexual attraction, sexual behavior, or sexual identity.
Sexual attraction includes thoughts, feelings, wants, or desires for sexual relations or to be
in a loving sexual relationship with another person; it does not include behavior. Many people
have feelings, thoughts, or fantasies of being intimate with another person without acting on
those feelings. All of these are aspects of sexual attraction (Savin-Williams, 2006).
Sexual behavior refers to a person’s actions, that is, those sexual activities they have
actually engaged in. This may include any genital contact and sexual excitement, with or
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 355

without intercourse or orgasm, occur-

ring with mutual consent of both partners
(Savin-Williams, 2006).
Finally, sexual identity includes
labels people associate with their sexual-
ity, whether personally selected or socially
ascribed. Recall from Chapter 5 that iden-
tity includes interpersonal aspects (e.g.,
roles, relationship), potentialities (e.g., who
we might become), and values (e.g., morals,
priorities) (Baumeister, 1986). All of these
aspects of identity are inherent in the labels
of gay, lesbian, bi, and straight. Identifying
oneself with one of these labels is as much
a political statement as a psychological one
(Savin-Williams, 2007).
To illustrate these different facets of
sexual orientation, imagine a young woman
coming out to her parents. How might their For many young people self-
reaction differ depending on what she says? identifying as gay, lesbian, or
bi means taking on a social
Mom, Dad . . . identity as well as a sexual
one.
I’m attracted to girls.
I’m dating girls.
I’m having sex with girls.
I’m a lesbian. SEE FOR YOURSELF
When did you become
Each of these statements reveals a different aspect of her sexual orientation (Savin-Williams,
aware of your sexual orien-
2007, p. 64). tation? Was it a conscious
Thinking of sexual orientation as encompassing these three aspects can help us under- choice, or something you
stand sexual orientation in other cultures. In many cultures, people can engage in sexual just knew?
behaviors and express a range of sexual desires without being labeled gay, lesbian, or bisexual
(Peplau, 2001). In Sumatra, they call a woman who acts like a man a tomboi, from the English
“tomboy.” A tomboi sees herself as a man, acts like a man, and is attracted to a traditionally THINK ABOUT IT
feminine woman. However, there is no special label for the lover of a tomboi; she is con-
sidered the same as other women in the culture (Blackwood, 2000). Similarly, among the Why should a culture’s
tolerance of same-sex
Mojave Indians, as long as a woman adequately performed the traditional male social role,
behavior be different for a
she could choose to live as a man and even marry a woman. Her wife, often a traditionally man than for a woman?
feminine woman in the tribe, is not considered homosexual or cross-gendered (Blackwood,
1984, discussed in Peplau, 2001).
Consider another example: 168 of the 250 Native American languages still spoken in the
United States contain terms for people who are not considered male or female. Instead, these
people contain two spirits: a male and a female one. They might dress and act as either male
or female, and have relationships, including sexual ones, with a man or a woman, and they can
even marry a person of either gender. These people take on a spiritual-sexual identity in the
community and are considered blessed (Tafoya, 1997, discussed in Garnets, 2002).
Cultures can also vary in their acceptance of same-sex behavior. For example, African
American communities in the United States are less tolerant of same-sex behavior, especially
among men (Greene, 2000; Icard, 1996). Similarly, Latin American cultures are less tolerant of
same-sex behavior than Anglo culture, particularly among women (Gonzales & Espin, 1996).
In still other cultures, there are different standards for what constitutes homosexuality. In
Mexico, two men who are engaged in sexual relationship take on one of two exclusive roles in
the relationship: either the receptive partner or the inserting partner. The receptive partner is
considered feminine, unmanly and gay; the inserting partner is considered masculine and is not
labeled as gay (Magaña & Carrier, 1991). A similar distinction occurs in many Arab cultures,
356 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

like Egypt, for example (Miller, 1992). Often the inserting partner in Mexican or Arab cultures
later marries and raises a family and is considered heterosexual; he would never be called or
even label himself bisexual despite his earlier behavior.

“I’m not bisexual or

homosexual, I’m just sexual.” How Many People Are Gay, Lesbian,
Female participant in the study by
Diamond (2005, p. 126)
Straight, or Bisexual?
Given our discussion of what constitutes homosexuality in other cultures, you can see how
this seemingly straightforward question, in practice, is not so easy to answer. The percentage
of people who consider themselves gay, lesbian, straight, or bisexual varies depending on how
the question is worded (see Table 12.3). Even then, many surveys fail to ask what percentage of
respondents’ attractions or behaviors are toward one sex or the other leading to possible incon-
sistencies and errors of classification between studies (Savin-Williams, 2006). Further, even
within a single study, people’s classifications can shift depending on whether the survey refers
to attraction, behavior, or identity. In one study, only about 20% of gay and lesbian adults in the
THINK ABOUT IT United States were consistently classified as gay or lesbian on all three dimensions, according
Are these problems with to Savin-Williams (2006, reporting data collected by Laumann, Gagnon, Michael, & Michaels,
defining sexual orientation 1994). Asking about same-sex attractions elicits the greatest prevalence whereas asking about
due to methodological identification elicits the least. However, only a very small percentage of people who report any
problems or to something
same-sex attractions or engage in any same-sex behavior self-identify as gay or lesbian. People
fundamental about sexual
orientation? who call themselves gay or lesbian are actually a very small, and perhaps exceptional, fraction
of the general population (Savin-Williams, 2006).
These differing definitions of what counts as gay, lesbian, bisexual, and heterosexual can
explain the wide range of estimates of sexual orientation across studies. Alfred Kinsey and
his associates reported the largest estimate. They found that 37% of men and 13% of women
recounted at least one adult sexual experience with another member of the same sex that resulted
in orgasm. However, far few people—4% of men and 3% of women—reported being lifelong
homosexuals (Kinsey et al., 1948, 1953). The 37% figure made for sensational headlines back in
the day, but as we saw, was probably an overestimate of what occurs in the general population.
More recently, the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chi-
cago conducted a more extensive and better designed survey of sexual behavior in the United
States (Laumann et al., 1994). They used sound scientific sampling methods and face-to-face
interviews, followed up by anonymous questionnaires to find out about the sexual behavior
of American adults aged 18 to 59, including a large representative sample of ethnic minorities.
According to the National Health and Social Life Survey (NHSLS), about 0.9% and 0.4% of
men and women report having had same-sex relations since age 18, yet 2% of men and 0.9%
of women self-identify as gay or lesbian. Similarly, 4% of men and 3.7% of women report

Table 12.3 Prevalence of Homosexuality Among Females and Males in Four Countries According
to Component of Sexual Orientation
Attraction Behavior Identity
Country and Population Female Male Female Male Female Male
United States: Young adults 13% 5% 4% 3% 4% 3%
United States: Adults 8 8 4 9 1 2
Australia: Adults 17 15 8 16 4 7
Turkey: Young adults 7 6 4 5 2 2
Norway: Adolescents 21 9 7 6 5 5
Note: Numbers indicate percentage of sample endorsing that response.
Source: Adapted from Savin-Willams (2006, Table 2, p. 41). Reprinted with permission from Savin-Williams, R. C. (2006),“Who’s gay?
Does it matter?,” Current Directions in Psychological Science, 15(1), 40–44. Permission conveyed through the Copyright Clearance Center.
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 357

Table 12.4 Sexual Behavior, Attraction, and Identity Among Men and Women
Men Women
Sexual Behavior
No partners, last year 10.5% 13.3%
Opposite-gender partners only, last year 86.8 85.4
Same-gender partners only, last year 2.0 1.0
Both male and female partners, last year 0.7 0.3
No partners since age 18 3.8 3.4
Opposite-gender partners only since age 18 91.3 92.5
Same-gender partners only since age 18 0.9 0.4
Both male and female partners since age 18 4.0 3.7
Sexual Attraction
Only opposite gender 93.8% 95.6%
Mostly opposite gender 2.6 2.7
Both genders 0.6 0.8
Mostly same gender 0.7 0.6
Only same gender 2.4 0.3
Sexual Identity
Heterosexual 96.9% 98.6%
Bisexual 0.8 0.5
Gay/lesbian 2.0 0.9
Other 0.3 0.1
Note: Numbers indicate percentage of sample endorsing that response.
Source: Adapted from Laumann et al. (1994, Table 8.3A and 8.3B, p. 311). From Laumann, E. O., Gagnon, J. H., Michael, R. T., &
Michaels, S. (1994),“The social organization of sexuality: Sexual practices in the United States,” Chicago, IL: University of Chicago
Press. Copyright © 1994. Used with permission.

having sex with both men and women since age 18; yet only 0.8% of men and 0.5% of women
self-identify as bisexual (Laumann et al., 1994; see Table 12.4). Still, it is possible that these
figures underestimate the actual figures if people are reluctant to reveal same-sex attractions
and behaviors due to the stigma associated with these activities in our culture.
In a 2002 update of this survey, 6% of men and 11.2% of women aged 15 to 44 reported
having any same-sex sexual contact ever in their lives, but only 2.3% of men and 1.3% of
women gave their sexual orientation as gay or lesbian. Only 1.8% of men and 2.8% of women
said they were bisexual (Smith, 2006a).

What Determines Sexual Orientation? “Love does not have an

orientation of its own.”
Until very recently, the research on sexual orientation has been colored by three assumptions. Researcher Lisa M. Diamond
First, many theories take a heteronormative view and assume that different-sex sexuality is the (2003b, p. 174)
norm and same-sex sexuality is an exception or abnormality that must be explained. Refresh-
ingly, current theories focus more on the orientation part, or what drives sexual arousal or
attraction, and less on the sameness or otherness of the partner eventually chosen. Second,
scientists have assumed that the same processes operate on men and women and have looked
for theories that can explain the orientation of both gay men and lesbians. Again, newer theories
suggest that given the large differences in sexuality of males and females—recall our discussion
from Chapter 11—perhaps the causes of sexual orientation are different in males and females
too (Chivers, 2005; Peplau, 2003). Finally, researchers are also starting to wonder if, at least
in men, there is not just one type of same-sex sexuality, but many types, each determined by
358 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

different factors (Bell, 1974). That is, social factors might explain why some men are gay but
genetic factors might account for the orientation of others.
Do differences in sexual orientation reflect differences in social experiences, differences in
biological factors unrelated to social experiences, or both? Let’s take a closer look at biological,
social, and interactionist theories.

Biological Explanations of Sexual Orientation

THINK ABOUT IT Evolution. Same-sex sexuality presents a Darwinian paradox: If gays and lesbians repro-
Because there is a genetic duce less than heterosexuals, how is this trait maintained in the population (Ciani, Corna,
component to same-sex & Capiluppi, 2004)? There are at least three possible solutions to this problem: male alliance
sexuality, then what is the theory (Muscarella, 2006), the kin altruism hypothesis (Confer et al., 2010; Wilson, 1978), and
evolutionary advantage of increased female reproductive success (Ciani et al., 2004).
same-sex sexuality? Some have reasoned that male–male sexual behavior evolved as a way of regulating
dominance–submission and of forming alliances among a group of males living together,
both of which increase survival and reproductive success of males (Muscarella, 2006). How-
ever, the alliance theory can’t account for exclusive male same-sex behavior, nor does it apply
to the same-sex behavior of women. To date, the evidence for this theory has been indirect;
no studies have been conducted testing the theory.
From an evolutionary perspective, genes that code for behaviors that are important for an
individual’s or species’ survival will be selected and genetically passed on. However, people who
do not reproduce do not directly pass on their genes. So, how did same-sex sexuality survive
natural selection? According to the kin altruism hypothesis of male same-sex sexuality, gay men
adapt by shifting from investing in offspring to investing in next of kin, such as the children of
their sisters and brothers (Confer et al., 2010; Wilson, 1978).
The evidence for this hypothesis is weak, at best. In one study, gay men and heterosexual
men and women in Samoa were asked how willing they would be to engage in various activities
for their nieces and nephews or for an unrelated child living nearby. Activities included baby-
sitting, buying toys for the child, tutoring the child, helping expose the child to art and music,
and contributing money toward the child’s welfare. Gay men were more willing to engage in
these behaviors toward nieces and nephews than were heterosexual women or men. However,
all three groups showed the same low levels of willingness to help nonkin. Because only the
gay men showed higher willingness to help kin than nonkin, it suggests that same-sex sexuality
does pay off. Gay men become “helpers-in-the-nest” caring for their nieces and nephews and
increasing their fitness indirectly (Vasey & VanderLaan, 2010).
However, another study in the United States comparing not just the willingness to help
nieces and nephews, as in the Samoan study, but actual altruistic behaviors found no evidence
for the kin altruism theory (Bobrow & Bailey, 2001). They found there was no difference
between gay and straight men, of comparable income level, in their willingness to give financial
or emotional resources to family members or in the willingness to channel resources toward
THINK ABOUT IT nieces and nephews. More importantly, there was also no difference in altruistic behaviors,
Notice that these three including giving monetary resources to family members over the past year. If anything, gay
theories attempt to explain men tended to feel more distant and estranged from their families than heterosexual men
male sexual orientation. (Bobrow & Bailey, 2001).
How might an evolution- Based on the available evidence, there is no evidence for the kin selection theory of same-
ary explanation account for
sex sexuality (Confer et al., 2010). However, another way that evolutionary forces could have
the same-sex orientation of
females? selected for same-sex sexuality is if somehow the gene or genes that code for same-sex sexuality
also code for the greater reproductive success of relatives (Ciani et al., 2004).
Two recent studies in Italy found evidence for an increase in the fertility of female relatives of
gay men. Maternal relatives of gay men, that is, their aunts and mothers, had more children than
the aunts and mothers of heterosexual men, even after controlling for differences in family size
(Ciani et al., 2004; Iemmola & Ciani, 2009). Maternal relatives of gay men averaged 2.17 children
whereas the maternal relatives of straight men averaged 1.83 children (Ciani et al., 2004). There
was no difference in the number of children of fathers and uncles or grandparents of gay and
straight men.
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 359

Table 12.5 Concordance Rate of Same-Sex Orientation

Sibling Men Women
Identical twin 52% 48%
Fraternal twin 22 16
Biological (nontwin) sibling 9.2 14
Adopted (nonbiological) sibling 11 6
Note: Numbers indicate percentage of sample with a gay or lesbian sibling as a function of relationship.
Sources: Bailey et al. (1993); Bailey & Pillard (1991).

In addition, there are more gay relatives among a gay man’s mother’s extended family than
among his father’s side of the family, a pattern that is not found in the families of heterosexual
men (Ciani et al., 2004; Iemmola & Ciani, 2009). Gay men were also less likely to be firstborns
than heterosexual men and to have more older brothers. These findings suggest that same-sex
sexuality, in males, is genetic and transmitted at least partially through the X chromosome
(Iemmola & Ciani, 2009). Scientists have not theorized an evolutionary explanation for female
same-sex sexuality.

Genetics. In addition to the findings just discussed, other studies suggest that part of the
variation in same-sex orientation is accounted for by genetic variance (Bailey & Pillard, 1991;
Bailey, Pillard, Neale, & Agyei, 1993; Kendler, Thorton, Gilman, & Kessler, 2000; Kirk, Bailey,
Dunne, & Martin, 2000). In a study of gay men and their twin brothers (Bailey & Pillard, 1991)
and lesbian women and their twin sisters (Bailey et al., 1993), there was a much greater chance
that an identical twin than a fraternal twin or an adopted sibling would be gay or lesbian as
well (see Table 12.5). The researchers estimated that the heritability, or proportion of variance
in same-sex orientation that is accounted for by genetic variation, was 0.31 to 0.74 in gay men
and 0.40 to 0.76 in lesbian women. More recent research gives a narrower estimate of herita-
bility of same-sex sexual behavior in men as 0.34 to 0.39 and in women as 0.18 to 0.19, with
unique, nonshared environmentality estimates of 0.61 to 0.66 in men and 0.64 to 0.66 in women
(Långström, Rahman, Carlström, & Lichtenstein, 2010).

The concordance rate of

sexual orientation suggests a
strong genetic component in
addition to an environmental
component.
360 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

These findings suggest that there is a moderate genetic component to same-sex orienta-
tion and that the impact of genetics is stronger in men than in women. However, because the
concordance rate in identical twins—those with identical genetic material—is not 100%, this
suggests that there is a substantial impact of environmental factors on same-sex orientation as
THINK ABOUT IT well. In particular, nonshared environments, including both social and biological ones, have a
moderate to large effect on sexual orientation (Långström et al., 2010).
What is the controversy
Building on these results, Michael Bailey and his colleagues found evidence that two aspects
over finding a so-called gay
gene? of same-sex sexuality also have a genetic component: childhood gender nonconformity and
adult masculinity–femininity (Bailey, Dunne, & Martin, 2000).
As we saw in Chapter 6, research on human genetics is often misunderstood. Though
research teams are trying to identify the exact gene responsible for sexual orientation, the results
to date are inconsistent (Bailey et al., 1999; Bailey & Pillard, 1995; Hammer, Hu, Magnuson, Hu,
& Pattatucci, 1993; Marshall, 1995; McKnight & Malcolm, 2000; Rice, Anderson, Risch, & Ebers,
1999). In their exuberance over a possible “gay gene” people tend to forget that the environment
accounts for a large part of the variance in same-sex orientation as well. Any gene associated
with sexual orientation will only confer a predisposition rather than definitively cause same-sex
or different sex-orientation (Mustanski & Bailey, 2003).

Brain Structures. Only a handful of studies have investigated whether parts of the brain
differ between people with a same-sex orientation and those with a different-sex orientation
(Allen & Gorski, 1992; Byne et al., 2001; LeVay, 1991; Swaab & Hofman, 1990). Sadly, these
studies have a small number of participants, inconsistent findings, and a noticeable lack of
women, lesbians in particular, making it difficult to draw conclusions. However, the most
promising—and controversial—study found sex and sexual orientation differences in the
hypothalamus (LeVay, 1991). Because the hypothalamus is the center for many kinds of sexual
behavior, differences between people here may be related to differences in sexual arousal,
reproduction, gender identity, gender identity disorders, and sexual orientation (Swaab, 2005).
LeVay (1991) studied the brain tissue of 18 men who were gay and died of AIDS, 16 men
who were presumed to be heterosexual (6 died of AIDS), and 6 women who were presumed
heterosexual (1 died of AIDS). He replicated a previous finding and verified that the third
interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus (called INAH-3) was less than half as large in
heterosexual women as in heterosexual men. However, his real discovery was that the INAH-3
of gay men was indistinguishable from that of heterosexual women and was also half the size
of heterosexual men. Despite the difference in volume of the INAH-3 in gay and straight men
there was no difference in the number of neurons found in this area. A later study replicated
and extended these findings in gay men, straight men, and straight women (Byne et al., 2001).
This research came under intense scrutiny and was criticized on methodological grounds. The
major critique was that AIDS, and not sexual orientation, could have caused the difference between
the INAH-3 of the gay and straight men. However, LeVay (1991) still found a significant difference
even when he compared only the brains of gay men with the straight men who had died from AIDS.
A second criticism concerned the heterosexual men. Because their orientation was not
assessed directly and merely presumed, they could have been gay or bisexual. However, if this
were the case, then LeVay (1991) would have actually ended up underestimating the true differ-
ence between the INAH-3 of gay and straight men. That is, mislabeling these men as straight
would have only made it harder for him to find a difference.
Third, a major omission of the LeVay (1991) study and other studies in this area (e.g., Swaab
& Hofman, 1990) is that they did not include lesbian women. To gain a complete picture of sexual
orientation we need to study both men and women, of various orientations including bisexual.
Finally, there is no way to tell if these men were gay because they had smaller sections of
THINK ABOUT IT the hypothalamus, or if being gay causes this part of the hypothalamus to develop smaller, or if
some other neurohormonal process influences both sexual orientation and brain structure, as
Why might there be may be the case with other areas of the brain (Allen & Gorski, 1992). That is, we cannot infer
difference in brain structures
causality from this kind of correlational study. We need larger, more extensive—and inclusive—
between gay and straight
men? studies, using the latest noninvasive techniques from neuroscience including PET scans and
MRIs to understand these initial findings (Bailey, 2003).
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 361

Ultimately the question remains, why do differences in brain structures between gay and
straight men occur? Newer research on prenatal hormone exposure and maternal immune
response, which we shall cover shortly, suggests a possible mechanism by which these brain
differences develop (Blanchard & Bogaert, 1996). Exposure to prenatal hormones during a
critical period may affect the development of brain structures that influence sexual orientation
(Bailey, 2003).

Prenatal Factors. Hormonal Theories One early view of sexual orientation was that
circulating levels of hormones determined choice of sexual partner (Mustanski, Chivers, &
Bailey, 2002). Research soon found that there is no difference in circulating levels of male
hormones between gay and heterosexual men (Meyer-Bahlburg, 1984). Experimentally regu- THINK ABOUT IT
lated levels of male hormones appear to affect the strength, not the direction, of the sex drive Should strength of sex drive
in men (Barahal, 1940). Studies of hormones and sexual orientation in women have been be added to sameness or
inconsistent or contain methodological problems (Mustanski et al., 2002). One thing we can otherness of partner and
flexibility as a third
say for sure is that there is no causal relationship between adult hormonal status and sexual
dimension of sexual
orientation (Byne, 1995). However, there is evidence that prenatal hormones may indirectly orientation?
affect later sexual orientation.
During prenatal development, all embryos start out developing exactly the same. At around
the 7th week, the chromosomes direct the gonads (testes and ovaries) to begin sexual differen-
tiation. Once the ovaries and testes have formed, they begin to produce different sex hormones
that continue the development of the rest of the internal and external sex characteristics (Hyde
& DeLamater, 2006). From 7 to 24 weeks of development and peaking at the 18th week, sex
hormones also impact development of the brain. Exposure to prenatal hormones during this
critical period affects the development of certain brain structures that appear to influence
sexual orientation (Bailey, 2003). Prenatal sex hormones may affect later brain development
and sexual development.
Based on animal experiments and human studies of endocrine disorders present at birth, it
appears that masculine hormones (e.g., testosterone and similar substances, called androgens)
regulate sexual behavior, potential attraction to females, and the brain structures that support
these behaviors. High androgen exposure during a critical period of prenatal development is
thought to be associated with heterosexuality in men and same-sex sexuality in women, whereas
low androgen exposure may be associated with same-sex sexuality in men and heterosexuality
in women (Bailey, 2003; Ellis & Ames, 1987). However, other studies found that women who
had prenatal exposure to high levels of the female hormone estrogen were more likely to be
classified as bisexual or lesbian than women without such exposure (Meyer-Bahlburg, 1997;
Meyer-Bahlburg et al., 1995). The idea that androgens regulate the sexual differentiation of
brain structures in humans is generally accepted; why it happens during development remains
speculative (Bailey, 2003).
Currently, science lacks the technology to monitor these prenatal hormones so we cannot
directly correlate later sexual orientation with events that occurred during development in the
womb (Mustanski et al., 2002). However, as an alternative we can indirectly see the effect of
prenatal hormones by studying traits thought to be affected by them, such as characteristics
and behaviors typical of the other sex including cross-gender interests (Berenbaum & Snyder,
1995) and physical markers (Ellis & Ames, 1987). Physical markers indicative of one sex or the
other have included dermatoglyphics (fingerprint ridge patterns), otoacoustic emissions (faint
sounds generated by the inner ear), waist-to-hip ratio, spatial ability, finger length ratio, and
handedness. Though all of these have some association with sexual orientation, only cross-
gender behavior, finger length ratio, and handedness produce the most consistent and reliable
results (Lippa, 2003; see Mustanski et al., 2002, for a review).

Gender Nonconformity. Early research on sexuality hypothesized that gays and lesbians
have a gender inversion. People believed that a biological defect occurred during development
that turned a male into a female and a female into a male in both psychological characteristics
and body type (Ellis, 1928; Krafft-Ebing, 1908/1986). Sigmund Freud even described psycholog-
ical processes that could lead to gender inversion and same-sex attractions (Freud, 1915/2000).
362 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Obviously, this very simplistic view of sexual orientation and gender identity is wrong (Peplau,
Spalding, Conley, & Veniegas, 1999). However, there is some truth to the notion that gay men
are more similar to women than to other men, and lesbians are more similar to men than to
other women but only when it comes to career interests and hobbies, not to personality.
One study investigated the difference between men and women, both gay or lesbian and
straight, in career interests, hobbies, instrumentality, expressivity, masculinity and femininity,
characteristics known to differ between the genders (Lippa, 2000). There were significant sex
and sexual orientation differences in this college student population.
First, there was no evidence for the gender inversion hypothesis. The overall pattern did
not indicate that the personalities of gay men were more like women or that the personalities of
lesbian women were more like men. Despite significant differences in masculinity, femininity,
instrumental traits, and expressive traits, the overall pattern suggests that gay men were more
similar to straight men than to straight women, and lesbians were more similar to straight
women than to straight men. That is, people tend to be similar in personality to others of their
sex, regardless of their sexual orientation.
For example, although gay men scored the same as straight men on expressive traits, they
scored lower on instrumentality. Lesbian women scored the same as straight women on instru-
mental traits, but they scored lower on expressive traits. Gay men and lesbians fell in between
straight men and straight women on measures of occupational interest, hobbies, masculinity,
and femininity. That is, gay men and lesbians are less masculine than straight men but not
as low in masculinity as straight women. Gay men and lesbians are also more feminine than
straight men, but not as feminine as straight women.
Other studies have found similar effects using the five factors. Although lesbian women
scored higher on Openness and lower on Neuroticism than straight women, they were not
more similar to straight men in their NEO-PI-R profile. However, gay men were more similar
to women, scoring significantly higher than straight men on Neuroticism, Openness, Agreeable-
ness, and Conscientiousness factors of the NEO-PI-R (Lippa, 2005b).
Second, regardless of sexual orientation, men scored higher than women on the more tra-
ditionally masculine measures of personality and women scored higher than men on the more
traditionally feminine measures of personality. The difference between gay and straight men
and between lesbian and straight women was the greatest in interests and hobbies, followed by
self-ascribed masculinity and femininity. The differences were the lowest on instrumental and
expressive traits (Lippa, 2000).
Finally, gay men and lesbians were more similar to the other gender in their interests
and hobbies. Lesbians, compared to heterosexual women, and straight men, compared to gay
men, were less likely to show interest in becoming a beauty consultant, interior decorator,

In men, but not in women,

gender nonconformity as a
child is related to adult sexual
orientation.
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 363

fashion model, or grade school teacher, but were more interested in becoming a poet, car- THINK ABOUT IT
penter, computer programmer, or jet pilot. There was no difference in preference for gender-
neutral occupations such as lawyer, physician, newspaper reporter, or psychologist. Later While growing up, did you
studies confirmed these findings: Having gender nonconforming interests and hobbies as a enjoy any toys or activities
typically associated with the
child or teenager shows the highest correlation with sexual orientation as an adult, but hav- other gender?
ing instrumental or expressive traits does not correlate with sexual orientation as an adult
(Lippa, 2000, 2002, 2005b).
Although there is no evidence for the gender inversion hypothesis of personality traits,
the research does suggest that gender nonconformity of behaviors and interests during child-
hood is related to sexual orientation as an adult. Indeed, a meta-analysis of 41 retrospective THINK ABOUT IT
studies found that adults with same-sex attractions recalled substantially more cross-sex-typed Might differences between
behavior in childhood than heterosexual adults, and this was especially true for gay men (Bailey traditional boys’ and girls’
& Zucker, 1995). Even as children and adolescents, men who would grow up to be gay often toys and hobbies like
felt that their interests and activities did not fit in with those of their male playmates (Green, moving parts, challenge,
1987; Zucker, 1990). However, whereas gender nonconformity during childhood is one of the outdoors, activity level, and
so on make boy’s activities
strongest predictors of a man’s adult sexual orientation (Bailey & Zucker, 1995), no research more fun and appealing to
has followed lesbians from girlhood into adulthood to see if this is predictive of women’s adult both boys and girls?
sexual orientation as well (Bailey & Zucker, 1995; Peplau & Huppin, 2008).
Gender nonconformity in girls often takes the form of being a tomboy, the name given
to girls who like traditional boy games and activities (Peplau et al., 1999). Lesbian women in
the United States, the Philippines, Brazil, and Peru all reported more gender nonconformity
in childhood than heterosexual women. Lesbians in these countries were more likely to play
with boys’ toys and to be labeled as a tomboy by others (Whitam & Mathy, 1991). However,
being a tomboy was not predictive of adult sexual orientation: the overwhelming majority of
tomboys grow up to be heterosexual women (Bailey & Zucker, 1995). This was even true for
women who showed extreme gender nonconformity as children.
How is it that childhood gender nonconformity is a poor predictor of adult sexual orienta-
tion in women? First, women have more latitude to explore cross-gender behavior than men
both in childhood and in adulthood, so that a girl faces less ostracism and rejection than a boy
would for cross-gender behavior (Peplau, Garnets, Spalding, Conley, & Veniegas, 1998). Second, THINK ABOUT IT
as mentioned, many heterosexual women recall being tomboys as children, so tomboyism may
be less related to sexual orientation in women (Peplau et al., 1998). Finally—and we’ll see hints Is gender nonconformity
determined by social
of this throughout the chapter, as we have already—women’s sexuality may be fundamentally
norms or by an individual’s
different from men’s (Baumeister, 2000). We’ll take up the question of how well these theories personality?
apply to women’s sexuality in the final section.

The majority of tomboys

grow up to be heterosexual
women.
364 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Stressors During Development Based on evidence from animal research, maternal stress
during pregnancy may feminize and demasculinize male rat progeny because of a delay in the
androgen surge necessary for proper sexual development. However, only a few studies have been
done in humans testing this notion, with some finding a significant effect of maternal stress on
males but not on females (Ellis, Ames, Peckham, & Burke, 1988), and others on females but not
on males (Bailey, Willerman, & Parks, 1991).
For example, one study involved over 7,500 male and female heterosexual, gay, lesbian, and
bisexual college students from 20 U.S. and Canadian universities and their mothers (Ellis &
Cole-Harding, 2001). Mothers were asked if they had experienced any of 76 potentially stress-
ful experiences just before, during, and just after their pregnancy, including physical stress,
health- and pregnancy-related stress, emotional or intrapersonal stress, marital and sexual
stress, nuclear family stress, extended family and friendship stress, and social or natural disaster
stress. Mothers also rated their overall stress for each month of their pregnancy and indicated
their drug, alcohol, and nicotine use.
The study found that mothers of gay men were more likely than mothers of straight men
to report stress during the first trimester of their pregnancy. Mothers of lesbian women were no
more likely to report stress during their pregnancy than mothers of straight women. There was
no relationship between alcohol or drug use during pregnancy and children’s sexual orientation,
but mothers of lesbians had greater nicotine use during the first trimester of their pregnancy
combined with higher stress in the second trimester than mothers of straight women (Ellis &
Cole-Harding, 2001).
Even though the results of this study are promising, we need to interpret them with cau-
tion. The results were based on mothers’ recollections, which could be flawed, or to demand
characteristics, because some of the mothers knew that sexual orientation of their children
was the focus of the study. Also, this is the first study to identify a link between nicotine use
and sexual orientation in women and the results need to be replicated. The researchers noted
that smoking mothers and their daughters had higher levels of testosterone than nonsmoking
mothers and their daughters. However, more research is necessary to discover if nicotine, or the
androgen testosterone, or some other variable that affects both testosterone levels and tendency
to smoke affects sexual orientation in women (Ellis & Cole-Harding, 2001).

Fraternal Birth Order and Maternal Immune Response Fraternal birth order refers
to the birth order of brothers in a family. A robust finding in numerous studies is that gay
men tend to have a larger number of older brothers than nongay men (Blanchard, 1997, 2001;
Blanchard & Sheridan, 1992; Blanchard & Zucker, 1994; Blanchard, Zucker, Bradley, & Hume,
1995). However, there is no difference in birth order or number of older male or female sib-
lings between lesbian and straight women (Blanchard, 1997, 2001). This fraternal birth order
effect in males is not due to the number of older sisters, the time interval between births, or
an artifact of the more advanced age of mothers and fathers by the time younger siblings come
along (Blanchard, 2001).
According to one estimate, 14.5 to 15.2% of gay men can attribute their sexual orientation
to this fraternal birth order effect (Cantor, Blanchard, Paterson, & Bogaert, 2002). Another
estimate suggests that each additional older brother increases the odds of same-sex attraction
by 33% (Blanchard & Bogaert, 1996). Because statistical significance is not the same as practical
significance, we are a long way from predicting the sexual orientation of a male child based on
his number of older brothers. The probability of a couple’s having a gay son rises from only 2%
for their first son to 6% for their sixth son, still an overall small probability (Blanchard, 2001).
In one test of this hypothesis, gay adolescents and children who later self-identified as
gay were matched to nongay controls. All participants were currently under treatment at a
psychiatric clinic. The children in the gay group were referred to the clinic because of cross-
gender behavior or gender identity problems, whereas the adolescents were openly gay and were
referred to the clinic for other problems. Each participant was matched to a nongay male of
the same age and the same number of siblings in the family. These control participants came
to the clinic for a range of childhood disorders, but mostly disruptive behavior disorders and
developmental disorders (Blanchard, Zucker, & Hume, 1995).
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 365

The researchers found that gay and pregay participants had a total of 149 brothers and
THINK ABOUT IT
106 sisters whereas participants in the control group had 130 brothers and 125 sisters. Statis-
tical analyses confirmed that both being later-born and having older brothers was related to Where else in this book have
being gay or pregay. Merely being in a large family or having a large number of older sisters you seen evidence of the
immune system affecting
was not related to sexual orientation. These findings suggest that same-sex orientation may
psychological processes and
be caused by prenatal factors and not childhood social factors (Blanchard, Zucker, & Hume, vice versa?
1995).
Why does this fraternal birth order effect occur? Many possible explanations have been inves-
tigated, but the one with the most support is that the male fetus provokes an immune response in
the mother. The likely suspect in this process is one of the H-Y androgens (male hormones regu-
lated by a gene on the Y chromosome), which are different enough from the mother’s antigens so
as to trigger an allergic response. According to the maternal immune hypothesis, H-Y antigens
that, by definition, are present in male but not in female fetuses get into the mother’s circulation
triggering the immune system. The mother’s antibodies react by attacking the H-Y antigen which
prevents the fetal brain from developing male-typical brain structures and behaviors. Each male
fetus increases the sensitivity of the mother’s immune system to the antigen, triggering a stronger
immune response with successive males increasing the chances that later-born male children will
be gay (Blanchard, 2001; Blanchard & Bogaert, 1996).
Both direct and indirect evidence, from a combination of human and animal research,
supports this hypothesis (see Blanchard & Klassen, 1997, for a review). Animal studies suggest
that H-Y antigens, which are necessary for male brain development, are not necessary for male
genital development. Anti-H-Y antibodies in utero have been shown to disrupt later sexual
behavior in male mice. The mother’s immune system, by attacking the H-Y antigens, disrupts
brain development—but not physical development—by diverting it from the male-typical
pathway. In humans, this may explain how a man can have a male-typical body but be attracted
to other men, have feminine characteristics, or possibly feel that he is a female “trapped” in a
man’s body, as experienced by transsexual men.
Given that the animal models are quite promising, what about evidence in humans? We
know that in humans H-Y antigens play a role in the sexual development of males and females
and that the mother’s immune system does respond to fetal H-Y antigens. Also, H-Y antigens
can cross the blood-brain barrier and move from the mother’s body into the fetus’s brain.
Finally, cytology research does show that the maternal immune response is greater to cells from
male than female children.
An interesting finding is that newborn boys with older brothers tend to have a lower
birth weight than boys with older sisters. In addition, gay men weighed even less at birth than
straight men. This suggests that earlier male pregnancies influence the development of later
male fetuses. The fetuses most strongly affected by this process as indicated by lower birth
weights also happen to be those who grow up to be gay (Blanchard, 2001).
Researchers suspect that some prenatal process—like maternal immune response—impacts
both birth weight and the sexual orientation of males. Lower birth weight may be a side effect
of maternal immune response to the developing male fetus (Blanchard, 2001). Again, direct
evidence for this comes from animal studies. The maternal immune response hypothesis sug-
gests that a growth-inhibiting process rather than a feminization process is at work. Perhaps this
is an evolutionary way of limiting the number of children later offspring can bear to ensure the
greater reproductive success of relatives. If this is the case, then why don’t mothers with many
sons produce even more gay sons (Blanchard, 2001)?
The maternal immune hypothesis cannot account for men who are gay but who do not
have older brothers. In one study, there was no difference in birth weight between firstborn gay
men and firstborn straight men, nor between gay and straight men who had older sisters only.
Because their birth weights do not show signs of maternal immune attack, there must be other
explanations for sexual orientation in addition to prenatal factors (Blanchard, 2001).
As promising as the maternal immune response hypothesis is, and how parsimoniously it
unites the findings on brain structure, there is a lack of direct evidence in humans. Obviously,
more research is necessary, and this appears to be one of the most fruitful paths for understanding
sexual behavior and sexual orientation.
366 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

THINK ABOUT IT Environmental Theories

Can sexual desire be taught? If a same-sex orientation is not due to nature, then it must be due to nurture, right? Although
the notion that we learn how to be gay or straight has intuitive appeal, it has very little research
support. Men and women are indeed socialized into gender roles, but these social pressures
push people to be heterosexual (Hyde & Jaffee, 2000). People become gay, lesbian, or bisexual
despite, not because of, socialization. Similarly, being raised by lesbian or transsexual parents
does not make children grow up to be lesbian or transsexual (Golombok, Spencer, & Rutter,
1983; Green, 1978; Kirkpatrick, Smith, & Roy, 1981). In fact, most lesbian women and gay men
were raised by heterosexual parents (Bailey & Dawood, 1998; Patterson, 1997). Not only does
socialization by peers and family have little impact on a person’s sexual orientation, but the
person himself or herself doesn’t exactly choose whom to be attracted to (Ellis, 1996).
Even studies investigating early childhood experiences of gay men and lesbians have failed
to find any evidence whatsoever for the Freudian notion that certain experiences in childhood
(e.g., domineering mother, weak father, failure to identify with same-sex parent, etc.) make
people gay or lesbian (Bell, Weinberg, & Hammersmith, 1981a; Downey & Friedman, 1998;
Magee & Miller, 1997).
Despite the fact that in our society heterosexuality is modeled and reinforced whereas
same-sex attractions are invisible and often punished, people do grow up to be gay, lesbian,
or bisexual (Bohan, 1996). No matter how hard researchers have looked, they found no child-
hood events or activities that are reliably related to later bisexual or lesbian attractions in adult
women (Bohan, 1996).

Interactionist Theories
Psychologists believe that sexual orientation is not due to biology or learning alone, but is multiply
determined, especially for women (Peplau & Garnets, 2000). These newer theories hypothesize
that people are gay, lesbian, or bisexual due to an interaction of biological and social factors.

The Exotic Becomes Erotic. One such interaction theory is Daryl Bem’s notion that what
we find unusual or exotic, piques our sexual interest, and becomes sexually attractive to us
(Bem, 1996, 1998, 2000). According to the exotic becomes erotic (EBE) theory, cultures that
emphasize the differences between men and women and organize social life, norms, and expec-
tations for behavior of children and adults around this dichotomy (e.g., S. L. Bem, 1993) end
up polarizing the genders (remember our discussion from Chapter 11 about Mars and Venus?).
The result is that the other gender becomes foreign, mysterious, and a source of interest.
According to EBE theory, biological variables such as genes do not directly cause sexual
orientation, but rather determine aspects of childhood temperament like aggression or activity
level, both of which have a strong biological basis and are greater in boys than in girls (Easton
& Enns, 1986; Else-Quest, Hyde, Goldsmith, & Van Hulle, 2006; Hyde, 1984). Children will
THINK ABOUT IT choose activities and interests on the basis of their temperament. For example, some children,
perhaps the more active or aggressive ones, will enjoy rough-and-tumble play or competitive
If a child grows up in a sports, which are male-typical behaviors. Others will prefer to socialize quietly or play with
family with girls and boys,
dolls, female-typical behaviors. Children will seek out playmates who share their interests in
will the other sex still seem
exotic to them? these activities, so that children who prefer baseball or football will choose boys to play with,
whereas children who prefer dolls or arts and crafts will choose girls.
Depending on the activities and playmates chosen, children may be conforming or non-
conforming to the gender expectations of their culture. Children who prefer same-sex play-
mates and sex-typical activities are gender conforming, whereas children who prefer other-sex
playmates and sex-atypical activities are gender nonconforming. Children who are gender con-
forming will feel different from their other-sex peers and see them as dissimilar, unfamiliar,
and exotic. But children who are gender nonconforming will feel different from their same-sex
peers and see them as dissimilar, unfamiliar, and exotic.
These feelings of differentness cause arousal, either in childhood, adolescence, or adulthood.
Bem gives the example of how a girl may feel timid, shy, and apprehensive around boys or how boys
might feel contempt in the presence of “yucky” girls. Bem also suggests that boys who face teasing
for being a “sissy boy” might come to feel anger or fear in the presence of boys. Similarly, a girl
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 367

who is teased for being a tomboy by her peers may feel anger and arousal in their presence. In both
cases, this arousal is later transformed into a sexual arousal and an attraction for same-sex peers.
The strongest piece of evidence for the EBE theory is the robust finding that more gay men
than heterosexual men were gender nonconforming as a child, a finding reviewed earlier. How-
ever, because this is not the case for women, as discussed, critics suggested that EBE theory cannot
account for sexual orientation of women (Bem, 1998; Peplau et al., 1998, 1999). Bem answered
these criticisms by analyzing data from studies of male and female, monozygotic and dizygotic
twins. He found a significant effect of genetics on gender nonconformity and indeed, in both
males and females, a direct effect of childhood gender nonconformity on adult sexual orienta-
tion (Bem, 2000, 2008). However, there was no direct effect of genetics on sexual orientation,
suggesting that the genetic influence on sexual orientation works through gender nonconformity.
EBE theory has also been criticized for failing to account for other findings on sexual
orientation (Peplau et al., 1998). For example, in a study cited by Bem (1998), most men and
women—regardless of their sexual orientation—reported that most or all of their childhood
friends, including their best friend, were of their own sex (Bell et al., 1981a; Bell, Weinberg, &
Hammersmith, 1981b). This goes against EBE theory, which assumes that gay men and lesbian
women must have spent more time among children of the other gender.
As it stands, EBE theory has identified gender nonconformity as an important childhood
precursor of adult sexual orientation. However, empirical evidence will have to determine if
the cause of this nonconformity is more social, due to conformity pressures and feeling differ-
ent; biological, due to prenatal androgens or genetics; or some combination of the two such as
gender polarization of society and children’s inborn temperament.

The Biobehavioral Model of Love and Desire: Accounting for the Experiences of “Men are lust; they lead
Women. As we have seen in this chapter, much of the research reviewed does not explain with the gonads. Women are
same-sex sexuality in women. There are many ways in which sexuality and sexual orientation is limerence; they lead with
experienced differently by women and men (Diamond, 2007). As you may recall from Chapter 11,
their hearts.”
men and women differ the most when it comes to sexuality. On average, women have lower sexual
Daryl J. Bem (1998, p. 397),
desire than men and more conservative attitudes toward premarital sex (Hyde & Oliver, 2000).
summarizing Peplau and
When it comes to understanding sexual orientation, there are sex differences as well: “the male
colleagues’ (1998) discussion of sex
model of sexual orientation has been rejected in women” conclude some researchers (Mustanski
differences in sexuality
et al., 2002, p. 127).
Why do we think that sexuality and sexual orientation is experienced differently by women?
For one, adolescent and adult women are more likely to report bisexual attractions than to “It is therefore unwise to
report exclusive same-sex attractions (Diamond, 2007). In contrast, men are more likely to generalize from the male to
report exclusive male or female attractions than to report bisexual attractions (see Figure 12.2). the female situation.”
This same pattern also holds for other aspects of sexual orientation including physiological
Linda Garnets (2002, p. 118)
arousal and sexual desire.

Female sexuality may be

fundamentally different from
male sexuality. For women,
sexual desire involves a
longing to be emotionally
close to another person.
368 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Figure 12.2 Fluidity of female

sexuality illustrated: A scatter 7
plot of attraction to men (x-axis)
and attraction to women
(y-axis) for men (top panel) and
6
women (bottom panel). Men
tend to be attracted to either
men or women in accord with
their sexual orientation. Women 5
are often attracted to both men Attraction to Women
and women, regardless of their
sexual orientation. Source: From
Lippa (2006b, Figure 1, p. 51). 4
Reprinted with permission from
Lippa, R. A. (2006b), “Is high sex
drive associated with increased
sexual attraction to both 3
sexes?,” Psychological Science,
17(1), 46–52. Permission
conveyed through the
2
Copyright Clearance Center.

1 Men

5
Attraction to Women

1 Women

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Attraction to Men

Second, men’s attractions, whether they are toward the same or the other sex, tend to stay
stable over their lifetime whereas women’s attractions can change over time and across situations
(Diamond, 2007). Daryl Bem characterizes this difference by noting that men who come out later in
life might say “[I’ve] finally discovered [my] true sexual orientation,” but lesbians in the same situ-
ation are more likely to say “That’s who I was then, and this is who I am now” (Bem, 1998, p. 398).
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 369

Third, because female sexuality is more sensitive than male sexuality to situational, inter-
personal, and contextual factors, psychologists describe it as more fluid than male sexuality
(Baumeister, 2000; Diamond, 2007; but see Hyde & Durik, 2000, for an alternative view). As
a result, women often report that their attractions can vary depending on the circumstances
and the person involved, whereas men often report that their attractions originate from within
themselves. Most women have a relational or partner-centered orientation to sexuality; most
men have a physical or body-centered orientation (Peplau, 2001; Peplau & Garnets, 2000)
developing an attraction “to the person not the gender” (Diamond, 2008a, p. 12), as we saw in
the study that opened this chapter.
To illustrate, consider how one young heterosexual man defined sexual desire: “Sexual desire
is wanting someone . . . in a physical manner. No strings attached. Just for uninhibited sexual
intercourse.” A young woman from the same study said: “Sexual desire is the longing to be
emotionally intimate and to express love for another person” (Regan & Berscheid, 1996, p. 116).
Finally, men tend to experience their first sexual attractions before puberty, regardless of
whether it is to females, in the case of straight men, or other males for gay and bisexual men.
In contrast, many women report experiencing their first same-sex attraction in adulthood as a
result of meeting a lesbian or bisexual woman, encountering the idea of a same-sex attraction,
or having the opportunity for same-sex contact (Diamond, 2007).
Why should this be the case that sexuality is different in women? Psychologist Lisa Dia-
mond (2006a) suggested that women’s sexual desire evolved to be flexible so that females are
able to reproduce not just during ovulation, when desire peaks, but at any time in their cycles.
Biologists distinguish between proceptivity, the motivation to initiate sexual activity, and
receptivity in the case of animals, or arousability in the case of humans, that is, the capacity to
become aroused to sexual stimuli. As higher primates evolved from having a limited and readily SEE FOR YOURSELF
observable period of heightened fertility and receptivity called estrus, to being sexually active
Does your own pattern of
at any time in their cycles, proceptivity and arousability separated into two systems. Fluidity
sexual arousal match what
in women evolved at the same time that the processes of proceptivity and arousability evolved the research shows?
into independent systems (Diamond, 2006a).
Although women have heightened proceptivity linked to their reproductive cycles, peaking
during ovulation, they have arousability at any time in their cycles. Men, however, experience
continual proceptivity due to high testosterone levels. In contrast to men, women’s day-to-day
experience of sexual desire is more influenced by arousability than proceptivity. Arousability
is more general and does not necessarily orient a woman toward a specific sex the way that
proceptivity does. Because arousability is more dependent on the situation, some women show
greater malleability in their desires across time and situations and can experience same-sex,
other-sex, or both desires (Diamond, 2006a).

Proceptivity, the motivation to initiate sexual activity, is when a woman is feeling sexual desire. Animals signal their readiness to
engage in intercourse through physical or olfactory signals. Proceptivity in women peaks during ovulation when they are the most
fertile. Proceptivity is more likely to orient a woman toward one sex or the other.
370 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Arousability, the capacity to

become aroused, occurs when
a woman is not feeling strong
sexual desire, but could be
open to it if the circumstances
and the partner are right.
Human females have the
capacity to become aroused
at any point in their cycle.
Arousability is more general
and does not necessarily
orient a woman toward a
specific sex the way that
proceptivity does.

More and more, researchers are suggesting that we need a new view of sexuality and sexual
orientation to account for the diversity of men’s and women’s sexual experiences (Garnets,
2002; Peplau et al., 1999; Peplau & Garnets, 2000). Instead of viewing sexual orientation as
dichotomous, defined by behavior, fixed at an early age, and established by a single pathway,
research suggests that sexuality and sexual orientation, are flexible and multifaceted, and
defined by attractions and attachments, in addition to behavior. Sexual orientation, especially
for women, is fluid and changeable, with many possible pathways for developing an orienta-
tion or an identity. Recently, Lisa Diamond (2003b) proposed a biobehavioral model of sexual
orientation based on her research with young women.
The biobehavioral model of sexual orientation combines both biological processes and
social ones. Diamond (2003b) suggested that there are two components to sexual orientation:
sexual desire and emotional attachment. She proposed that these two components of sexual
orientation are controlled by two separate biological systems rooted in evolutionary processes.
Because of the way these two systems interact with sex hormones, sexual orientation in men
tends to be fixed as either gay or heterosexual, whereas for women it tends to be more fluid,
defying set labels of either lesbian, heterosexual, or even bisexual.
One system, sexual desire, is regulated by the sexual mating system that promotes sexual
union for the purpose of reproduction (Fisher, 1998). Sexual desire is a wish, need, or drive
to be with or to engage in sexual activities with a person we find sexually attractive (Regan &
Berscheid, 1995).
The second system, emotional attachment, maintains romantic relationships and causes
us to fall in love (Hazan & Shaver, 1987). This system is regulated by pair-bonding which,
evolutionarily, keeps couples together to protect and care for their young. Human and animal
species with pair bonding are more likely to birth developmentally immature young at birth
who need additional care. Often, fathers are involved in the care of offspring of pair bonds
(Fraley, Brumbaugh, & Marks, 2005).
In contrast to the sexual desire system, which for evolutionary reasons must be oriented
toward a member of the other sex, attachment orients emotional bonds without concern for
gender. That is, attachment is gender-blind. We can form an attachment to members of the
same sex or the other sex. This makes perfect sense, after all, if the attachment system is meant
 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 371

to keep a caregiver close to its young, or a young close to its caregiver (Diamond, 2003b).
Although sexual desire is oriented toward one sex or the other or both, romantic attraction is
person-, rather than sex-, oriented.
The distinction between these two systems is illustrated by the following. One gay man
reported that he found sex with his former girlfriend “satisfying physically, but not emotion-
ally.” Another gay man said that he had been in love with his high school girlfriend, but that
“physically, I didn’t want her” (Savin-Williams, 1998, p. 110). For most people these two systems
lead to the same sexual orientation, but for some people—often women more than men—this
is not the case. Some lesbian and bisexual women report that they fall in love with the person,
not the gender (Diamond, 2003b).
In humans, these two systems are separate so that we can mate without bonding and bond
without mating (Diamond, 2003b). Yet, both systems play off each other so that sexual desire
can lead to attachment and attachment can lead to sexual desire. The finding that women are
THINK ABOUT IT
more jealous over emotional infidelity and men over sexual infidelity supports the idea that these
two systems are separate and have evolutionary roots (Buss et al., 1992). Because spending time If Diamond is correct, do we
together, feeling a sense of togetherness, and touch can foster feelings of romantic love (Hazan need a different definition
of sexual orientation than
& Zeifman, 1994), we can, according to Diamond (2003b), experience romantic love without
the one given earlier in this
sexual desire even for people we may not be sexually oriented to. By the same token, it is also chapter?
possible to develop sexual feelings for a same-sex friend.
Women are more likely than men to have sexual feelings for a same-sex friend, a finding that
may be bolstered by biological as well as cultural and social factors (Diamond, 2003b). In humans,
oxytocin facilitates both sexual behavior and pair bonding, particularly in women (Diamond,
2004; Taylor, Klein, et al., 2000). Also, it is more socially acceptable for women to develop strong
emotional bonds with other women (Diamond, 2004). Because of their flexibility of responding
to situational cues, women are more likely than men to fall in love with their female friends and,
because of the release of oxytocin, override their general sexual orientation (Diamond, 2004).
Diamond’s biobehavioral model of sexual orientation is too new to have been directly
tested in humans. Right now, much of the evidence is indirect or comes from animal research
(e.g., DeVries, Johnson, & Carter, 1997). However, the theory is very exciting because it pres-
ents a model of sexual orientation that applies to both men and women. This is an improve-
ment over current theories with inconsistent or nonexisting findings for women. Still, there are
aspects of sexual orientation the theory cannot account for.
When the theory says that a woman falls in love with the person and not the gender, what
aspects of the person sparked that love? The biobehavioral model cannot predict who a person
will fall in love with; then again, no theory can account for this most magical and mysterious
of human experiences. Similarly, the theory is also not able to predict why some people have
sexual feelings for one gender or the other. As discussed earlier, Diamond is continuing her
research and has identified some people who are more flexible in their sexual orientation. The
next step, of course, is to try to find out what makes these people more flexible. Is this where
genetics or prenatal hormones have an impact?
In light of her research, Diamond recommended a new definition of sexual identity as
something more individually constructed, rather than socially constructed (Diamond, 2006b):
a chosen perspective from which to understand one’s sexual feelings and behaviors (Weinberg,
Williams, & Pryor, 1994). No doubt this newer research, in aiming to explain sexual orientation
in women, will help us understand sexual orientation in both men and women.

Chapter Summary
In this chapter we reviewed what sexual orientation is and saw how the number of people who Study and Review
are gay, lesbian, or bisexual changes depending on whether we define orientation as attraction, on mysearchlab.com
behavior, or identity. Back in the 1940s, Alfred Kinsey and his associates were the first to conduct Go online for more
a survey of the sexual behavior of the American public, and to conceptualize same-sex sexuality resources to help you
and other-sex sexuality on a continuum, using the famous 0 to 6 Kinsey scale. However, due to review.
372 Chapter 12 Sexual Orientation: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

sampling bias they overestimated the number of people who are gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Today
the National Health and Social Life Survey provides a better estimate. More people report having
same-sex attractions than identify themselves as gay or lesbian. The study by Diamond (2008a)
that opened this chapter illustrated how sexual orientation can be fluid, especially for women, and
that some women may change how they experience their sexual identity over their lifetime. We also
identified a number of common myths and misperceptions about sexual orientation.
These problems with defining same-sex sexuality and the finding that sexual orientation may
be fluid and changing within a single person over the life span make it difficult to interpret some
of the studies that have been done on the causes of sexual orientation. Some psychologists have
theorized that sexual orientation is innate, determined by biological factors, including evolution,
genetics, brain structures, and prenatal factors (hormones, brain structures, the invalid gender
inversion hypothesis, gender nonconformity, maternal stress, fraternal birth order, and maternal
immune hypothesis). Other psychologists have suggested that sexual orientation is a pattern that
is learned or develops out of childhood experiences. Still other psychologists believe that sexual
orientation is determined by biological and social factors interacting together (such as Daryl Bem’s
exotic becomes erotic theory). Finally, newer research suggests that none of these theories explains
the sexual orientation of women and has suggested a biobehavioral model of sexual desire and
emotional attachment. This model has the advantage of accounting for the wide spectrum of
sexual experiences of both women and men. As our models become more sophisticated and our
operationalizations more precise, the research in this most intimate area of our personality will
lead to new findings and increased understanding of human sexual orientation in the near future.

Review Questions
1. Why might the labels of lesbian, bisexual, and heterosexual be inaccurate and inadequate
for describing human sexual orientation?
2. What are some common myths and misperceptions about sexual orientation?
3. How do psychologists define sexual orientation today? How did Kinsey define sexual
orientation? What are some criticisms of Kinsey’s studies? What is the difference between
thinking about sexual orientation as separate categories or as a continuum? How is sexual
orientation defined in other cultures?
4. About how many people in the population consider themselves gay, lesbian, bisexual, or
straight?
5. What are some possible biological explanations of sexual orientation including evolution,
genetics, brain structures, and prenatal factors?
6. Is there any evidence that sexual orientation is learned?
7. What is the exotic becomes erotic theory of sexual orientation?
8. What is the biobehavioral model of love and desire in women? What is proceptivity and
arousability? How do these relate to sexual desire and emotional attachment?

Key Terms
Fluid sexuality Gender inversion Proceptivity
Heteronormativity Fraternal birth order Arousability
Sexual orientation effect Sexual desire system
Sexual attraction Maternal immune Emotional attachment
Sexual behavior hypothesis system
Sexual identity Exotic becomes erotic
Androgens (EBE) theory
CHAPTER
13 RESILIENCE:
AN INTEGRATIVE
MINI-CHAPTER
WHAT IS RESILIENCE?
CHARACTERISTICS OF RESILIENT PEOPLE
Hardiness: Control, Commitment, and Challenge
Trait Resilience
Positive Emotions
Positive Emotions Foster Adaptive Ways of Coping
Positive Emotions Repair the Harmful Physiological Effects of Negative Emotions
Positive Emotions Increase Flexibility in Thinking
Positive Emotions Build Enduring Social Connections
Positive Emotions Generate Upward Spirals
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY RESILIENT PEOPLE
THE PERSONALITY OF EVERYDAY LIFE: WHO IS HAPPY?
CHAPTER SUMMARY
REVIEW QUESTIONS
KEY TERMS
Read the Chapter on
mysearchlab.com

373
374 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

W
“He’s a million rubber bands hen I think of resilience, I think of my older brother Jerry. He is a certified ski
in his resilience.” instructor in an adaptive ski program for people with disabilities. He spends his win-
Alan K. Simpson ters training and teaching across New England. He spends his summers kayaking,
fishing, surfing, and engaging in other outdoor sports with a group of young men and women
as part of the Wounded Warrior Project. What makes my brother truly amazing is that over 45
years ago, he was a wounded veteran himself, returning from Vietnam with two prosthetic arms.
Nearly 20% of military service members returning from Iraq and Afghanistan report
symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or major depression (Ramchand, Karney,
Osilla, Burns, & Caldarone, 2008). As tragic as this figure is, consider the flipside: Some 80% of
returning soldiers—the vast majority—don’t!
Why are some people able to snap back from adversity whereas others have considerable
difficulty? Consider a study of Army National Guard and reservist medical units that had
recently returned from serving in the first Gulf War (Bartone, 1999). The average age of the
sample was 34 years and it included both men and women. The personnel were deployed
in the Persian Gulf (Saudi Arabia or Kuwait), U.S. Army stations in Germany, or remained
in the U.S.
First, as you might expect there was a significant effect of location on physical and psycho-
logical health. Personnel who worked closer to the Persian Gulf reported the most amount of
stress, PTSD, and health problems followed by those deployed in Germany, with those serving
stateside reporting the lowest of all.
But the question the researchers were most interested in was, is there a type of person who
is less likely to experience distress after exposure to active combat? Take a look at Figure 13.1.
Participants were divided into two groups depending on their personalities. The dotted line
suggests that for one group of people, high exposure to combat stress was related to more psy-
chological symptoms of distress such as anxiety and depression. However, this was not the case
for participants in the second group (the solid line); they had low levels of distress no matter
what their exposure to combat stress was.
The same effect was found for PTSD and for physical symptoms of stress: Participants in
the second group showed fewer signs of physical and mental distress under conditions of high
combat stress than people in the first group.
What was this special personality variable that protected some of the reservists from the
negative effects of witnessing combat? It all came down to resilience. Some people have certain
personality traits, cognitions, values, and beliefs that protect them in times of stress. In this
study, people who were high in hardiness experienced less distress than people who were low
in this characteristic.
In this integrative mini-chapter, we discuss how personality traits and cognitions together
act on the body’s physiology to protect some people from the physical and psychological harm
normally associated with stress. This chapter builds on material covered in earlier chapters
to give you a sense of how the separate aspects of personality that we have been discussing

Figure 13.1 The effect 2.5

of combat stress and Low Hardiness
hardiness on psychological 2 High Hardiness
Global Severity Index

distress. Source: Bartone

(1999, Figure 3, p. 79). Bartone, 1.5
P. T. (1999). Hardiness protects
against war-related stress in
1
army reserve forces. Consulting
Psychology Journal: Practice
and Research, 51(2), 72–82. 0.5

0
Low High
Combat Stress Exposure
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 375

Jerry Miserandino surfing

in the summer of 2010 with
the Wounded Warriors. The
Wounded Warrior Project
provides programs and
services to injured service
members. According to its
website, the organization’s
vision is “to foster the most
successful, well-adjusted
generation of wounded
warriors in this nation’s
history.”

throughout the book work together. Resilience builds on research in physiology, traits, cogni-
tion, attachment theory, and regulation and motivation.

“What does not kill me,

What Is Resilience? makes me stronger.”
Resilience is the ability to recover from tragedy, adversity, hardship, or to adapt to ongoing Friedrich Nietzsche
life stressors (Newman, 2005; Tugade & Fredrickson, 2007). When hit with a traumatic event,
everyone is momentarily thrown off balance. But just like how the body regulates temperature
through homeostasis, humans also have an amazing, even magical (Masten, 2001) capacity to
maintain psychological equilibrium and rebound to our former states of well-being (Carver,
1998). The great surprise of research in resilience is that the astounding ability of the human THINK ABOUT IT
spirit to rebound and achieve good outcomes despite adversity is actually quite common (Mas-
What’s so magical about
ten, 2001, p. 228): We all have the capacity to be resilient (Bonanno, 2004; Masten, 2001; Tugade resilience?
& Fredrickson, 2007).
When a traumatic event hits, such as the death of a loved one, diagnosis of a major illness, a
terrorist attack like September 11, 2001, combat, or violent crime, there are at least four possible Figure 13.2 “Potential
responses (Carver, 1998; see Figure 13.2). After the initial shock of the event passes, some people responses to trauma. A
may not survive the event (succumbing) whereas others might be permanently traumatized or downturn (physical or
psychological) in response to
a traumatic or stressful event
can be followed by a downward
Adverse slide and eventual succumbing,
Event by survival in an impaired
condition, by recovery to the
Thriving prior level of functioning, or
Level of Functioning

by the eventual attainment of

Resilience (recovery) a level of functioning superior
to that displayed earlier—
thriving.” Source: From Carver
Survival with
1998, Figure 1, p. 246). Reprinted
Impairment with pernission from Carver, C. S.
(1998), “Resilience and thriving:
issues, models and linkages,”
Journal of Social Issues, 54(2),
Succumbing 245–266. Permission conveyed
through the Copyright
Time Clearance Center.
376 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

crippled by the event (survival with impairment). We are interested in the two groups of people
who may recover (resilience) or even achieve a better level of functioning (thriving) than before
the event, such as people who say that their illnesses or tragedies were the best things that ever
happened to them because these events challenged them to live better.
Psychologists have proposed at least four kinds of models of how personality impacts
THINK ABOUT IT health (Smith, 2006b). First, according to health behavior models, some people, like those
higher in Conscientiousness or with an internal locus of control, adopt a healthier lifestyle
How might a person high
in Neuroticism create more
and take better care of themselves such as eating a healthy diet, exercising, and not smoking.
stress for themselves? Second, according to transactional stress moderation models, some personality traits, like
Neuroticism or sensation seeking, may influence a person’s exposure to stressful or dangerous
circumstances. For example, recall from Chapter 7 how high sensation seekers seek out situ-
ations and behaviors, such as unsafe sexual practices and recreational drug use, that actually
place them at an increased risk for injury and illness (Hoyle et al., 2000; Kaestner et al., 1977;
Mawson et al., 1988; Zuckerman, 2007).
Constitutional predisposition models suggest that there may be some underlying genetic
or constitutional factor that influences both personality and disease. For example, recall Hans
Eysenck’s Psychoticism-Extraversion-Neuroticism model (Eysenck, 1990) and Jeffrey Gray’s
reward sensitivity theory (Corr, 2008b) from Chapter 7. Both theories claim that differences in
personality come from differences in physiological reactivity and neurology. The constitutional
predisposition model suggests that these biological differences may also be related to physical
or psychological disorders.
Finally, interactional stress moderation models are perhaps the most fascinating of all
and the ones we focus on here. These models suggest that personality characteristics modify
physiological responses by reducing or increasing them. For example, in Chapter 10 we saw
how optimism bolsters the immune system making people less susceptible to damage from
long-term stress (Brydon et al., 2009). Are there other personality characteristics that can help
us be resilient in the face of adversity?

Characteristics of Resilient People

What kind of person is more likely to recover from a stressful event? Personality psychologists
THINK ABOUT IT
have pursued the answer to this question from at least three different lines of research. Resilient
What characteristics of the people tend to be high in hardiness, trait resilience, and to experience lots of positive emotions.
five-factor model might be These personality characteristics, along with a healthy dose of positive emotions such as joy,
related to resilience? interest, contentment, pride, love, elevation, and happiness, may protect people from the del-
eterious effects of stress and facilitate recovery from trauma.

Grammy-award winning
singer, songwriter, and breast
cancer survivor Sheryl Crow as
spokesperson for the National
Breast Cancer Coalition urging
congress to pass legislation
to increase funding for breast
cancer research.
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 377

Hardiness: Control, Commitment, and Challenge

Have you ever noticed that some people seem to catch a cold at the worst time of the semes-
SEE FOR YOURSELF
ter? Endocrinologist and pioneer researcher on the biology of stress, Hans Selye, recognized
over 50 years ago that there must be something unique that allows some people to experience What time of the year do
high levels of stress without becoming ill whereas others succumb to illness (Selye, 1956). To you typically get sick?
find out what personality characteristics distinguished these so-called hardy types from others,
researchers embarked on a 12-year-long study of middle and upper managers of the Illinois Bell
Telephone Company. At the time, the industry was undergoing deregulation so that the workers “Stressed” spelled backward
experienced high stress, facing both industry and company reorganization. is “desserts”!
In the first of many studies, the researchers divided this sample of highly stressed workers
into those who experienced a high rate of illness and those with a low rate of illness. Work-
ing with a small subset of the entire sample, they identified personality characteristics that
distinguished the high and low illness group from each other. They then cross-validated their “Brick walls are there for a
results from this subset on the rest of the sample. Of course, based on theorizing of the time,
reason. The brick walls are
the researchers had some idea of what characteristics might be related to hardiness. Hardy
executives, those who stayed healthy despite being under high stress, were higher in the three not there to keep us out; the
Cs of control, commitment, and challenge (Kobasa, 1979; see Figure 13.3). brick walls are there to give
First, hardy people believe that they can control their own outcomes and reinforcements. us a chance to show how
As we saw in Chapter 10, an internal locus of control prevents people from feeling helpless, badly we want something.
being passive, and giving up in the face of adversity (Hiroto, 1974). A sense of control makes The brick walls are there to
hardy people dig in and try to change the course of events around them for the better (Maddi,
stop the people who don’t
Kahn, & Maddi, 1998).
Second, hardy people are also actively engaged in the social world around them. They are want it badly enough. They
committed to others and to causes greater than themselves. They use their sense of commit- are there to stop the other
ment to get involved rather than alienated, to turn their stressful experiences into something people!”
interesting or important (Maddi et al., 1998). Randy Pausch
Finally, challenge is seeing the negative event as an opportunity rather than as the end of
the world. For example, I knew a resilient woman who was about to lose her hair due to the side
effects of chemotherapy. Rather than being upset, she decided that this was the perfect time to
try out a new hair color, one that she was ordinarily too timid to wear in public.
Even when things are going well, hardy people know how to get the most out of life by
reflecting on their experiences and interactions with others, savoring them and learning what
they can from them. A person without this sense of challenge would not be able to grow and
develop from his or her experiences (Maddi, 2002). In contrast, hardy people seek fulfillment
in their lives. They approach life seeking continual growth and challenge rather than routine,
security, and ease (Maddi et al., 1998).
Together these three values help
a hardy person get involved, take Figure 13.3 Schematic
action, and turn a stressful event into comparing high hardiness
something manageable, interesting, and low hardiness groups
important, and a learning experience on four key variables:
1 = Perception of Personal
(Maddi, 2002).
Stress; 2 = Internal Locus of
In numerous research studies
Control; 3 = Commitment to
with different populations, hardiness Own Values; 4 = Seeking Out
is related to better health, protection Challenge. Source: Based on
against burnout, greater activity in the data from Kobasa (1979).
elderly, better quality of life among
those facing a serious illness, better
performance, less stress in the face of
life changes, more effective coping,
engagement in healthier behaviors,
and greater immune response (Maddi
et al., 1998). One study found that 1 2 3 4
hardiness provided greater protection High Illness/High Stress Low Illness/High Stress
378 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

against illness than social support or

physical exercise (Maddi et al., 1998).
According to Salvatore Maddi and
his colleagues (Maddi, 1987; Maddi &
Kobasa, 1984), when we face a stress-
ful event, our immediate response is
arousal. With more events, or more
devastating events, or prolonged stress,
the stress and strain on a person may
produce physical or mental illness, inef-
fectiveness, a decreased sense of social
support, and decreased job satisfaction.
However, people high in hardiness face
their problems rather than avoid them.
Alexandra “Alex” Scott battled
childhood cancer throughout They may appraise their own thoughts
most of her young life. Though and emotions raised by the stressful
she died at age 8, she coped situation, striving to understand them
with her illness by raising over more fully, putting them in a broader
$1 million by selling lemonade perspective, taking actions to decrease
to help find a cure for cancer. their stressfulness, and creating meaning
The Alex’s Lemonade Stand around the event. Through what Maddi
foundation continues the and his colleagues call transforma-
work she started. tional coping, people high in hardiness
turn the experience into something less
threatening and ultimately even growth
enhancing.
The Chinese symbol for In one study, managers at a utility company who volunteered for a stress management
“crisis” is made up of two course were randomly assigned to one of three treatment conditions (Maddi et al., 1998).
words, one meaning danger Regardless of treatment, participants met in small groups for 1.5 hours once a week for 10
weeks. In the hardiness training condition, participants learned about transformational coping
and the other meaning
through exercises and discussions. In the relaxation/meditation treatment, a standard treat-
opportunity.
ment for stress, participants learned a combination of muscle relaxation exercises, visualization
techniques, and simple meditation. In the passive listening condition, participants related their
stressful experiences while the facilitator emphasized the importance of finding one’s own
solution through discussion and reflection with peers in a supportive setting, just like they
“It’s just a speed bump, it’s were doing during the session. All three groups had homework assignments. Although all three
not a dead end.” treatments are effective ways of managing stress, the researchers predicted that the hardiness
Dimitrios Diamantaras training would be superior to the other two methods.
Indeed, participants in the hardiness training group showed a larger gain in hardiness
compared to the other two groups. They also showed a greater reduction in tension and symp-
THINK ABOUT IT
toms of illness and an increase in job satisfaction and perceived social support. Not only did
How is hardiness similar to hardiness cause these positive outcomes, but the positive attitude associated with hardiness is
locus of control, explana- something that can be effectively learned and taught (Maddi et al., 1998).
tory style, or dispositional How does hardiness help people rebound? First, by finding meaning even under duress, hardy
optimism discussed in
people alter their perceptions of events to render them less stressful (Maddi & Kobasa, 1984).
Chapter 10?
Second, the transformational coping of hardy people is an effective way of coping (Funk, 1992),
probably because of the optimism it engenders which, as we saw in Chapter 10, is a very powerful
mechanism for coping with stress (Peterson, 2000; Scheier et al., 2001). Also, transformational
coping is an active problem-focused strategy rather than a passive emotion-focused strategy for
dealing with a traumatic event (Scheier & Carver, 1985). Third, hardy people are more engaged
with people, and psychologists know that social support is very important (Cobb, 1976). People
low in hardiness do not have these sources of social support (Maddi & Kobasa, 1984). Finally,
people high in hardiness—no doubt due to their internal locus of control—live healthier lives
and take better care of themselves (Lefcourt, 1982; Selander et al., 2005).
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 379

As promising as these findings are, newer research found many problems with the concept
of hardiness (Funk, 1992; Funk & Houston, 1987). First, the three components of hardiness—
control, commitment, and challenge—appear to be separate components rather than aspects
of a single personality type. That is, they don’t seem to go together the same way the facets of
Neuroticism or Extraversion go together, for example (e.g., Costa & McCrae, 1992). Also, any
one of these three components helps buffer people from stress; having all three components
doesn’t provide any greater advantage than having just one.
A second, and perhaps bigger problem is that hardiness is not a unique concept: it overlaps
with other concepts such as dispositional optimism (Scheier & Carver, 1987), locus of control
(Hull, Van Treuren, & Virnelli, 1987), and Neuroticism (Funk, 1992). That is, hardiness does not
explain or predict outcomes any better than these other variables. In one study, hardy people
scored significantly higher on Extraversion, Openness and Conscientiousness and lower on
Neuroticism on the NEO Personality Inventory than people low in hardiness (Ramanaiah &
Sharpe, 1999; see also Robins, Caspi, Moffitt, & Stouthamer-Loeber, 1996). Further, the effects
of hardiness are eliminated when Neuroticism scores are included, suggesting that hardiness
overlaps with emotional stability (Funk, 1992).
Finally, like resilience, we know that hardiness is related to lower levels of illness and dis-
tress, but we do not know why. This could be due to the usual bias with self-report research,
problems with the scales used to measure hardiness, imprecision of the definition of hardiness,
or flawed research designs testing for hardiness effects (Funk, 1992; Funk & Houston, 1987).
There is not even a standard questionnaire for measuring hardiness, making it difficult to
compare and evaluate findings across studies (Funk, 1992).
For example, both people high in Neuroticism and people low in hardiness are more nega- THINK ABOUT IT
tive in their self-reports. People high in Neuroticism report more physical symptoms and view
their life more negatively than people low in Neuroticism, even though there are no differences Is the report bias of people
in objective measures of health or quality of life (Funk, 1992). People low in hardiness share a high in Neuroticism due to
their traits or their cogni-
similar reporting bias, where they report more symptoms and less life satisfaction than people tions? Can it be changed?
high in hardiness (Rhodewalt & Zone, 1989).
Further, this negativity of hardy/neurotic people may actually create social worlds that are
more stressful than those of people without these characteristics (Rhodewalt & Zone, 1989),
illustrating the transactional stress moderation model discussed previously. Some have claimed
that both lack of control and lack of commitment are stressful. No wonder that people without
control or commitment—those low in hardiness—are more distressed than people with these
characteristics (Hull et al., 1987)!
The controversy surrounding the concept of hardiness suggests that control, commitment,
and challenge may not be the key characteristics that protect people from illness. Instead, vari-
ables that are confounded with hardiness—such as negative and positive emotion—may be
responsible for the protective effect of hardiness.

Trait Resilience
The term resilience first appeared in the psychological literature over 60 years ago in dis- “Man never made any
sertations written by psychologists and collaborators Jack and Jeanne Block in the early material as resilient as the
1950s. In keeping with the Freudian thinking of the day, the Blocks reasoned that people human spirit.”
would either exert more or less control over their own emotions and actions in response to Bern Williams
a situational stressor. Some people, those who are better able to roll with the punches say,
are better able to respond flexibly to a frustration or a stressor and are quicker to return
to their characteristic level of self-control. They termed this ego-resilience which is what
we might think of as self-regulation today (see Chapter 9). Ego-resiliency referred to the
ability to modify one’s responses to meet the requirements of a stressful situation and to
return to one’s characteristic level of self-regulation after a stressor (Block & Kremen, 1996).
Researchers today refer to this concept as trait resilience. The Ego-Resiliency Scale (Block &
Kremen, 1996; see Table 13.1) is one of many scales designed to measure resilience (Ahern,
Kiehl, Sole, & Byers, 2006).
380 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Table 13.1 Items of the Ego-Resiliency (ER89) Scale

1. I am generous with my friends.
2. I quickly get over and recover from being startled.
3. I enjoy dealing with new and unusual situations.
4. I usually succeed in making a favorable impression on people.
5. I enjoy trying new foods I have never tasted before.
6. I am regarded as a very energetic person.
7. I like to take different paths to familiar places.
8. I am more curious than most people.
9. Most of the people I meet are likable.
10. I usually think carefully about something before acting.
11. I like to do new and different things.
12. My daily life is full of things that keep me interested.
13. I would be willing to describe myself as a pretty “strong” personality.
14. I get over my anger at someone reasonably quickly.
Note: Respond to each item using the following scale: 1 = Does not apply at all; 2 = Applies slightly, if at all; 3 = Applies
somewhat; and 4 = Applies very strongly. In one sample of college students aged 17 to 40, ER scores ranged from 28 to 54 with
a mean of 42 (SD = 6.41) (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004).
Source: Block and Kremen (1996, Table 1, p. 352); Tugade and Fredercickson (2004). Block, J., & Kremen, A. M. (1996). IQ and ego-
resiliency: Conceptual and empirical connections and separateness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(2), 349–361.
Copyright American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.

We can think of trait resilience or self-control as occurring on a continuum, where some

people may undercontrol their responses, others might overcontrol their responses, but resilient
people are able to strike an appropriate balance between these two extremes (Block & Kremen,
1996). In a sample of adolescent boys, the researchers identified three personality types who
differed in the extent to which they were able to regulate their own behaviors: overcontrolled,
undercontrolled, and resilient (Robins et al., 1996).
Resilients were best able to regulate their own behavior, responding appropriately to frustrations
and stressors and returning to their usual state. Caregivers described them as assertive, expressive,
energetic, dependable, personable, open-minded, smart, and self-confident. In contrast, overcon-
trollers were shy, timid, interpersonally sensitive, and dependent. They were also somewhat anxious
and withdrawn, yet warm, cooperative, and considerate. Undercontrolled boys were impulsive, self-
centered, manipulative, confrontational, and outgoing. However, they showed significantly greater
delinquent behaviors, performed worse in school, and scored lower on an intelligence test than boys
in the other two groups. In addition, these three groups differed on the five factors of Extraversion,
Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and Openness (see Figure 13.4).
Similar results were found in a study of 18-year-old men and women. Those who were
high in trait resilience reported being more flexible and adaptable and showed better psy-
chological adjustment than people who were low in trait resilience. Resilients also reported
being more confident and experiencing more positive emotions. In contrast, overcontrollers
may rigidly overregulate instead of showing flexibility when faced with a stressful experience
whereas undercontrollers may underregulate and have no clear strategy for how to manage
stress. Neither of these two extremes is adaptive (Block & Kremen, 1996).
Resilient undergraduates were rated by acquaintances as having wide interests, a high aspi-
ration level, and being socially skilled, confident, assertive, and cheerful. They had meaningful
lives. Undercontrollers were described as being moody, unpredictable, assertive, rebellious, self-
indulgent, and dramatizing. Overcontrollers were rated as more dependable, consistent, calm,
and bland (Letzring, Block, & Funder, 2005).
Much research supports the notion that trait resilient people do indeed rebound from
stressful experiences faster physiologically (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004) and emotionally (Ong,
Bergeman, Bisconti, & Wallace, 2006; Waugh, Fredrickson, & Taylor, 2008) than people low in
resilience (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2007).
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 381

55 Figure 13.4 Big Five profiles

a a of the three adolescent
a
personality types. Means
Resilients a a with different letters differ at
a
p 6 .01. Source: From Robins
Undercontrollers et al. (1996, Figure 1, p. 163).
50
a Robins, R. W., Caspi, A., Moffitt,
T. E., & Stouthamer-Loeber, M.
(1996). Resilient, overcontrolled,
and undercontrolled boys:
b
Three replicable personality
T-score

b
45 types. Journal of Personality
b and Social Psychology, 70(1),
157–171. Copyright American
b
Psychological Association.
Reprinted with permission.

40

b
b c c
Overcontrollers

35
0 Extraverted Agreeable Conscientious Emotionally Open
Stable

SEE FOR YOURSELF

For example, in one experiment undergraduates who were high and low in trait resilience The next time you are fac-
prepared an impromptu speech that they thought would be videotaped and critiqued by ing a stressful situation, try
viewing it as a challenge
other undergraduates. For half of the participants, this task was described as a challenge; for
or opportunity instead of a
the other half it was described as threatening. While anticipating the speech and then finding threat.
out no speech would be given, researchers recorded the cardiovascular reactivity of the par-
ticipants. They found that the blood pres-
sure and heart rate of people high in trait
resilience returned to baseline faster than
that of low resilients and that they experi-
enced more positive emotions, especially if
they were in the threat condition. However,
there was no difference in cardiovascular
reactivity or positive emotion between
people high and low in resilience in the
challenge condition (see Figure 13.5).
This suggests that viewing a situation as a
challenge, rather than as a threat, induces
positive emotions in low-resilient people,
providing them with a measure of protec-
tion comparable to what highly resilient
people are able to do naturally (Tugade &
Fredrickson, 2004).
Recall that viewing events as a chal-
lenge is one of the three Cs of hardiness.
This study further suggests that hardiness
Viewing a situation as a
and trait resilience are similar in that peo-
challenge rather than a threat
ple high in either characteristic experience helps protect people during a
more positive emotions than those low in stressful event.
hardiness or low in trait resilience. Indeed,
382 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

High Slow

Cardiovascular Reactivity
= Low Resilience

Positive Emotions
= High Resilience

Low Threat Challenge Fast Threat Challenge

Instructional Set Instructional Set
Figure 13.5 Schematic showing differences in positive emotions and return to cardiovascular base
rate as a function of instructions and resilience. Source: Based on Tugade and Fredrickson (2004).

the ability to experience positive emotions may explain why hardiness and trait resilience help
people cope better with stress.
What about rebounding emotionally from stressful experiences? Consider the following
study on positive and negative emotions and resilience. In a study of men and women aged 62
to 80, participants who were high or low in trait resilience recorded their daily fluctuations in
emotions and distress for 30 to 45 days. They found that positive emotions were more common
among resilient people (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006).
To understand the significance of this finding, we need to first understand a bit about how
emotions work. When we are not under stress, positive emotions and negative emotions tend to
be separate experiences (Diener & Emmons, 1984). That is, it is not the case that the more sadness
THINK ABOUT IT we feel on a given day the less happiness we feel, or vice versa. We can feel sadness while watching
Is it that people low in a movie but delight in the experience of watching it with friends while sharing a bowl of popcorn.
resilience have fewer oppor- We can get angry at the driver who cut us off on the way to a restaurant, but then enjoy being out
tunities to experience posi- with the gang. The number of positive experiences people have over the course of a typical day
tive emotions or that they
is not negatively correlated with the number of negative experiences they report. However, when
are just not uplifted by the
opportunities they do have? we are dealing with a stressful event, positive and negative emotions are negatively correlated,
so that that the more sadness we feel, the less happiness we feel (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006).
In this study of daily moods that’s just what the researchers found. People low—but not
high—in resilience showed an inverse relationship between negative and positive emotion
while under distress: the more negative emotion they reported on a given day the less posi-
tive emotion they reported feeling. This was especially true on highly stressful days. How-
ever, highly resilient people, even under duress, experienced a fair amount of both negative
and positive experiences. In addition, these effects were virtually identical whether hardi-
ness or trait resilience was used to identify resilient people (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006).
Remarkably, these findings even held for a sample of women who recently lost their hus-
Figure 13.6 Relationship bands, enduring a particularly stressful time in their lives. Highly resilient widows experienced
between daily positive
a range of positive emotions, such as cheerfulness, peacefulness, and happiness, right along
and negative emotion as a
function of trait resilience, on
with negative emotions such
high-stress days in recently as depression, worry, and
60 Low Resilience anxiety (Ong, Bergeman, et
widowed women. Source: Ong,
Daily Negative Emotions

High Resilience al., 2006; see Figure 13.6).

Bergeman, et al., (2006, Figure 50
5, p. 742). Ong, A. D., Bergeman, Together, these two stud-
40
C. S., Bisconti, T. L., & Wallace, K. A. ies suggest that the reason why
(2006). Psychological resilience, 30 people high in resilience—
positive emotions, and defined either as hardiness or
sucessful adaptation to stress in 20
as trait resilience—are able
later life. Journal of Personality to endure and recover from
10
and Social Psychology, 91(4),
stressful experiences better
730–749. Copyright American 0
Psychological Association. Low High than people low in resilience
Reprinted with permission. Daily Positive Emotions has to do with the experiences
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 383

of positive emotions. Positive emotions help people regulate and recover physiologically and
emotionally from stress. The key component of resilience may well be the ability to regulate
positive emotions (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006; Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004, 2007).

Positive Emotions
Positive emotions have proved somewhat of a puzzle to psychologists (Fredrickson, 1998). For
one, they don’t involve as much physiological arousal as negative emotions do. Second, accord-
ing to one estimate, negative emotions outnumber positive emotions by a factor of about 3 or
4 to 1. Third, negative emotions seem to have unique facial expressions associated with them
whereas many positive emotions share variations of just the one expression: the Duchenne smile
or true smile, involving both the mouth and the eyes. For example, there are fewer differences
between happiness and joy, interest and wonder, or love and elation than there are between
sadness and anger. Fourth, even though it’s easy to see how the fight or flight response associ- THINK ABOUT IT
ated with negative emotions helps preserve our species when faced with life-threatening events,
From an evolutionary per-
positive emotions don’t seem to create the same urgency to take action for self-preservation.
spective, what purpose do
Certainly life is more fun with positive emotions, and positive emotions may signal health and positive emotions serve?
well-being, important attributes for mating, but are they truly important for our survival?
Emerging research suggests that positive emotions don’t just feel good—they actually do
us good (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006; see Table 13.2). Positive emotions increase flexibility in
thinking and problem solving (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005; Isen, Daubman, & Nowicki,
1987), undo the physiological effects of negative emotions (Fredrickson & Levenson, 1998; Ong
& Allaire, 2005), foster adaptive coping (Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000, 2004), build enduring
social connections (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2001; Keltner & Bonanno, 1997), and trigger an
upward spiral of increased well-being (Fredrickson, 2000; Fredrickson & Joiner, 2002). Let’s
take a closer look at some of the research evidence for these conclusions.

Positive Emotions Foster Adaptive Ways of Coping. The results from the diary study
of resilient widows suggest that positive emotions are particularly adaptive when people
are under stress or are low in resilience, as they help people recover from adversity (Ong,
Bergeman, et al., 2006). This may be because positive emotions interrupt the experience
of stress, giving people a much-needed psychological break from their feelings of distress
(Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000; Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006). Positive emotions may also
replenish one’s ability for self-control, making it easier to adapt to stressors that come along
later (c.f., Tangney, Baumeister, & Boone, 2004). For example, adults and elders who were
low in Neuroticism (i.e., low in negative emotion), high in Extraversion (high in positive THINK ABOUT IT
emotion), and high in Openness reported greater well-being and seemed to cope better
Is it true that laughter is the
with stressors in their lives (McCrae & Costa, 1986). Positive emotions help people regulate best medicine?
emotional distress and facilitate the recovery process (Ong, Bergeman, et al., 2006).
In one study of people living with the chronic pain of arthritis or fibromyalgia, feelings of
positive affect, such as interest, excitement, enthusiasm, pride, or inspiration, lessened negative
feelings like distress, upset, fear, irritability, or nervousness typically experienced along with
pain. As pain increased, the buffering effect of positive emotions was even stronger. Posi-
tive emotion during a painful episode seemed to interrupt the usual link between pain and

Table 13.2 Don’t Worry Be Happy: How Positive Emotions Produce Health and Well-Being
Positive Emotions
1. Foster adaptive ways of coping.
2. Repair the harmful physiological effects of negative emotions.
3. Increase flexibility in thinking.
4. Build enduring social connections.
5. Increase future well-being.
Source: Ong, Bergeman, et al. (2006).
384 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Figure 13.7 The interaction 1.75 negative affect. Further, the greater the posi-
High Positive Affect
between weekly positive tive affect, the weaker the link between pain
Mean Positive Affect
affect and pain in women and negative affect (Zautra, Smith, Affleck,
Low Positive Affect
with arthritis. Positive affect 1.65
& Tennen, 2001). In this way, positive emo-

Negative Affect
was related to a weaker link
tions lessened the emotional distress people
between pain and negative
reported feeling (see Figure 13.7).
affect. Weeks with increased 1.55
pain showed less of an According to the broaden-and-build
increase in negative affect if theory, positive emotions—like eleva-
positive affect was also high. 1.45 tion (Haidt, 2000), joy, interest, content-
The same pattern of results ment, pride, and love—broaden or expand
was found in women with people’s awareness, thoughts, and actions
fibromyalgia. Source: Zautra 1.35 (Fredrickson, 2001). This engagement in
(2001, Figure 1, p. 790). Zautra, Low Pain Mean Pain High Pain
new ways of thinking and doing helps build
A. J., Smith, B., Affleck, G. G., & physical, intellectual, social, and psychologi-
Tennen, H. (2001). Examinations cal resources. Think of it like this: When we
of chronic pain and affect
are in pain, physical or emotional, we develop a kind of psychological tunnel vision where all
relationships: Applications of
we are aware of is our pain. Positive emotions produce the opposite effect, causing us to open
a dynamic model of affect.
Journal of Consulting and up to a wider array of possibilities beyond our immediate situation and ourselves (Fredrickson,
Clinical Psychology, 69(5), 2001). For example, when we are joyful, we feel an urge to play and be creative (Ellsworth &
786–795. Copyright American Smith, 1988). When we feel interest, we venture out exploring our world taking in new experi-
Psychological Association. ences and information (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Ryan & Deci, 2000). When we feel love, we seek
Reprinted with permission. out contact and interaction with friends and family (Izard, 1977).
In turn, the expansion of our attention, thoughts, and actions help us build and bank
new resources. Through trying new activities we build physical resources, by developing our
interests we expand our intellectual resources, by encountering new experiences we build our
psychological resources, and by interacting with others we build social resources. No doubt
you’ve heard the advice to “save for a rainy day”? The resources built through the experience
of positive emotions act like money in the bank to be drawn on for sustenance during hard
times. Taking the metaphor a step further, positive emotions accumulate and compound, much
like interest on a savings account, and lead to more positive emotions and better coping in the
future (Fredrickson & Joiner, 2002). Essentially, positive emotions help build resilience to future
adversities (Fredrickson, 2000; see Figure 13.8).

Figure 13.8 The broaden-

and-build theory of positive
emotions. Source: Frederickson
(2002, Figure 9.1, p. 124).
Fredrickson, B. L., & Joiner, Transform People
and Produce
T. (2002), “Positive emotions
Upward Spirals
trigger upward spirals toward
emotional well-being,”
Psychological Science, 13(2),
172–175. Copyright © 2002 by Build Enduring
Sage Publications. Reprinted Personal Resources
by permission of Sage
Publications.

Broaden Momentary
Thought-Action
Repertoires

Experiences of
Positive Emotions
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 385

Positive Emotions Repair the Harmful Physiological Effects of Negative Emotions. The THINK ABOUT IT
survival benefit of positive emotions may be that they can correct or undo the deleterious physi-
cal and psychological effects of prolonged exposure to negative emotions that occur under stress Many hospitals and nursing
(Fredrickson & Levenson, 1998). Specifically, positive emotions may help the body recover homes include pet therapy,
where dogs visit with the
faster from cardiovascular reactivity (Fredrickson, Mancuso, Branigan, & Tugade, 2000). patients. Why might this be
To test this notion, researchers monitored the blood pressure and heart rate of under- an effective treatment?
graduate volunteers as they anticipated giving a speech that they believed would be videotaped
and later evaluated (Fredrickson et al., 2000). Participants thought that they had a 50–50
chance that a computer would randomly select them to give their speech or that they would
watch a film instead. Of course, this manipulation merely served to successfully induce anxiety
in the participants. No speeches were actually given and instead, at this point, participants
were randomly assigned to view one of three brief film clips. The three films were pretested
to be of comparable interest, but to evoke different emotions: waves crashing on a beach
(contentment), puppies playing (amusement), or an abstract film of colorful sticks piling up
(no emotion).
As you can see in Figure 13.9, participants who watched the contentment and amuse-
ment films recovered from the anxiety of anticipating a speech sooner than participants in the
neutral film condition. The groups differed in the number of seconds it took to return to their
prestress baseline of heart rate and pulse. Positive emotions—whether contentment or amuse-
ment—lessened the cardiovascular reactivity associated with anxiety, and they did so even in
men and African Americans, groups known to be at particular risk for cardiovascular illness
(Fredrickson et al., 2000). In a second study, Fredrickson et al. (2000) ruled out the possibility
that positive emotions merely replace negative cardiovascular reactivity with positive reactivity,
further supporting the notion that positive emotions counteract the cardiovascular effects of
anxiety, fear, and other health-damaging stressors.

Positive Emotions Increase Flexibility in Thinking. Direct evidence for the broaden-and-
build theory comes from an experiment in which undergraduates viewed two emotional film
clips and then took a visual processing test or made a list of action tendencies (i.e., things they
felt like doing as a result of the emotion elicited by the film). The researchers reasoned that
positive emotion would make people think broadly and to imagine many possible actions
they could take, whereas negative emotions would make people think more narrowly, focusing
on small details and limiting the potential actions they could imagine doing (Fredrickson &
Branigan, 2005).
Participants were randomly assigned to view one of five possible clips, varying in the
specific positive or negative emotion evoked by the film. Two video clips elicited the posi-
tive emotions of amusement (penguins playing) or contentment (a nature film) and two
elicited the negative emotions of disgust (bullies taunting Amish passers-by from the movie
Witness) or anxiety (a prolonged mountain climbing accident from the movie Cliffhanger).
There was also a neutral film, the same abstract film with colorful sticks used in previous
research.
For the visual processing test, participants had to view a series of graphics and judge
which of the two arrays was most similar to the target array. Figure 13.10 shows a sample

Figure 13.9 Mean duration of

cardiovascular reactivity by film.
Amusement Error bars represent standard
errors of the means. Source:
Contentment From Frederickson et al. (2000,
Figure 2, p. 248). Fredrickson,
B. L., Mancuso, R. A., Branigan,
Neutral C., & Tugade, M. M. (2000). The
undoing effect of positive
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 emotions. Motivation and
Time (in seconds) Emotion, 24(4), 237–258.
386 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Figure 13.10 An example

of stimuli used for the visual
processing task. Would
participants who felt negative
or positive emotions judge
similarity based on general
characteristics of arrangement 1a. 1b.
and number or on fine details
like shape? Test figures
at the top shared broad
characteristics with the figures
below them on the left and
narrow characteristics with
figures below them on the
right. Source: From Frederickson
and Branigan (2005, Figure 1, 1c. 1d.
p. 317). Fredrickson, B. L., &
Branigan, C. (2005),“Positive
emotions broaden the scope
of attention and throught- of four stimuli (labeled a–d) used in this experiment. As you can see at the top of the first
action repertoires,” Cognition figure (top left, labeled 1a) participants had to decide whether the three squares (at the very
and Emotion, 19(3), 313–332.
top) were more similar to the three triangles (below them on the left) because they share
Reprinted by permission of
Taylor and Francis.
the same number of items arranged in a triangular format, or if the three squares were more
similar to the four squares (below them on the right) because they share the same shape.
Previous research had shown that when subjects are anxious or depressed they tend to
choose based on the more narrow characteristic of shape, but when they are feeling happy or
optimistic they choose similarity based on broader characteristics like number (Fredrickson
THINK ABOUT IT & Branigan, 2005).
If positive emotions make The researchers wondered, how would the emotions of amusement, contentment, dis-
people think more broadly, gust, and anxiety, evoked in participants by the film clips, affect their ratings in this task?
can they help people think Viewing either of the two positive films caused participants to think more broadly, judging
of new solutions to their a visual array based on general characteristics (arrangement, number) rather than on fine
problems? Can they help details (shape), when compared to the judgment of participants who watched the neutral
them view negative events
film (see Figure 13.11). Participants who viewed the negative films tended to make nar-
as challenges rather than
threats? rower judgments compared to the neutral film, but these did not quite reach statistical
significance.

Figure 13.11 Mean number

of global choices on the Penguins
visual processing task by film
viewing condition. Source:
From Frederickson and Nature
Branigan (2005, Figure 2,
p. 323). Fredrickson, B. L., &
Branigan, C. (2005), “Positive Sticks
emotions broaden the scope
of attention and throught-
action repertoires,” Cognition Witness
and Emotion, 19(3), 313–332.
Reprinted by permission of
Taylor and Francis. Cliffhanger

3 4 5 6
Number of Global Selections
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 387

Figure 13.12 Mean number

Penguins of action tendencies listed by
film viewing condition. Source:
From Frederickson and
Nature Branigan (2005, Figure 3,
p. 324). Fredrickson, B. L., &
Branigan, C. (2005), “Positive
Sticks emotions broaden the scope
of attention and throught-
action repertoires,” Cognition
Witness and Emotion, 19(3), 313–332.
Reprinted by permission of
Taylor and Francis.
Cliffhanger

4 8 12 16
Number of Action Urges

Similarly, viewing either of the two positive films gave participants more ideas of what they
would like to do than the neutral film. But viewing two negative films produced significantly
fewer desires than in participants who viewed the neutral film (see Figure 13.12). In fact, newer
research suggests that the intensity of the emotion, which increases the tendency to act, is what
causes the broadening and narrowing of attention, not whether the emotion is positive or nega-
tive (Gable & Harmon-Jones, 2010).
As you can see, when people are feeling positive emotions they feel more of a desire to
act, attend to stimuli in a global way, and think more broadly. Negative emotions decrease
the desire to act, and cause a narrowing of attention and thought. Other studies have also
found that positive moods make people think in unusually flexible, creative, and receptive
ways (Isen, 1987). Further, researchers found that this effect is linked to increases in brain
dopamine, the neurotransmitter that responds to pleasure and incentive (Ashby, Isen, &
Turken, 1999).

Positive Emotions Build Enduring Social Connections. Positive emotions function as

rewards or reinforcements for behaviors we find rewarding in others and which they find reward-
ing in us. Positive emotions lead to continued interactions whereas negative emotions deter
undesirable behavior and discourage further interaction (Keltner & Haidt, 2001). For example,
depressed people often—and alas correctly!—perceive that others are rejecting them; after all, they
are no fun to be around (Myers, 2000a). Humor, amusement, smiling, and play—all of which are
often expressions of affection and love—are not only forms of communication, but they increase “Smile and the whole world
the responsiveness of others, build social bonds, and solidify attachments between and among smiles with you, cry and you
individuals (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2001). In turn, the social connections built and strengthened
cry alone.”
through shared positive emotions become sources of support in times of need. In fact, resilient
people have a knack for eliciting positive emotions in the people they interact with (Tugade,
Fredrickson, & Barrett, 2004).
Can positive emotions build social connections that can endure even the death of a loved
one? Apparently so! Men and women aged 21 to 55 who lost a spouse or partner in the previous
3 to 6 months who could talk about their deceased partners with at least one genuine instance of
smiling and laughter remembered their relationships as healthier and more warm than people
who did not show a genuine smile and laughter (Keltner & Bonanno, 1997). While talking
about their deceased partners to an interviewer, people who laughed expressed less distress, less
negative emotions such as anger, distress, fear, or guilt, and greater positive, relative to negative,
emotions.
388 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

Positive Emotions Generate Upward Spirals. Not only does finding meaning in a trau-
matic event lead to positive emotions that facilitate coping, but these positive emotions, because
they broaden thinking, increase the likelihood of finding meaning in future events (Fredrickson,
2000). Just as depression and pessimistic thinking build on each other and lead to a downward
spiral of physical and psychological illness, improved coping and positive emotions build on
each other leading to an upward spiral of good feelings, effective coping, increased well-being
(Fredrickson & Joiner, 2002), and psychological resilience (Cohn, Fredrickson, Brown, Mikels,
& Conway, 2009).
To test these ideas, researchers wanted to know if positive emotions led to an increased
use of a broad-minded coping style (Fredrickson, 1998). Undergraduate men and women filled
out questionnaires assessing their positive emotions, negative emotions, and coping styles over
the course of a semester (Fredrickson & Joiner, 2002). When faced with “the most important
problem” they faced during the past year, participants with broad-minded coping were more
likely to say that they tried to “think of different ways to deal with the problem” or tried to “step
back from the situation and be more objective.”
In addition, the more positive emotions participants felt at the beginning of the study,
the more broad-minded coping they showed 5 weeks later. Broad-minded coping was the only
coping strategy that was related to positive emotions; no coping style was related to negative
emotion. In addition, participants who used broad-minded coping showed an increase in posi-
tive emotions, but not a decrease in negative emotions, over the course of the study. Finally, the
researchers found that broad-minded coping and positive emotions built on each other over
“The pain passes but beauty time (Fredrickson & Joiner, 2002).
endures.” Interestingly, the key difference between participants who relied on broad-minded coping
Auguste Renoir, to Henri Matisse, or another style was not in their experience of negative emotions or the amount of distress
when asked why he continued they felt, but in their experience of positive emotions. Positive emotions led to a broader way
to paint with crippling arthritis in of thinking, which in turn led to a broader way of coping, which led to more positive emotions
his hands in the following weeks and an increase in their overall well-being.
A more recent study, using similar methods, took these results a step further and discovered
that positive emotions increased trait resilience and life satisfaction in undergraduates over the
course of a month (Cohn et al., 2009). Participants who experienced higher average levels of
amusement, awe, compassion, contentment, gratitude, hope, interest, joy, love, and pride on a
daily basis not only felt better but they became more trait resilient as well. This ability to adapt
to change, including recognizing opportunities, adapting to circumstances, and bouncing back
from adversity, helped them deal with a range of life’s challenges and gave them feelings of
satisfaction with the course of their lives (Cohn et al., 2009).

The Seven Habits of Highly Resilient People

“Live well, love much, If anything, the research just reviewed suggests that, rather than one hardy or resilient personal-
laugh often.” ity type, there may be many pathways to resilience (Bonanno, 2004). In fact, there is remarkable
overlap, as you no doubt noticed, among hardiness, trait resilience, and positive emotions.
These three lines of research have suggested at least seven characteristics, experiences, and
behaviors that build resilience and buffer against stress (see Table 13.3). Let’s take a closer look
at some of these.
As we saw, positive emotions produce health and well-being by fostering adaptive coping,
repairing the physiological wear-and-tear of negative emotions, increasing cognitive flexibility,
building enduring social connections, and generating a store of good feelings for the future.
One very big way of building resilience, therefore, is to cultivate positive emotions including
joy, playfulness, interest, curiosity, wonder, flow, contentment, and love.
If positive emotions help people physically and mentally cope with adversity, then laughter
may indeed be the best medicine. Laughter helps people cope with traumatic events (Keltner &
Bonanno, 1997) and enhances immune system functioning in people who are prone to laugh a
lot (Dillon, Minchoff, & Baker, 1985–1986). Resilient people use humor as a coping mechanism
(Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004, 2007).
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 389

Table 13.3 The Seven Habits of Highly Resilient People

1. Positive emotions and laughter: joy, playfulness, interest, curiosity, wonder, flow,
contentment, love, etc.
2. Loving relationships with family and friends
3. A meaningful life
4. Optimism and hope
5. Gratitude
6. Relaxation
7. Happiness

An important part of getting through tough times is having loving relationships with fam-
ily and friends. Resilient people have a network of people they can depend on in times of stress
(Cobb, 1976; Maddi & Kobasa, 1984). Recall that according to the self-determination theory,
relatedness—or the interest, time, and energy others give to us that lead us to feel connected to
and valued by others—is an essential psychological need (Connell, 1990). Without this, people
feel unmotivated, disaffected, and disengaged and show poor well-being (Deci & Ryan, 2008b).
Similarly, attachment theory also supports the importance of relationships (Ainsworth et al.,
1974; Bowlby, 1969, 1973, 1980).
Having meaning in one’s life leads to better physical and psychological well-being (Davis,
Nolen-Hoeksema, & Larsen, 1998; Taylor, Kemeny, Reed, Bower, & Gruenewald, 2000). Meaning
creates positive emotions that help people cope with adversity (Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000;
Fredrickson, 2000) and also increases immune system functioning (Epel, McEwen, & Ickovics,
1998). Happy people also have satisfying work that provides them with feelings of flow, a state
marked by deep enjoyment, intense concentration, and complete absorption in an activity
(Myers & Diener, 1995).
People can find positive meaning through positive reappraisal, where they reframe
adverse events in a positive light; by infusing ordinary events with positive value; and by
pursuing and attaining realistic goals (Fredrickson, 2000). In a study of people who were
caring for a loved one with AIDS/HIV, 22% of caregivers reported that they using positive
reappraisal in their daily lives by feeling connected to others and cared about (Folkman,
“Red, hope is a good thing,
Moskowitz, Ozer, & Park, 1997). Other ways of finding meaning included having an oppor-
tunity to be distracted from everyday cares (21%), feeling a sense of achievement, pride, or maybe the best of things, and
self-esteem (17%), feeling hope or optimism (13%), and receiving affirmation or validation no good thing ever dies.”
from others (11%). Religion is yet another way that people can find meaning in their lives Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank
(Fredrickson, 2000). Redemption
Like positive emotions, hope appears to help lessen the impact of negative emotions and
facilitate recovery from stress (Ong, Edwards, & Bergeman, 2006; Snyder, 2002). The more hope
a person felt on a given day, agreeing with statements like “At the present time, I am energetically
pursuing my goals” and “There are lots of ways around any problem that I am facing now,” the
less impact negative emotions had on them and the better able they were to cope with adversity.
This effect was even stronger in people who had characteristically high levels of trait hope (Ong,
Edwards, & Bergeman, 2006; see Table 13.4).
Did you ever have somebody tell you to count your blessings? This bit of folk wisdom does
seem to help people cope with the negative events in their life by helping them focus on the
good as well as reflect on how they are better off than others (Emmons & McCullough, 2003).
Either way, feelings of gratitude (Emmons & McCullough, 2003), contentment (Fredrickson,
2000), and loving kindness toward others (Fredrickson, Cohn, Coffey, Pek, & Finkel, 2008)
increase positive emotions and boost well-being. Undergraduates who kept a weekly gratitude
journal reported fewer physical symptoms, exercised more regularly, felt better about their lives,
and made more progress toward important academic, interpersonal, or health-related personal
390 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

The Viennese psychologist

and Holocaust survivor
Viktor Frankl took the words
of Friedrich Nietzsche to
heart that “He who has a
why can endure any how,”
founding his logotherapy
school of psychotherapy on
the importance of finding
meaning in one’s life (Frankl,
1959).

goals. Students who listed their daily hassles or merely reported the good and bad events of
their week did not reap these psychological and physical benefits (Emmons & McCullough,
2003).
Finally, relaxation through imagery, muscle relaxation, yoga, biofeedback, or meditation
practice are also effective ways of dealing with stress (Fredrickson, 2000) and bolstering immune
system functioning (Davidson et al., 2003).
Based on this review, you can see how resilient people are better equipped to cope with
stressful events. The hardy reservists from the Bartone (1999) study that opened this chapter
had a combination of personality traits, cognitions, values, and beliefs that protected them
in times of stress, including many of these characteristics of resilient people such as positive
emotions, an optimistic outlook, close relationships, and meaning in their lives.

Table 13.4 Items of the State Hope Scale

1. If I should find myself in a jam, I could think of many ways to get out of it.
2. At the present time, I am energetically pursuing my goals.
3. There are lots of ways around any problem that I am facing now.
4. Right now I see myself as being pretty successful.
5. I can think of many ways to reach my current goal.
6. At this time, I am meeting the goals that I have set for myself.
Note: Please take a few moments to focus on yourself and what is going on in your life at this moment. Once you have this here
and now set, go ahead and answer each item according to the scale. Please select the number that best describes how you think
about yourself right now and put that number in the blank provided: 1 = Definitely False; 2 = Mostly False; 3 = Somewhat
False; 4 = Slightly False; 5 = Slightly True; 6 = Somewhat True; 7 = Mostly True; and 8 = Definitely True. In one sample
of college students, the mean of 444 students was 37 (SD = 6.33).
Source: Snyder, Sympson, Ybasco and Borders (1996, Appendix, p. 335). Snyder, C. R., Sympson, S. C., Ybasco, F. C., & Borders, T. F.
(1996). Development and validation of the state hope scale. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(2), 321–335. Copy-
right American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.
 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter 391

The Personality of Everyday Life

Who is happy?
Happy people, in particular, demonstrate a number of habits that help people cope
with adversity. Happy people are more successful than unhappy people when it comes
to income, career, and health (Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005), but money cannot
buy happiness (Myers, 2000b). Happy people are also more energetic, decisive, creative,
and sociable, and report a great deal of positive emotions in their lives (Myers, 2000a).
Because people’s judgments of life satisfaction come from the balance between positive
and negative emotions (Diener & Larsen, 1993), positive emotions may be at the heart of
the positive outcomes in life due to happiness (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005).
Happy people also tend to have high self-esteem, an internal locus of control, and to
be high in Extraversion (Myers & Diener, 1995) and low in Neuroticism (Lyubomirsky et
al., 2005). Extraverts are more engaged in events in their daily lives that have the potential
to inspire more positive emotions. In contrast, people who are high in Neuroticism are
more sensitive to the negative events in their lives (Zautra, Affleck, Tennen, Reich, & Davis,
2005). Recall that people high in trait resilience were also high in Extraversion and high
in emotional stability (Robins et al., 1996).
Happy people also have close, loving relationships with family and friends including
people with whom they are comfortable sharing intimate concerns (Myers, 2000b). For
example, married people tend to be happier than unmarried people. Happy people are
more successful in marriage and friendships (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005).
Finally, happy people tend to be religious and attend services frequently (Myers,
2000b). Religion may increase happiness because it often provides answers to life’s deep
questions, a sense of meaning and purpose for our existence, hope, and a supportive com-
munity (Myers & Diener, 1995). No doubt you recognize that happy people and hardy
people share the characteristics of personal control, commitment to others, and imparting
meaning on adversity by seeing it as a challenge rather than a threat (Maddi et al., 1998).
As a result, happy people are better able to tolerate frustration and to delay immediate
gratification (Myers, 2000a). They are more often lenient, loving, and forgiving, and less
often abusive. They are less likely to overreact to slight criticism. They prefer upbeat music,
stories, movies, and people, and tend to be more optimistic, focusing on the brighter side of
life (Myers, 2000a) and demonstrating an optimistic explanatory style (Fredrickson, 2000).

Chapter Summary
In this chapter we started out with the question of why some people are able to bounce back Study and Review
from adversity and achieve good outcomes in life. Though you may think there is something on mysearchlab.com
special about the personality of highly resilient people, resilience is actually more common
Go online for more
than many people think and involves characteristics that we all have the ability to cultivate in
resources to help you
ourselves.
review.
How does personality impact health? There are four kinds of models that psychologists
have proposed to understand the impact of personality on physical and psychological health:
health behavior models, transactional stress moderation models, constitutional predisposition
models, and interactional stress moderation models.
The elements of what makes people resilient seem to boil down to hardiness (i.e., internal
locus of control, commitment, and challenge), trait resilience (i.e., ego resilience or the ability to
self-regulate emotional reactions and behaviors; neither overcontrolled nor undercontrolled),
and positive emotions. People who are high in hardiness, for example, use transformational
392 Chapter 13 Resilience: An Integrative Mini-Chapter

coping to turn traumatic experiences into growth-enhancing ones. Despite initially promising
research in this area, hardiness may be confounded with other variables that are known to be
related to health and well-being (e.g., control, positive affect, Neuroticism).
Researchers are just now appreciating the power of positive emotions to foster adaptive
ways of coping, repair the harmful physiological effects of negative emotions, increase flex-
ibility in thinking, build enduring social connections, and generate good feelings as protection
against future stressors. Positive emotions function like money in the bank, protecting us in
case of emergency and amassing good feelings for the future. Much of the power of positive
emotions comes from the broaden-and-build theory that says that positive emotions broaden
our attention, thoughts, and range of possible behaviors. These in turn lead to better ways of
coping and greater resilience in the face of adversity.
Finally, what does it take to build physical and psychological resilience? Based on research
reviewed in this chapter, the answer is positive emotions—including happiness, laughter, love,
hope, and gratitude—an optimistic outlook, close relationships, a meaningful life, and relax-
ation. Indeed, many of these were identified as characteristics of the hardy reservists from the
Bartone (1999) study that opened this chapter. Having this combination of personality traits,
cognitions, values, and beliefs protects people in times of stress, whether it be giving a speech
in front of a class or coping with combat during times of war.

Review Questions
1. Discuss the Bartone (1999) study of military personnel and hardiness. What personality
characteristics make up hardiness?
2. What is resilience? What are the four kinds of models proposed by psychologists to under-
stand how personality impacts health?
3. What are the three characteristics of resilient people?
4. What are the three Cs of hardiness? What are some criticisms of the work on hardiness?
5. What is trait resilience? How is it measured? Do people with various levels of trait resil-
ience differ in Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and
Openness?
6. How do people high in hardiness or trait resilience experience and regulate positive emo-
tions compared to less resilient people?
7. What are the five ways in which positive emotions produce health and well-being?
8. What are the seven habits of highly resilient people?
9. What makes people happy?

Key Terms
Resilience Constitutional predisposi- Transformational coping
Health behavior models tion models Ego-resilience
Transactional stress modera- Interactional stress modera- Trait resilience
tion models tion models Broaden-and-build theory
 GLOSSARY

Acquiescent responding A type of response set in which respondents agree with nearly every
question.
Active genotype–environment correlation When people with a certain genotype seek out a specific
environment because of their personality.
Actualizing tendency The motive to actualize, that is, to bring about growth and positive change.
Adult attachment interview A method for assessing attachment in adults by using open-ended
interview questions to probe memories of adults’ relationships with their primary caregivers.
Agency A traditionally masculine way of approaching the social world concerned with actions
and accomplishments.
Agreeableness A personality trait which describes the quality of personal relationships; how much
a person feels for and gets along with others. People who are low in Agreeableness tend to be
quarrelsome, critical, harsh, blunt, and aloof.
Ah-Q An indigenous Chinese trait term that means defensiveness; named for Ah-Q, a well-known
fictional Chinese character depicted in a classic novel.
Alleles Alternative forms of the same gene which occur in pairs, one inherited from each birth parent.
Alpha Part of the two-factor model of personality, being emotionally stable enough to get along
with others. Includes the factors of Emotional Stability, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness.
Amae An indigenous Japanese trait term describing a state of dependency on another person and
the inducing of responsibility for caregiving in that other person.
Amotivation The state of having no motivation, being neither intrinsically nor extrinsically
motivated. Often accompanied by feelings of apathy or alienation.
Anal expulsive personality A fixation in the early part of the anal stage resulting in inhibition,
self-confidence, resistance to authority, lack of sphincter or bowel control, and the symbolic
behaviors of generosity and creativity.
Anal retentive personality A fixation in the later part of the anal stage resulting in rigidity,
compulsiveness, living up to the expectations of others, constipation, stinginess, and the
symbolic behaviors of orderliness, stubbornness, and perfectionism.
Androgens Masculine hormones, like testosterone, that regulate sexual behavior and the brain
structures that support these behaviors.
Androgynous Males and females who score high on both the masculinity and femininity scales
of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI).
Anhedonia The lack of positive emotion; a loss of or inability to experience pleasure that may or
may not be accompanied by the presence of negative emotions.
Anxious-ambivalent attachment An insecure bond children have with their primary caregivers,
marked by inconsistent responsiveness at home, little exploration in the strange situation, distress
when separated, and seeking out of the mother on reunion, but being unable to be comforted.
Arousability In physiology, how reactive people are to stimulation; an important difference
between extraverts and introverts. In sexuality, the capacity to become aroused to sexual stimuli.
Arrangement techniques A type of performance-based test in which respondents move objects
around or choose their favorites using ambiguous stimuli.
393
394 Glossary

Ascending reticular activating system (ARAS) A pathway transmitting signals from the limbic sys-
tem and hypothalamus to the cortex. Activation here can make a person alert and mentally sharp.
Association techniques A type of performance-based test, such as the Word Association Test
and Rorschach inkblot test, in which respondents report their reactions to ambiguous stimuli.
Assumption of representativeness The assumption that identical twins are typical of the population
on the specific characteristic under investigation, an assumption behind the double-the-difference
between MZ and DZ twins reared apart measure of heritability.
Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ) A 12-item personality test designed to measure
explanatory style.
Attributive self-descriptions In the Twenty Statements Test, aspects of the self-concept that refer
to psychological or physiological states or traits.
Authentic self-presentation Presenting a true, correct image of the self.
Autonomic nervous system Regulates smooth muscles including inner organs, cardiac muscle,
and glands. Includes the sympathetic division and parasympathetic division.
Autonomous orientation The degree to which people interpret a situation as autonomy supportive,
providing information to allow them to be self-regulating.
Autonomy One of the three needs according to self-determination theory; feeling free and able to
make choices about one’s actions.
Avoidant attachment An insecure bond children have with their primary caregivers, marked by
little affection at home, exploration in the strange situation, no overt reaction to separation, and
no seeking of comfort on reunion.
Avoidant coping Strategies aimed at avoiding problems and not managing the negative emotions
associated with stressful events.
Barnum Effect When people falsely believe that invalid personality tests are actually good
measures of personality because they contain feedback so general that it applies to many
people at the same time.
Behavioral approach system (BAS) The brain system associated with stimuli that are enticing, pleasur-
able, and rewarding and the personality characteristics of optimism, impulsiveness, addictive behav-
iors, high-risk impulsive behaviors, and mania. The BAS makes a person more sensitive to rewards.
Behavioral genetics The study of the genetic and environmental contributions to individual
differences in personality and behavior.
Behavioral inhibition system (BIS) The brain system associated with conflicts that may cause
feelings of anxiety, worry, rumination, risk assessment, vigilance, a sense of possible danger,
and a sense of loss. May be related to obsessive-compulsive disorders or a generalized anxiety
disorder. When the BIS is activated, people become more sensitive to punishment.
Behavioral residue Physical traces in living spaces left behind by the everyday actions of people.
Beneficence Along with respect for persons and justice, one of the three principles of ethical
research with human participants outlined in the Belmont report.
Beta Part of the two-factor model of personality, being open and adapting to new experiences.
Includes the factors of Extraversion and Openness.
Big Five A five-factor model of personality based on the lexical approach: Surgency (Extraversion),
Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and Culture.
Biopsychosocial model A model of gender differences that suggests gender differences are caused
by a combination of biological, psychological, and social forces interacting with one another.
Bipolar scale A scale that measures a single dimension, defined at either end by two contrasting
qualities (e.g., masculinity–femininity, active–passive).
Boredom susceptibility The need for change and variety and an aversion to routine and sameness.
One of the four subscales of the Sensation Seeking scale.
Broaden-and-build theory The theory that positive emotions like elevation, joy, interest, content-
ment, pride, and love expand people’s awareness, thoughts, and actions and help build physical,
intellectual, social, and psychological resources for coping with adversity.
Cardinal trait A single trait that completely dominates a person’s entire personality. Most often
found in fictional characters than in actual people.
Case study method The in-depth research study of a single individual.
Castration anxiety When a boy lives in fear that his father will castrate him as revenge for loving
his mother.
Catharsis The release of built-up id energy.
 Glossary 395

Causality orientation People’s typical way of regulating their motivation and behavior developed
over a lifetime of experiences with internal and external motivation.
CAVE technique (the content analysis of verbatim explanations technique) A method for measuring
explanatory style from any kind of verbal material.
Central nervous system The brain and the spinal cord.
Central traits The 5 to 10 traits that best describe a person.
Challenge test A technique to identify neurotransmitter function in which researchers administer
a drug with a known effect on a specific neurotransmitter and monitor the impact of the drug
on reactions that are thought to be related to the neurotransmitter.
Change When a personality trait is different, either increasing or decreasing, over time.
Clear purpose integrity tests (overt integrity tests) A type of personality assessment, often used
during the hiring process, to test the honesty of job candidates in a way that is clearly stated
and obvious to the test taker.
Cognitive foundations One of the building blocks of personality concerned with how people
perceive and think about information about themselves and the world.
Cognitive unconscious The part of the mind that contains nonconscious urges, thoughts, wishes,
desires, and memories that may influence our conscious thoughts.
Collectivism The belief that the views, needs, and goals of the group are more important than
those of the individual, emphasizing the interconnectedness of individuals and the group.
Collectivistic cultures Cultures that emphasize collectivism more than individualism.
Common rule Regulations about human participant research adopted by all U.S. federal agencies
establishing an institutional review board and procedures for obtaining informed consent at all
institutions where research is conducted.
Communion A traditionally feminine way of approaching the social world concerned with
nurturing and getting along with others.
Competence One of the three needs according to self-determination theory; feeling effective in
one’s actions.
Completion techniques A type of performance-based test, such as sentence completion tests, in
which respondents fill in the blanks with their own responses.
Complex A pattern of thoughts, memories, and perceptions organized around a theme that signify
an important, but often unconscious, concern of a person.
Computer axial tomography (CAT) scan A high-resolution x-ray picture of thin slices of brain
tissue, now called a computerized tomography (CT) scan.
Computerized tomography (CT) scan A high-resolution x-ray picture of thin slices of brain
tissue, formerly called a computer axial tomography (CAT) scan.
Conscience The part of the superego that contains knowledge of what we should not do, actions
we have been punished for in the past, and that punishes us with feelings of guilt, shame, and
embarrassment when we do something wrong in the present.
Conscientiousness A personality trait that describes an individual’s degree of physical and mental
organization and regulation of impulses like thinking before acting, delaying gratification, or
following norms and rules. People who are low in Conscientiousness are described as disorga-
nized and tend to be late, careless, and impulsive.
Consistency When a personality trait stays the same over time; also called continuity.
Constitutional predisposition models Models of how personality impacts health that suggest
that there may be some underlying genetic or constitutional factor which influences both
personality and disease.
Construct validity When an assessment successfully measures the theoretical concept it was
designed to measure.
Construction techniques A type of performance-based test, such as the Thematic Apperception
Test and the Draw-A-Person Test, in which respondents create a story or a piece of artwork in
response to an ambiguous stimulus.
Content analysis Organizing and making sense out of people’s verbal responses in a meaningful way.
Continuity When a personality trait stays the same over time; also called consistency.
Control condition In an experiment, this refers to the group of participants who receive no
treatment or a neutral treatment.
Controlled orientation The degree to which people interpret a situation as controlling, letting the
environment or their own introjects control their behavior.
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Convergent validity Establishes how good an assessment is by comparing the results to other
tests of the same construct or to tests of related constructs in order to establish what the test
measures.
Conversion reaction When anxiety is so extreme that it causes a physical symptom.
Correlation coefficient An estimate of the co-relation between two variables. Correlations can be
positive or negative depending on the type of relationship.
Correlational study A type of research design in which experimenters measure variables to see
how they are related. Used when certain variables, like personality, cannot be directly manipu-
lated for practical or ethical reasons.
Counterproductive work behaviors Actions that make it difficult or impossible for people to
function in their jobs, including absenteeism, tardiness, turnover, accidents, and stealing.
Criterion validity Establishes how good an assessment is by comparing the results to an external
standard such as another personality test or some behavioral outcome.
Cronbach’s alpha A measure of internal consistency reliability; the average correlation among
all possible combinations of test items taking them half at a time.
Cross sex-typed A female who scores high on the masculinity scale and low on the femininity scale
of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI); a male who scores high on the femininity scale and low
on the masculinity scale of the BSRI.
Defense mechanism How the ego deals with anxiety caused by an unacceptable impulse by chang-
ing the impulse or its desires into something more acceptable in order for the ego to protect
itself and minimize anxiety and distress.
Deindividuation The loosening of social norms and roles that occurs when people are anonymous
or part of a large group.
Denial A defense mechanism in which threatening or traumatic events or emotions are not
acknowledged.
Dependent variable The variable under study, a participant’s response, the variable the experi-
menters measure or observe.
Development Continuity and change in personality over time.
Dialectic A way of thinking in which contradictions are seen to be part of a higher truth rather
than as opposing forces.
Discriminant validity Establishes how good an assessment is by comparing the results to tests of
theoretically unrelated constructs in order to establish what the test doesn’t measure.
Disguised purpose integrity tests A type of personality assessment, often used during the hir-
ing process, to test the honesty of job candidates in a way that is hidden from the test taker.
Disinhibition The extent to which people have lowered social inhibitions and enjoy letting
loose in the company of others without a thought about decorum, proper behavior, or social
norms. Disinhibition often takes the form of alcohol use, partying, and sex. Disinhibition is
one of the four subscales of the Sensation Seeking scale.
Disorganized/disoriented A lack of a clear, consistent bond between children and their primary
caregivers marked by a lack of attachment strategy in the Strange Situation, often to a mother who
is highly anxious and unable to give comfort to the child at home.
Displacement A defense mechanism in which the ego substitutes an unacceptable object of an
impulse with a more acceptable object.
Dispositional optimism A general expectation that things will get better, good things will happen
in the future, events and circumstances will work out for the best.
Dizygotic (DZ) twins Fraternal twins, sharing about 50% of their genes with each other. DZ
twins are created when two different sperm fertilize two different eggs leading to the develop-
ment of genetically distinct fetuses.
Double-blind technique A research method to minimize expectancy effects in which neither the
experimenter nor the participant knows which condition a participant is in.
Dream analysis The detailed examination of the content and symbolism of dreams in order to
decipher their hidden, unconscious meaning.
Effect size A statistic that estimates the average difference between two groups.
Efficacy expectation In self-efficacy theory, the belief that one is capable of acting in a certain way.
Ego ideal The part of the superego that contains knowledge of what we should do, actions we have
been rewarded for in the past.
 Glossary 397

Ego resilience The ability to modify one’s responses to meet the requirements of a stressful situation
and return to one’s characteristic level of self-regulation after a stressor; now called trait resilience.
Eigenvalue In factor analysis, the amount of variation among participants’ answers that a factor
accounts for.
Electroencephalogram (EEG) Identifies electrical activity in the brain through electrodes placed
on the scalp.
Electromyography (EMG) A measure of muscle activity during contraction and relaxation.
Emotion-focused coping Strategies aimed at reducing distress by managing the negative emotions
associated with stressful events.
Emotional attachment system The biological system that maintains romantic relationships by
causing us to fall in love; regulated by pair-bonding that evolutionarily keeps couples together
to maximize the chances their offspring will survive.
Environmentality (e2) The amount of observed individual differences in a characteristic which
can be accounted for by environmental differences.
Epigenetics The study of how the environment changes the function of genes without changing
the genes themselves.
Equal environments assumption The assumption that identical twins are not treated more alike
than fraternal twins, an assumption behind the double-the-difference between MZ and DZ
twins reared apart measure of heritability.
Erogenous zone A part of the body where instincts originate; a part of the body that is a special
focus of attention during a psychosexual stage of development.
Eros The life instincts.
Evoked potential Electrical activity in a specific brain cell in response to a stimulus.
Evolutionary psychology The branch of psychology that studies how the need to survive, adapt,
and reproduce under various biological and environmental conditions has shaped human
personality and behavior.
Exemplification A self-presentation strategy of projecting a false image of the self as a good example
in order to arouse guilt in others.
Exon That part of the gene which codes for a specific trait.
Exotic becomes erotic (EBE) theory The theory of Daryl Bem that suggests that cultures that
emphasize the difference between men and women end up polarizing the genders, causing the
other gender to become foreign, mysterious, and a source of sexual interest.
Experience seeking The desire for moderate arousal through different kinds of experiences involv-
ing both the mind and the senses, perhaps through music, travel, or an unconventional lifestyle.
One of the four subscales of the Sensation Seeking scale.
Experimental condition In an experiment, this refers to the group of participants who receive the
treatment the experimenter is testing.
Experimental control This is when all aspects of an experiment are the same except for the specific
variable(s) under study. Along with random assignment, this allows experimenters to draw
conclusions about the cause of their results.
Explanatory style How people explain the good and bad events in their lives using the three
dimensions of internal–external, stable–unstable, and global–specific.
Expression techniques A type of performance-based test in which respondents express their
thoughts and feelings through creative play or artwork.
External regulation A type of self-regulation where behavior is controlled by something or someone
outside a person often by rewards and punishments.
Extraversion A personality trait that describes how much people energetically seek out interac-
tions with others and experience positive emotions. People who are low in Extraversion are
described as introverted and tend to be reserved, quiet, and shy.
Extreme responding A type of response set in which respondents avoid the middle of a scale,
choosing answers on either end.
Extrinsic motivation Engaging in an activity due to reasons outside the activity itself.
Extrinsically motivated Doing something because of external pressures like rewards and
punishments.
Face validity When an assessment appears to measure the theoretical concept it was designed to
measure based on the kinds of questions it contains.
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Facets A set of subtraits for each of the five factors originally based on the subscales of the
NEO-PI-R, a questionnaire measure of the five-factor model.
Factor analysis A statistical technique that mathematically identifies a meaningful underlying
structure (that is, factors) among a set of variables (such as questions on a questionnaire).
Factor loadings An estimate of how strongly each question fits into a given factor in a factor
analysis.
Faking bad Falsely answering a personality assessment to appear worse off in specific ways related
to the outcome of the test (e.g., unqualified, in need of help, etc.).
Faking good Falsely answering a personality assessment to appear better off in specific ways related
to the outcome of the test (e.g., appearing more psychologically healthy, more qualified, more
experienced, etc.).
Feared self Negative image of what we do not want to become or dread becoming in the future.
Feminine sex-typed A female who scores high on the femininity scale and low on the masculinity
scale of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI).
Feminist theory An explanation of gender differences that studies how men and women are dif-
ferent as a result of differences in social status in society, and that different is not necessarily
better or worse.
Field studies Research that is conducted outside a laboratory.
Field-dependent An individual difference between people in the way they perceive the world by
relying more on visual cues, seeing the big picture rather than details.
Field-independent An individual difference between people in the way they perceive the world
by relying on their own sensations, showing a selective attention to the fine details rather than
the big picture.
Fight-flight-freeze system (FFFS) The brain system associated with fear and reactions to aversive
stimuli (for example, fight or flight) and the personality characteristics of fearfulness, avoidance,
phobias, and panic disorders.
Filial piety An indigenous Chinese trait term describing the qualities of caring for the mental and
physical well-being of one’s elderly parents, continuing the family line, and bringing honor to
one’s family and ancestors.
Five-factor model A five-factor model of personality based on the measurement approach:
Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness.
Fixation When some psychic energy is devoted to unresolved psychosexual issues of the
past; may cause certain personality characteristics, behaviors, and symbolic behaviors in
adulthood.
Flow A positive state of complete absorption, deep enjoyment, and intense concentration in a task.
Fluid sexuality A sexual orientation that is changeable.
Forced-choice format A type of self-report test in which respondents must choose their answer
from among a limited number of alternatives, typically two or three.
Fraternal birth order effect The finding that gay men tend to have a larger number of older brothers
in their families than do non-gay men.
Free association A Freudian technique in which patients talk about whatever pops into their
heads, following one thought to another, without trying to control, monitor, or censor what
they are saying.
Freudian slip A mistake in speaking caused by unconscious desires.
Fully functioning The combination of being open to new experiences, trusting in oneself and the
world, lacking fear of disapproval or rejection, experiencing thoughts and emotions deeply,
being sensitive and responsive to others’ needs, and volunteering in the community that marks
a healthy, well-adjusted adult, according to Carl Rogers. These characteristics are often shown
by securely attached adults.
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) A high-resolution three-dimensional picture
of brain activity over time using blood-oxygen levels. Color enhancement is used to identify
amount of activity across many regions of the brain.
Galvanic skin response (GSR) A measure of arousal using sweat.
Gender identity A psychological sense of our maleness or femaleness apart from our biological
gender.
Gender inversion The early and now discredited belief that same-sex behavior is caused by a
biological switch that turns males into females and females into males.
 Glossary 399

Gender socialization Teaching children to think and act in ways society says are appropriate for
males and females.
Gene A sequence of DNA that codes for a specific trait.
General Personality Factor (GPF) A single factor that describes human personality in one dimen-
sion of being emotionally stable enough to get along with others and flexible enough to deal
with change and demands. People who are high in this factor are altruistic, sociable, able to
handle stress, relaxed, open to experience, dependable, and task-focused.
Generalizability Establishes the limits of an assessment, the conditions, uses, and populations for
which the measure is valid.
Genetics One of the building blocks of personality. The study of how genes and environment
affect personality and behavior.
Genotype The genetic makeup that codes for a specific trait.
Genotype–environment correlation When a genotype is exposed differently to an environment;
when personality affects the environments people find themselves in. Genotype–environment
correlations may be passive, reactive, or active.
Genotype–environment interaction When people respond differently to the same environment
due to their differing genetic makeup.
Global self-descriptions In the Twenty Statements Test, aspects of the self-concept that are so
abstract, comprehensive, or vague that they do not distinguish the person from others.
Global versus specific One of three dimensions of explanatory style; whether the cause of an event
will also affect other aspects of a person’s life (global) or just the one aspect (specific).
Health behavior models Models of how personality impacts health that suggest that people with
certain personality traits adopt a healthier lifestyle and take better care of themselves than others.
Heritability (h2) The amount of observed individual differences in a characteristic that can be
accounted for by genetic differences.
Heteronormativity (normative heterosexuality) The view that heterosexuality is the natural, cor-
rect, and normal way for people to be.
HEXACO model A six-factor model of personality including Honesty-Humility, Emotionality,
Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Openness to experience.
Hoped-for self A positive image of what we would like to become in the future.
Hopelessness model of depression The theory that helplessness beliefs generalize to future events
leading people to lose hope, stop trying, and feel sadness. If these thoughts last more than
2 weeks, may lead to major depression.
Humanistic tradition A viewpoint in psychology that emphasizes the importance of responsibility,
growth, and actualization.
Hypothesis An educated guess about what may be causing an observed or predicted effect.
Hysterical character A fixation of females in the phallic stage resulting in hyperfemininity,
flirtatiousness, seductiveness, and the symbolic behaviors of promiscuity and male-bashing.
Identification When the ego finds an object or event that matches the wishes of the id and so
satisfies the id impulse.
Identified regulation A type of self-regulation where behavior is initiated from within a person,
because the person has accepted a goal that is more important or interesting than the task at
hand.
Identity Our place in society; definitions and standards imposed on us by others.
Identity crisis When a socially ascribed identity does not match our unique self-concept.
Idiographic An approach to the study of traits in which researchers identify the traits that are
important for the understanding of a single individual.
Illusion of control The belief that one has control over an outcome when in reality one does not.
Impersonal orientation The degree to which people feel they lack control over important
outcomes, often resulting in amotivation.
Implicit Association Test (IAT) A test administered on the computer that uses reaction times to
measure unconscious attitudes.
Impression management Using self-presentation to convey a specific image of the self to others,
for example, as likable, dangerous, competent, a good example, or helpless.
Independent variable The variable experimenters hypothesize to have an effect on participants’
responses. This may be manipulated in a true experiment or measured in correlational and
quasi-experimental studies.
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Independent view of the self A self-concept seen in individualistic cultures in which the self is
autonomous and independent of others.
Indigenous traits Words describing personality that are unique to a specific culture or language
group and not found in Anglo-Saxon cultures.
Individual change How an individual person changes over time.
Individualism The belief in the uniqueness of the individual, emphasizing the separateness of
individuals from the group.
Individualistic cultures Cultures that emphasize individualism more than collectivism.
Informed consent When potential research subjects willingly agree to participate in a study after
being told about the study’s procedures, likely risks, and potential benefits of their participation.
Infrequency scale A scale inserted into a personality assessment to identify people who may be
using a response set (e.g., a lie scale).
Ingratiation A self-presentation strategy of projecting a false image of the self as likable in order
to arouse affection in others.
Instincts Unconscious tension, impulse, or excitation originating in a bodily need.
Institutional review board (IRB) Reviews all research to ensure that it upholds federal standards
of ethical principles of research with human participants as outlined in the Common Rule.
Integrated regulation A type of self-regulation where behavior is initiated from within a person
because the person has internalized the goals and values involved with the task at hand such
that it is an expression of his or her personality.
Integration Combining individual parts into a coherent whole, such as how the building blocks
of personality combine to form a whole person greater than the mere sum of the parts.
Integrity tests Personality assessments, often used during the hiring process, to test the honesty
of job candidates. These may be overt or clear purpose.
Intellectualization A defense mechanism in which the ego keeps emotions separate from thoughts
so that one can talk about an event without experiencing disturbing emotions; a form of the
defense mechanism isolation.
Interactional stress moderation models Models of how personality impacts health that suggest
that certain personality characteristics modify physiological responses by reducing or increasing
them and help people be resilient in the face of adversity.
Interdependent view of the self A self-concept seen in collectivistic cultures in which the self
includes others and cannot be understood apart from clan, family, friends, coworkers, and so on.
Internal consistency reliability When an assessment gives consistent results across items, demon-
strated by parallel forms reliability, split-half reliability, or Cronbach’s alpha reliability.
Internal versus external One of three dimensions of explanatory style; whether an event was
caused more by people’s own actions (internal) or by outside influences (external).
Internal working models Internalized expectations of what caregiving relationships are like, based
on our early experiences.
Interpersonal relatedness An indigenous personality factor unique to the Chinese referring to
instrumentality of relationships, propriety, avoidance of conflict, support of traditions, and
compliance with norms. Includes the traits of Harmony, Ren Qing, Ah-Q, and Face.
Interrater reliability A measure of rater consistency; when there is agreement among raters.
Intimidation A self-presentation strategy of projecting a false image of the self as dangerous in
order to arouse fear in others.
Intrapsychic foundations One of the building blocks of personality concerned with our own
thoughts, feelings, and motives, both conscious and unconscious.
Intrinsic motivation Engaging in an activity due to reasons inherent in the activity itself like
satisfaction or pleasure.
Intrinsic regulation Freely choosing to engage in an activity because of the pleasure, satisfaction,
or interest inherent in the activity itself.
Intrinsically motivated Doing something because of the pleasure, satisfaction, and interest in
the activity itself.
Introjected regulation A type of self-regulation where behavior is controlled by something inside
a person, often by guilt and anxiety.
Intron That part of the gene which does not code for a specific trait but may orchestrate the
functioning of nearby genes in direct response to the environment.
Isolation A defense mechanism in which the ego mentally keeps an unacceptable thought or feeling
separate from other thoughts and feelings.
 Glossary 401

Justice Along with respect for persons and beneficence, one of the three principles of ethical
research with human participants outlined in the Belmont report.
L data See Life data.
Latent content The true meaning of the dream as revealed through free association and dream
analysis.
Learned helplessness A state of lack of motivation, problems in thinking and learning, and
negative emotions including depression caused by experiencing a lack of control.
Left–right asymmetries Individual differences in how strongly the left side of the cortex responds
to negative emotion compared to how strongly the right side responds to positive emotions.
Levels In an experiment, the number of groups in an independent variable.
Lexical approach Using synonyms within or commonalities across languages to identify the most
important traits for understanding personality.
Libido The energy of the life instincts (eros).
Life data Called L data, they include information about people that is publically available, such
as graduating from college, clubs and organizations, criminal records, marriages, and so forth.
Locus of causality People’s beliefs about the choice to engage in a behavior, feeling autonomous
or controlled.
Locus of control People’s beliefs about what determines their outcomes in life, their own efforts
(internal) or outside circumstances, such as other people, fate, or luck (external).
Longitudinal study An experimental design in which research participants are followed over long
periods of time, such as from childhood to adulthood, or from early to later adulthood.
Looking-glass self Seeing our self as others see us.
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) A high-resolution three-dimensional picture of the brain
tissue obtained by the use of radio frequency waves.
Manifest content What people remember seeing in their dreams.
Masculine sex-typed A man who scores high on the masculinity scale and low on the femininity
scale of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI).
Maternal immune hypothesis The theory that each male fetus increases the sensitivity of the
mother’s immune system which increases the chances that later-born male children will be gay.
Maturation Changes in personality that occur due to the normal process of growing from one
period of life (for example, childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle adulthood, old
age) to another.
Mean-level change A type of general change that affects nearly all people as they grow from
infancy to adulthood.
Measurement approach Using questionnaires and statistics to identify the most important traits
for understanding personality.
Mendelian inheritance A pattern of inheritance named after Gregor Mendel, in which one
trait dominates over another recessive trait that is later manifested in successive generations.
Meta-analysis A technique in which researchers combine the effects of a specific variable, like
gender, from many studies into a single index in order to estimate more accurately the average
effect of that variable.
Mirror test A test to see if an animal or human infant has a sense of self by showing self-directed
behaviors while looking in a mirror. Often tested by placing a red spot on the research subject
and observing its behavior.
Moderate responding A type of response set in which respondents avoid the ends of a scale,
choosing answers in the middle.
Monozygotic (MZ) twins Identical twins, exact genetic duplicates of each other. MZ twins are
created when a fertilized egg, the zygote, splits into two (or more) identical parts, each of which
develops into a fetus.
Monozygotic twins raised apart (MZA) Identical twins who were separated at birth and raised
in different environments.
Motivated unconscious The part of the mind that contains nonconscious urges, thoughts,
wishes, desires, and memories and which strives to make these urges known in our conscious
thoughts.
Narrow traits The subtraits that make up each of the three factors of Eysenck’s PEN theory.
Negative genotype–environment correlation When a genotype is exposed differently to an envi-
ronment that is unfavorable for developing certain characteristics. For example, an environment
may discourage the development of certain personality characteristics.
402 Glossary

Neuroscience One of the building blocks of personality. The study of how our brain and nervous
system affect personality and behavior through the study of bodily responses, brain structure,
brain activity, and biochemical activity.
Neuroticism A personality trait that describes how anxious and vulnerable to negative emotions
a person is. People who are low in Neuroticism are described as emotionally stable and tend to
be calm, relaxed, and able to handle stress well.
Neurotransmitters Chemicals released by neurons to inhibit or excite the next neuron into action
to help transmit signals through the nervous system.
Nomothetic An approach to the study of traits in which researchers seek to identify human univer-
sals (i.e., the key traits that are important for describing the personality of many different people).
Non-shared environment Aspects of the family or nonfamily environment that are unique to an
individual family member and that make him or her different from his or her siblings living
in the same household.
Noncontent responding Any way that people respond to a personality assessment that is not
directly related to the questions asked.
Nonindependence error A flaw in some fMRI studies that occurs when researchers uninten-
tionally bias their results by not independently selecting which brain areas to correlate with
personality characteristics or other variables.
Normative change How people change over time, on average.
O data See Observation data.
Objective self-awareness Seeing the self as an object of social scrutiny.
Observation data Called O data, they include information given by friends, family, teachers,
trained raters, or others based on watching how people behave in the laboratory or in their
daily lives.
Observational study A type of research design in which scientists observe what people do and
generate a hypothesis to explain their findings.
Oedipus complex When a child falls in love with the other-sex parent and shows hostility to the
same-sex parent.
Openness A personality trait that describes how much people appreciate creativity and the life of
the mind as revealed in ideas, thoughts, fantasies, art, and beauty. People who are low in Open-
ness are described as conventional, preferring the concrete and traditional.
Optimal challenge The point at which an activity is neither too easy, leading to boredom, or
too difficult, leading to frustration.
Optimistic explanatory style A consistent way of explaining good and bad events in which
people believe that positive events are explained by causes that tend to be internal, stable,
and global and that negative events are explained by events that tend to be external, unstable,
and specific.
Oral incorporative personality A fixation in the early part of the oral stage resulting in dependency,
eating, drinking, smoking, kissing, and the symbolic behaviors of collecting things and being a
good listener.
Oral sadistic personality A fixation in the later part of the oral stage resulting in aggression,
gum-chewing, nail-biting, overeating, and the symbolic behaviors of sarcasm, cynicism, and
ridicule.
Outcome expectation In self-efficacy theory, the belief that acting in a certain way will produce
a certain outcome.
Overjustification effect When people lose interest in a formerly intrinsically interesting activity
as a result of extrinsic control.
Overt integrity tests (clear purpose integrity tests) A type of personality assessment, often used
during the hiring process, to test the honesty of job candidates in a way that is clearly stated
and obvious to the test taker.
Parallel-forms reliability A measure of internal consistency reliability; when two or more versions
of a test give consistent results.
Parapraxes Mistakes in speaking (e.g., slips of the tongue), or acting (e.g., accidents, bungled
actions, mistakes, errors) caused by unconscious desires.
Parasympathetic division Part of the autonomic nervous system; replenishes the body’s energy
stores through salivation, digestion, and other functions.
Passive genotype–environment correlation When a genotype is exposed to an environment but
has done nothing to obtain the environment.
 Glossary 403

Path analysis A technique in which researchers use statistics to test hypotheses about how variables
relate to one another.
Path diagram A visual illustration of the results of a path analysis that shows the significant
connections among variables.
Patterned responding A type of response set in which respondents answer by making patterns
on their response sheet.
Penis envy Feelings of jealousy and inferiority girls feel when they realize that they do not have a
penis but boys do.
Performance-based tests Assessments in which people respond to unstructured stimuli, projecting
their own meanings, significances, patterns, feelings, interpretations, concerns, or worldviews;
sometimes called projective tests.
Peripheral nervous system The somatic nervous system and the autonomic nervous system.
Personality assessment The measurement of individual characteristics of a person, often through
personality tests, interviews, and other measures.
Personality coherence When the level of a personality trait within a person stays the same (e.g. from
childhood to adulthood) but the way it is expressed differs.
Personality development How personality changes or remains the same over time.
Personality psychology The scientific study of what makes us who we are. The study of individual
differences: identifying ways in which people are both similar and different and explaining how
they became that way.
Personality questionnaires Tests in which people answer questions about themselves that identify
certain aspects of their personality or personality functioning.
Pessimistic explanatory style A consistent way of explaining good and bad events in which people
believe that negative events are explained by causes that tend to be internal, stable, and global
and that positive events are explained by events that tend to be external, unstable, and specific.
Phallic character A fixation of males in the phallic stage resulting in hypermasculinity, a concern
for virility, and the symbolic behaviors of owning and using power tools, big cars and trucks,
and large machinery.
Phenotype The manifestation of the genes; the observable physical or psychological trait which
is coded by the genes.
Philotimo An indigenous Greek trait term describing the qualities of being polite, generous,
responsible, respectful, and having a strong sense of honor.
Phrenology The discredited theory of Joseph Gall from the 1790s that the size, shape, and location
of bumps on the scalp was related to particular mental or personality characteristics.
Physical self-descriptions In the Twenty Statements Test, aspects of the self-concept that refer to
physical qualities.
Pleasure principle How the id operates, wanting what it wants when it wants it, without concern
for reality or social standards.
Positional cloning A possible way of preventing inherited diseases by replacing defective genetic
code with corrected code that matches the gene as closely as possible.
Positive genotype–environment correlation When a genotype is exposed differently to an envi-
ronment that is favorable for developing certain characteristics. For example, an environment
may encourage the development of certain personality characteristics.
Positron emission tomography (PET) scan A picture of brain activity using a radioactive substance
and a special scanner. Color enhancement is used to identify amounts of activity across many
regions of the brain.
Possible selves Images of what we hope, fear, or expect that we may become in the future.
Primary control A way of exercising control by changing the circumstances.
Primary process thinking Making decisions based on wants and desires without logical rules and
conscious reasoning; used by the id.
Problem-focused coping Strategies aimed at reducing distress by working directly on remedying
the source of the stress and problem solving.
Proceptivity The motivation to initiate sexual activity; sexual desire.
Projection A defense mechanism in which the ego attributes its own disturbing or unacceptable
impulses onto another person.
Psychosexual stages The progression from childhood to adulthood, according to Sigmund Freud,
in which we move from an immature reflexive expression of sexual impulses involving the id, to
a mature, socially acceptable expression of sexual impulses involving ego and superego.
404 Glossary

Psychoticism A personality trait that describes how tough-minded, selfish, and antisocial a person
is. People who are low in Psychoticism are high in Agreeableness and Conscientiousness.
Qualitative methods Research methods that classify, judge, or organize participants’ verbal
responses into themes or patterns.
Quantitative methods Research methods that use numerical measures of some sort including
questionnaires, rating scales, test scores, and the like.
Quasi-experimental design A research study in which experimenters, either for practical, logistical,
or ethical reasons, do not randomly assign people to experimental conditions.
Random assignment What experimenters do to make sure every participant has an equal chance
of being a part of each experimental condition. Along with experimental control, this allows
experimenters to draw conclusions about the cause of their results.
Rater consistency When an assessment gives consistent results across multiple raters, often dem-
onstrated by interrater reliability.
Rationalization A defense mechanism in which the ego acknowledges an unacceptable behavior
but reinterprets it to make it seem more acceptable.
Reactant responding A type of response set in which respondents disagree or say no to nearly
every question.
Reaction formation A defense mechanism in which the true unacceptable impulse is expressed
by the opposite, acceptable impulse.
Reactive genotype–environment correlation When the environment responds to certain person-
alities because of their genotype.
Reality principle How the ego operates, satisfying id impulses within the confines of what is
possible in the social and physical world.
Reflected appraisals The opinions of significant others that are used as a mirror to evaluate
ourselves.
Reflex action Seeking gratification through immediate physical action; used by the id.
Regulation and motivation One of the building blocks of personality concerned with how people
adjust their responses to the environment, both consciously and unconsciously.
Reinforcement sensitivity theory The theory that the way people’s brain and nervous systems
respond to stimuli determines personality. The three hypothetical brain systems thought to
be related to personality differences are the fight-flight-freeze system (FFFS), the behavioral
approach system (BAS), and the behavioral inhibition system (BIS).
Relatedness One of the three needs according to self-determination theory; feeling meaningfully
connected to others.
Reliability How consistent a measure is over time, items, or raters.
Ren Qing An indigenous Chinese trait term that refers to a traditional relationship orientation
emphasizing give and take and connectedness.
Repression A defense mechanism in which the ego unconsciously keeps unacceptable thoughts
or urges in the unconscious.
Resilience The ability to recover from tragedy, adversity, hardship, or to adapt to ongoing life
stressors.
Respect for persons Along with beneficence and justice, one of the three principles of ethical
research with human participants outlined in the Belmont report.
Response set A habitual way of responding to a personality assessment that is not directly related
to the questions asked; noncontent responding.
S data See Self-report data.
Safe haven A primary caregiver to whom the child can turn for comfort when distressed.
Scatterplot or scattergram A two-dimensional graph that shows the relationship between two
variables.
Schema A pattern of thoughts, memories, and perceptions organized around a concept.
Scientific method A set of guidelines for making and testing observations about the world in order
to build knowledge while minimizing error and bias.
Secondary control A way of exercising control by changing oneself.
Secondary process thinking Logical thinking, weighing the costs and rewards of possible actions;
used by the ego.
Secondary traits Traits of lesser importance or less consistently displayed within a person.
 Glossary 405

Secure base A primary caregiver with whom the child feels safe enough to explore the environment.
Securely attached Children are securely attached when they have a positive bond children have
with their primary caregivers, marked by responsiveness at home, exploration in the strange
situation, distress when separated, and comfort on reunion.
Selective placement The assumption that adopted families of MZ twins raised apart are different
from each other, that the identical twins were not purposely placed in similar environments,
an assumption behind the rmza measure of heritability.
Self and identity One of the building blocks of personality. Our own sense of who we are, includ-
ing self-concept, self-esteem, and social identity.
Self-concept The set of ideas and inferences we hold about ourselves.
Self-concept clarity How well people know themselves; consistency of self-concept.
Self-determination theory The theory by Edward Deci and Richard Ryan that states that people
need autonomy, competence, and relatedness in order to feel intrinsic motivation.
Self-efficacy The belief that one can be competent and effective at some activity.
Self-esteem The evaluative component of the self; how we evaluate ourselves.
Self-esteem stability How consistent people’s feelings of self-worth are over time; consistency of
self-esteem.
Self-fulfilling prophecy The tendency for our own beliefs about what we think others are like to
come true.
Self-handicapping Purposely setting oneself up for failure in order to have a ready-made excuse
when things go wrong and look particularly good when things go right.
Self-monitoring A personality trait that describes the extent to which people are aware of and
manipulate their self-presentations, expressive behaviors, and nonverbal displays of emotion
in order to control the images and impressions others form of them.
Self-presentation Acting, speaking, or dressing in a certain way in order to convey a specific image
of ourselves to our self or others.
Self-promotion A self-presentation strategy of projecting a false image of the self as competent
in order to arouse respect in others.
Self-report data Called S data, they include any information people respond to directly, such as
objective personality tests, interviews, narratives, life stories, and survey questions.
Self-report tests Assessments in which respondents answer questions about themselves; some-
times called objective tests.
Sensation seeking The pursuit of varied, novel, complex, or intense experiences and the willing-
ness to take risks to have such experiences.
Sexual attractions Thoughts, feelings, wants, or desires for sexual relations or to be in a loving
sexual relationship with another person; it does not include sexual behavior.
Sexual behavior Sexual actions people have actually engaged in, including genital contact with
sexual excitement, with or without intercourse or orgasm, occurring with mutual consent.
Sexual desire system The biological system that promotes sexual union; regulated by sexual mating
that evolutionarily maximizes the chances of reproduction and survival of the species.
Sexual identity Labels people associate with their sexuality, whether personally selected or socially
ascribed.
Sexual orientation The prevalence of erotic arousals, feelings, fantasies, and behaviors one has
for males, females, or both.
Sexy Seven Dimensions of personality that describe sexuality and overlap about 80% with
the five factors: Sexual Attractiveness, Relationship Exclusivity, Gender Orientation, Sexual
Restraint, Erotophilic Disposition, Emotional Investment, and Sexual Orientation.
Shared environment Aspects of the family environment that are generally the same for all the
children living in the same household, including physical, psychological, and social aspects.
Social constructionism The idea that gender differences are in the eye of the beholder and actively
constructed rather than being innate differences between males and females.
Social identity Who people are when they are with others; the part of the self people present to
others.
Socially desirable responding Falsely answering a personality assessment to appear more coopera-
tive, likable, or socially appropriate, often by not admitting to distasteful, but perfectly human
tendencies (e.g., gossiping, jealousy, etc.).
406 Glossary

Social role theory The theory that males and females have different personality and social behavior
due to the different roles they hold in society.
Social self-descriptions In the Twenty Statements Test, aspects of the self-concept that refer to
social roles, institutional memberships, or a socially defined status.
Somatic nervous system Part of the peripheral nervous system; controls muscle movements.
Spiritual transcendence A dimension of personality separate from the five factors: the ability
of individuals to view life from a larger, more objective perspective; a personal search for a
greater connection across all of humanity.
Split-half reliability A measure of internal consistency reliability; when each half of a test gives
consistent results.
Stable versus unstable One of three dimensions of explanatory style; whether the cause of a posi-
tive or negative event is likely to reoccur in the future (stable) or not (unstable).
Stereotype A generalization about a group of people in which attributes are assumed to be true of
all members of the group regardless of the actual variation among group members.
Stereotype threat The distress people feel in a situation where their performance may confirm a
stereotype. This distress causes them to perform worse than they are capable of.
Strange Situation A research technique devised by Mary Ainsworth in which children go through
a series of separations and reunions with their primary caregivers and observed to measure the
quality of their attachment bonds.
Strategic self-presentation Presenting a false image of the self to others in order to achieve a goal.
Structural model of personality The parts of the personality according to Sigmund Freud com-
prised of the id, ego, and superego.
Sublimation A defense mechanism in which the ego substitutes an unacceptable impulse with a
more acceptable impulse.
Supplication A self-presentation strategy of projecting a false image of the self as helpless in order
to arouse nurturance in others.
Suppression A coping mechanism in which the ego consciously keeps unacceptable thoughts or
urges in the unconscious.
Symbolic behavior An innocent behavior that actually represents an unconscious desire, often
sexual or aggressive.
Sympathetic division Part of the autonomic nervous system; mobilizes energy for fight or flight.
T data See Test data.
Temperament A set of personality characteristics that are relatively stable across the life span,
present from birth, determined by genetic factors, and develop with maturation and experience.
Temporal consistency reliability When an assessment gives consistent results across time, often
demonstrated by test–retest reliability.
Test data Called T data, they include information about people’s reactions to a structured situa-
tion, such as experimental procedures, intelligence tests, performance tests, and projective tests.
Test–retest reliability A measure of temporal consistency; when a test gives a consistent result
from one point in time to a later point in time.
Thanatos The death instincts.
Theoretical approach Using theory to identify the most important traits for understanding
personality.
Thrill and adventure seeking Arousal seeking through physical sensations produced by speed,
height, falling, danger, like through extreme sports. One of the four subscales of the Sensation
Seeking scale.
Topographic model of personality The location of thoughts, memories, and desires in the mind
according to Sigmund Freud, comprised of the unconscious, preconscious, and conscious.
Trait resilience The ability to modify one’s responses to meet the requirements of a stressful
situation and return to one’s characteristic level of self-regulation after a stressor; once called
ego resilience.
Traits One of the building blocks of personality. A person’s typical way of thinking, feeling, and
acting in various situations at different times.
Transactional stress moderation models Models of how personality impacts health that suggest
that certain personality traits may influence a person’s exposure to stressful or dangerous
circumstances.
 Glossary 407

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) Using an electrical current to disrupt or enhance

neuron functioning to pinpoint with greater accuracy than other techniques an exact area of
brain function.
Transference The unconscious redirection of feelings for one person onto a different person who
resembles the original person in some way, especially from a person who was important in
childhood onto a person who is important in the present.
Transformational coping A way of coping with adversity in which people high in hardiness
reinterpret an experience as less of a threat and more of a growth-enhancing experience.
Triadic design A research method in learned helplessness experiments in which three groups are
used to test the controllability of an aversive stimulus.
Triangulation Using multiple methodologies within a single study.
True experiment A design in which participants are randomly assigned to conditions which are
identical except for the variable(s) under study, which allows experimenters to draw conclusions
about the cause of their results.
Twenty Statements Test (TST) A test of self-concept where participants generate 20 answers to
the statement “I am ______.”
Undifferentiated Males and females who score low on both the masculinity and femininity scales
of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI).
Undoing A defense mechanism in which the ego tries to nullify one action or thought with another.
Unidimensional scale A scale that measures a single dimension.
Validity How well a test measures what it was designed to measure.
Wish fulfillment Seeking gratification through imagining what one wants; used by the id.
Word association method A technique used to uncover unconscious material and complexes
in which participants respond to one word with the first word that comes to their minds.
Yoking A research technique in which participants in one group are matched to participants
in another group so that they receive the same treatment.
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 AUTHOR INDEX

A Anderson, C. A., 294 Baars, B., 209

Abela, J. R. Z., 292 Anderson, C. R., 276–277, 296 Baartman, H. E. M., 224
Abend, T., 124 Anderson, D., 109 Bailey, J. M., 358–364, 366
Abramson, L. Y., 282, 284–285, 287, 293, Anderson, G., 242 Bailey, S., 283
299 Anderson, J. C., 59 Baird, E., 268
Adams, N. E., 256 Anderson, K., 283 Bakan, D., 314
Adler, A., 228 Anderson, R., 250 Baker, D. B., 99–100
Adrian, C., 293 Andover, M. S., 293 Baker, K. H., 388
Affleck, G. G., 299, 384, 391 Angleitner, A., 151–152 Bakker, A. B., 40
Af Klinteberg, B., 199 Anonymous, 28 Baldwin, A. L., 28
Aguilar, R., 192 Antoni, M. H., 302 Ballard, M. E., 197
Agyei, Y., 359 Apel, P., 197 Banaji, M. R., 211, 327
Ahern, N. R., 379 Apter, A., 299 Bandura, A., 254–256, 324, 331
Ainsworth, M. D. S., 204, 231–234, 389 Arbisi, P., 177 Barahal, H. S., 361
Åkerström, B., 276 Archer, J., 323 Barbaranelli, C., 256
Akert, R. M., 314 Archer, R. P., 13, 80, 82, 87 Barclay, L. C., 55, 124
Alexander, G. M., 331–332, 334 Ardelt, M., 68 Bardeen, M., 340
Allaire, J. C., 383 Armstrong, T., 95 Barenbaum, N. B., 28–29
Allen, L. S., 360 Arnoult, L. H., 294 Barett, L. C., 287–288
Allen, N. B., 189 Aronson, E., 10, 220, 296, 314 Bargmann, K., 264
Allik, J., 71, 127, 339 Aronson, J., 113, 342 Barnum, P. T., 79, 84
Alloy, L. B., 282, 285 Asbury, K., 145 Barrett, J. L., 50
Allport, G. W., 23–30, 32, 41–43, 54, 226 Ashby, F. G., 387 Barrett, L. F., 176, 387
Almagor, M., 41 Ashton, M. C., 30, 41, 49 Barrett, P., 178
Alvarez, J. M., 110 Aspinwall, L. G., 299, 303–304 Barrick, M. R., 64, 93–94
Álvarez, M. S., 263–266 Asplund, R., 276 Barry, H. I., 28
Amelang, M., 276 Association for Psychological Science, 126 Bartholomew, K., 130
American Educational Research Atkinson, J. W., 90 Bartone, P. T., 374, 390, 392
Association, 79 Atkinson, M., 220 Bartram, D., 94
American Psychological Association, Auden, W. H., 134 Bartrum, E., 302
13–14, 79 Auster, C. J., 345 Basu, G. K., 196
American Psychological Society, 126 Ávila, C., 184–185, 187 Bates, J. E., 293
Ames, M. A., 361, 364 Avtgis, T., 277 Batty, G. D., 276
Anderegg, D., 205 Azar, B., 204, 224 Baumeister, R. F., 106, 111–113, 121–123,
Andershed, A., 161 125–129, 135, 214–219, 224,
Anderson, B. A., 158 B 354–355, 363, 369, 383
Anderson, C., 360 Baard, P. P., 257, 260 Baumgardner, A. H., 124

469
470 Author Index

Bazana, P. G., 68–69 Bogaert, A. F., 361, 364–365 Brunwasser, S. M., 307
Beall, A. E., 337 Bogg, T., 71, 73 Bryden, M. P., 321
Beaver, J. D., 185 Bohan, J. S., 366 Brydon, L., 304–306, 376
Beck, A. T., 84, 303, 306 Bolger, N., 110, 191 Buchanan, G. M., 285, 292
Becker, B. J., 329 Bolino, M. C., 134 Buchanan, L., 211
Beekman, A. T., 71 Bonanno, G. A., 375, 383, 387–388 Buckman, A., 252
Beevers, C. G., 293 Bond, M. H., 52–53 Buckwalter, G., 99
Bell, A. P., 358, 366–367 Bono, J. E., 128 Burger, J. M., 216
Bell, S. M., 204 Bons, T. A., 40 Burke, D., 364
Bellmaker, R. H., 173 Boomsma, D. I., 158 Burnette, J. L., 128
Bem, D. J., 66, 224, 252, 366–368 Boone, A. L., 383 Burns, L., 216
Bem, S. L., 343, 345–346 Borders, T. F., 390 Burns, R. M., 374
Benassi, V. A., 277 Bore, M., 96 Burris, L. R., 95–96
Benet, V., 41 Borgatta, E. F., 49 Burt, S. A., 161–162
Benet-Martínez, V., 41, 53–55, 80 Borman, W. C., 93–94 Burzette, R., 71
Benjamin, L. T., Jr., 209 Bossio, L. M., 291 Bushman, B. J., 218
Bennett, D. S., 293 Bosworth, H. B., 276 Buss, A., 72
Bennett, P., 276 Bouchard, T. J., 151, 158 Buss, D. M., 32, 49, 51–52, 332–333, 371
Berenbaum, S. A., 361 Bovbjerg, D. H., 276 Busseri, M. A., 299–300
Bergeman, C. S., 380, 382–383, 389 Bower, J. E., 389 Bussey, K., 324
Berger, C., 331 Bowers, A. M., 24 Buswell, B. N., 342
Berkman, E. T., 176 Bowlby, J., 204, 229–233, 235, 256, 389 Butcher, J. N., 84–85, 96, 343
Berlant, L., 352 Boynton, M. H., 315 Butler, B., 275
Bernieri, F., 247 Bradbury, T. N., 294 Butler, N. M., 306
Bernstein, D. M., 226 Bradley, R. H., 275 Bybee, D., 120–121
Bernstein, I. H., 81, 96 Bradley, S. J., 364 Bybee, J. A., 118
Bernstein, M., 49 Brandt, A. C., 126 Byers, J., 379
Bernstein, P., 13–14 Branigan, C., 383, 385–387 Byne, W., 360–361
Berry, C. M., 95–96 Branje, S. J. T., 69 Byrnes, J. P., 324–325
Berry, J. W., 278 Brannigan, G. G., 275
Berscheid, E., 369–370 Brebner, J., 327–328 C
Best, D. L., 313–314, 331, 341 Breen, L. J., 275 Cacioppo, J. T., 83, 85, 295
Betancourt, H., 52 Brennan, F. X., 291 Caldarone, L. B., 374
Bettencourt, B. A., 323 Brennan, K. A., 234 Callahan, C. A., 95–96
Beyer, S., 330 Brenner, C., 213, 228 Caltran, G., 109
Bhanji, J., 181, 196 Bretherton, I., 232 Cameron, J., 253
Bhanot, R., 342 Breur, J., 218 Campbell, D. T., 55–56, 80, 83
Biesanz, J. C., 135 Brewer, M. B., 11, 55, 117, 122 Campbell, J. B., 180
Billieux, J., 36 Brewin, C. R., 219, 285 Campbell, J. D., 123–124
Billings, J., 351 Bridges, M. W., 289, 300 Canli, T., 142, 193–196
Bisconti, T. L., 380 Brilleslijper-Kater, S. N., 224 Cantor, J. M., 364
Bissonnette, R., 251 Brockner, J., 123–124 Cantrell, S., 287, 294
Biundo, J. J., 198 Brody, L. R., 327 Capiluppi, C., 358
Blackburn, R., 43 Bromberger, J. T., 301 Caprara, G. V., 256
Blackburn, T. C., 278 Bronner, A. F., 24 Cardno, A., 142–143, 148, 156
Blackwood, E., 355 Brooks-Gunn, J., 109 Carey, G., 142–145, 147–148, 151,
Blanchard, R., 361, 364–365 Brown, G. K., 84 155–156, 158–159, 163–164
Blehar, M., 231 Brown, H. D., 273 Carli, L. L., 328–329
Blitstein, J., 217 Brown, J. C., 277–278 Carlsmith, J. M., 296
Block, J., 32, 75, 92, 379–380 Brown, J. D., 48, 124, 302 Carlson, L. A., 28
Bobrow, D., 358 Brown, S. L., 388 Carlson, N. R., 169
Bock, A., 73 Brown, W. L., 108 Carlson, R., 226
Boden, J. M., 219–220 Bruckner, K. H., 99 Carlström, E., 359
Boeck, P. D., 183 Brumbaugh, C. C., 204, 238, 370 Carpenter, J. S., 304
 Author Index 471

Carrier, J. M., 355 Clark, L. A., 33, 80, 87, 176, 191 Cramer, P., 220
Carroll, A., 63 Clark, R. A., 90 Crane, G. W., 99–100
Carter, C. S., 371 Clause, C. S., 82 Crawford, T., 70
Carter, S., 99 Clausen, J. A., 69 Creed, P. A., 302
Carter, S. R., 219 Cleveland, H. H., 331 Crews, F. C., 204, 219
Carver, C. S., 183, 185, 199, 216, 268, Clingempeel, W. G., 145 Critelli, J. W., 127
289, 298–304, 306, 375, 378–379 Cloninger, C. R., 177, 185 Crocker, J., 123, 126
Carver, P. R., 346 Cobb, S., 295, 378, 389 Cronbach, L. J., 7, 80–82, 92
Caseras, X., 184 Coffey, K. A., 389 Cross, S., 118
Casey, E., 118 Cohen, D., 117 Cross, S. E., 278
Caspi, A., 56, 65–68, 70–73, 129, 145, Cohen, J., 9, 315 Cross, T. B., 113
151–152, 157–158, 164, 379 Cohen, P., 70 Cross, W. E., 113
Cass, V. C., 113 Cohn, M. A., 388–389 Crowell, J. A., 233
Cassidy, J., 233 Cole, S. W., 154–155, 295 Crowley, M., 328
Castillo, I., 263 Cole-Harding, S., 364 Crowne, D. P., 85, 93, 277
Cattell, R. B., 25, 27, 30, 32, 39–40, 49, Collins, H., 163 Csikszentmihalyi, M., 248–250, 384
59, 160 Collins, P., 177, 196 Cunningham, M., 113
CBS3 News, 191 Combe, G., 188 Cunningham, M. R., 134
Ceci, S. J., 331 Comings, D. E., 158
Ceschi, G., 36 Como, P. G., 199 D
Cha, A. E., 97 Condry, J. C., 337–338 D’Acremont, M., 36
Chaiken, S., 216 Condry, S., 337–338 Dahlstrom, W. G., 84
Chamorro-Premuzic, T., 61 Confer, J. C., 4, 333–334, 358 Daignault, G., 275
Chan, D., 82 Conger, R. D., 71 Dale, K., 214
Chance, J. E., 274 Conley, T. D., 362–363 Daly, M., 324
Chang, E. C., 295, 303 Connell, J. P., 245–248, 250, 254, 261, Damasio, A. R., 204
Chang-Schneider, C., 129 266, 389 Daniels, D., 151
Chantala, K., 331 Connelly, F., 275 Darlington, R. B., 31
Chaplin, W. F., 48 Constable, R. T., 193 Dasen, P. R., 278
Chapman, C. N., 69–70, 73 Constantinople, A., 343 Daubman, K. A., 383
Charnetski, C. J., 291 Conway, A. M., 388 Davidson, R. J., 168, 194–195, 200, 390
Chart, H., 304 Conway, B. E., 49 Davies, P. G., 339
Chavanon, M. L., 185 Cooley, C., 111 Davis, C. G., 389
Chemers, M. M., 302 Cools, R., 196, 200 Davis, D., 235
Chen, C., 92 Coon, B., 118 Davis, J. A., 353
Chen, H., 70 Coon, H. M., 116 Davis, M. C., 391
Chen, Y., 117 Coop, R. H., 275 Dawe, S., 199
Cheney, T., 275 Cooper, H., 128 Dawes, S. A., 275
Cheryan, S., 339–340 Corbet, A. B., 134 Dawood, K., 366
Cheung, F. M., 54–55 Corbett, C., 339 Day, D. V., 136
Chew, B., 124 Corbin, C. B., 123 Deary, I. J., 276
Chia, R., 275 Corna, F., 358 Deary, V., 185
Chivers, M. L., 357, 361 Corpus, J. H., 88 Deaux, K., 313
Choi, S. C., 52 Corr, P. J., 169, 177, 181–185, 290, 376 De Avila, M., 291
Choi, S. H., 52 Cortina, J. M., 81 Deb, M., 95
Choma, B. L., 299 Costa, P. T., 24, 32, 35–39, 41, 48–49, DeBono, K. G., 136
Christie, R., 29, 89 53–54, 56–57, 61, 64, 68, 75, 81, DeCharms, R., 254
Church, A. T., 52 85–87, 131, 151, 177, 191, 197, Deci, E. L., 5, 126, 242–245, 248, 252–253,
Ciancarelli, V., 60–61 322, 339–340, 379, 383 257–261, 263, 266–269, 384, 389
Ciani, A. C., 358–359 Cousins, S. D., 114 Deeg, D. J., 71
Civil Service Commission, 97 Cowey, A., 173, 188–189 DeFries, J. C., 144, 148, 154
Clanton, N. R., 48 Cox, P. W., 273 De Fruyt, F., 71
Clark, A. J., 214 Craig, I. W., 154 De Geus, E. J. C., 158
Clark, C. L., 230 Craighead, E. W., 293 DeLamater, J. D., 361
472 Author Index

Delbridge, K., 82 DuBois, D. L., 128 Engels, R. C. M. E., 61

Delfour, F., 108 Duda, J. L., 263 Enns, L. R., 320, 366
Delsing, M. J. M. H., 61 Dudley, T. K., 276 Eno, C. A., 62
DelVecchio, W. F., 68 Duff, K. J., 217 Enriquez, V. G., 52
Denissen, J. J. A., 69 Dufour, C. L., 277 Epel, E. S., 389
Department of Health and Human Dumit, J., 173 Epping-Jordan, J. E., 302
Services, 14–15 Dunkel, C. S., 118 Equal Employment Opportunity
Department of Justice, 97 Dunn, D. S., 7, 205, 296 Commission, 97
Department of Labor, 97 Dunn, E. W., 135 Erber, R., 219
De Pascalis, V., 179 Dunn, G., 290 Erdelyi, M. H., 213, 219–220, 226
DePaulo, B. M., 134 Dunn, J., 145 Erikson, E., 112, 122, 224
Depue, R. A., 177, 196 Dunne, M. P., 359–360 Eron, L. D., 66
DeRubeis, R. J., 293 Dunnette, M. D., 91 Espin, O., 355
Desaulniers, J., 336 Dunning, D., 56, 91 Evans, D. C., 63
Descartes, R., 6, 273 Durand, D. E., 276 Evans, D. D., 293
Deshler, D. D., 121 Durik, A. M., 369 Evans, J., 274, 296
DeShon, R. P., 82 Durrett, C., 42 Evans, S., 338
D’Esposito, M., 196 Duval, S., 111 Evans, W. P., 277
DeVellis, R., 274 Dwairy, M., 115 Evardone, M., 334
Development Dimensions International Dweck, C. S., 273 Eysenck, H. J., 7, 26–27, 30, 32–35,
Inc., 95 Dwyer, J., 291 38–40, 42, 82, 85, 87, 168,
DeVries, A. C., 371 Dye, D. A., 39 176–181, 191, 376
De Vries, R. E., 41 Eysenck, M. W., 33–34, 178–179
De Waal, F. B. M., 108 Eysenck, S. B. G., 34, 82, 85, 87, 178–179
DeYoung, C. G., 43 E
Diamantaras, D., 378 Eagle, M., 229
Diamond, L. M., 350–351, 354, Eagly, A. H., 118, 323, 328–329, F
356–357, 367–371 335–337, 339, 342, 346 Fabes, R. A., 323
Dick, D. M., 145–146, 158 Eastman, K. L., 278 Fabrigar, L. R., 31
Dickerson, C. A., 220 Easton, W. O., 320, 366 Fahey, J. L., 304
Diener, E., 11–12, 69–70, 174, 191, 382, Eaton, N. K., 91 Farnham, S. D., 56
389, 391 Eaves, L., 178 Faschingbauer, T. R., 37
Digman, J. M., 30, 32, 36–39, 41–43, 72, Eber, H. W., 30 Feiler, A. R., 150
177 Ebers, G., 360 Feingold, A., 320, 322, 326
DiLalla, L. F., 141, 148 Eby, L. T., 276 Fejfar, M. C., 197
Dilchert, S., 95 Eccles, J. S., 342 Feldman, J., 226
Dillon, K., 388 Edwards, L. M., 389 Feng, J., 312–313, 334, 339
Doherty, K. T., 315 Ee, J. S., 127 Fenichel, O., 221
Doherty, R. W., 326 Egan, S. K., 346 Fennema, E., 320
Doi, T., 52 Egloff, B., 211 Ferenczi, S., 225
Dollinger, S. J., 60–61 Eillison, N. B., 134 Fermi, E., 12
Domes, G., 331 Eisen, M., 110–111 Festinger, L., 220, 252
Dondi, M., 109 Eisenberg, N., 314, 326 Fichtenberg, N., 211
Donnellan, M. B., 71, 129 Eisenberg, N. H., 37 Fick, C. M., 277
Donnelly, J. P., 43 Eisenberger, R., 253 Fields, W. C., 304
Donohew, R. L., 197 Elder, G. H., 66, 69 Filicia, T., 353
Donovan, D. M., 275 Elliot, A. J., 177, 236, 244 Fincham, F. D., 294
Doss, R. C., 194 Ellis, A., 306 Finkel, S. M., 389
Dostoevsky, F., 204 Ellis, H., 361 Finn, R., 353
Dougherty, S. B., 205 Ellis, L., 361, 364, 366 Finn, S., 135
Downey, J. I., 366 Ellison, N. B., 56 Fischbach, G., 191
Doxey, J. R., 124 Ellsworth, P. C., 296, 384 Fischbach, R., 191
Drexel University Replay Lab, 191 Elms, A. C., 226 Fischer, A. H., 327
Druen, P. B., 134 Else-Quest, N. M., 321, 366 Fisher, H. E., 370
Dubas, J. S., 69 Emerson, R. W., 111 Fisher, S., 204
Duberstein, P. R., 276 Emmons, R. A., 50, 191, 382, 389–390 Fiske, D. W., 32, 36, 55, 83
 Author Index 473

Fleeson, W., 73 Garry, M., 219, 226 Gotlib, I. H., 195

Fletcher, B., 215 Gay, P., 205 Goto, S. G., 115
Flint, J., 157 Ge, X., 161 Gottesman, I. I., 155
Flouri, E., 275 Gebhard, P. H., 353 Gottlieb, L., 99
Foa, E. B., 219 Geen, R. G., 179–181, 198–199 Gottman, J. M., 328
Folkman, S., 383, 389 Geher, G., 204 Gough, H. G., 87–88
Fonagy, P., 229 Geis, F. L., 29, 89 Gouveia, A., 251
Fong, G. W., 193 Gelman, A., 176 Graham, J. R., 84
Ford, H., 280 George, B., 351 Graham, T., 326
Forer, B. R., 78 George, M. S., 173 Gralinski, H., 109
Forsyth, D. R., 128 George, W. M., 220 Grande, I., 187
Foss, L., 17 Georgiades, S., 43 Grannemann, B. D., 55, 124
Foster, J. D., 236 Gere, R., 124 Grattan, K. P., 261
Fox, K. R., 123 Gergely, G., 229 Gray, E. K., 71
Fraley, R. C., 8, 204, 232–234, 236–238, Gergen, K. J., 121, 337 Gray, J, A., 181–186, 191, 199
370 Gesn, P. R., 326 Gray, P. O., 220
Franklin, B., 268 Getzels, J. W., 249 Graziano, W. G., 37
Franzoi, S. L., 123 Giannuzzi, T., 275 Green, J. D., 226
Fredrickson, B. L., 375, 380–391 Gibb, B. E., 293 Green, R., 362, 366
Freedman, Z. R., 261 Gibran, K., 272 Greenberg, J., 215
Frei, R. L., 94–95 Gilens, M., 69 Greenberg, J. R., 228
French, K. E., 320 Gillespie, W., 61–62 Greenberg, R. P., 204
French, L. A., 59 Gillham, J. E., 285, 287–288, 292–294, Greene, B., 355
French, R. D., 294 306–307 Greene, D., 252
Freres, D. R., 307 Gilman, S. E., 359 Greenier, K. D., 124
Freud, A., 230 Gilmor, T. M., 275 Greenwald, A. G., 56, 211
Freud, S., 4, 9, 28–29, 57, 122, 204–229, Gilovich, T., 216 Grigorenko, E. L., 199
232, 234, 237, 361 Girgus, J. S., 287 Grolnick, W. S., 250, 259–260
Freyd, J. J., 220 Gladstone, T. R. G., 285, 292 Gross, J. J., 191, 195–196
Friedman, R. C., 366 Glaser, J., 213 Grossmann, K. E., 232
Fromm, E., 228 Gleaves, D. H., 226 Grove, J. B., 56
Fudge, C., 64 Gleser, G. C., 80 Grow, V. M., 261
Funder, D. C., 380 Glick, P., 342 Gruenewald, T. L., 389
Fung, H. H., 41 Glueck, S., 74 Guadagno, R. E., 62
Funk, S. C., 378–379 Goffin, R. D., 93, 95 Guay, J. A., 275
Furnham, A., 61, 64, 274, 285 Goffman, E., 134 Guest, D. E., 290
Furrer, C., 261 Goldberg, L. R., 29–30, 38–39, 41, 43, Guiffrida, D., 251
49–50, 53–54, 177 Guimond, S., 339, 341
Goldman, B. M., 124, 236 Güntürkün, O., 108
G Goldman, D., 199 Guterl, F., 204, 237
Gabbard, G. O., 204 Goldney, R. D., 293
Gable, P., 387 Goldsmith, H. H., 366 H
Gabriel, M. T., 127 Goldstein, S., 52 Haeffel, G. J., 140–141, 156, 285
Gabrieli, J. D. E., 195 Goleman, D., 49 Haidt, J., 384, 387
Gagné, M., 261, 264–265 Golombok, S., 366 Haig, J., 71
Gagnon, J. H., 356 Gonnella, J. S., 96 Haines, E. L., 313
Gaines, J. G., 301 Gonzales, F., 355 Halberstadt, L. J., 287
Gale, C. R., 276 Gonzales, M. H., 296 Haley, W. E., 274
Gale, S. F., 94–97, 99 Good, C., 113 Hall, C., 275
Galinsky, A. D., 216 Goodenough, D. R., 273 Hall, J. A., 327, 336
Gall, F. J., 188 Goossens, L., 69 Halpern, D. F., 313, 320, 331–332, 334,
Gallup, G., 106–107, 109 Gordon, R. A., 288 339, 343
Gangestad, S. W., 85, 136 Gore, P. M., 275 Halvari, A. E. M., 262
Garb, H. N., 90 Gorski, R. A., 360 Halvari, H., 262
Garcia, B. F., 302 Gosling, S. D., 22–24, 31–32, 44, 59–63, Hammen, C. L., 293
Garnets, L. D., 355, 363, 366–367, 369–370 68, 81 Hammer, D. H., 360
474 Author Index

Hammersmith, S. K., 366–367 Hiers, J. M., 277 Hyde, J. S., 315, 317, 320–323, 330–332,
Hancock, J. T., 134 Higgins, D. A., 323 339, 342, 361, 366–367, 369
Hanks, R. A., 211 Higgins, D. M., 43
Hanson, M. A., 93 Hilgard, E. R., 213 I
Happé, F., 151 Hill, C., 339
Icard, L. D., 355
Hardin, T. S., 293 Hilt, L. M., 322
Ickes, W., 136, 277, 326–327
Hardy, A. B., 256 Hines, M., 331
Ickovics, J. R., 389
Hargrave, G. E., 96 Hiroto, D. S., 281–282, 293, 377
Iemmola, F., 358–359
Harker, L., 56 Ho, D. Y. F., 52, 54
Ilardi, B., 259
Harlow, H. F., 230 Hock, M. F., 121
Ilardi, S. S., 293
Harmon-Jones, E., 387 Hoffman, F. M., 199
Im, C., 279
Harrell, S. P., 251 Hoffman, R. R., III, 299
Irwin, M. R., 306
Harrington, H., 73 Hofhansl, A., 333
Irwing, P., 40
Harris, C., 172, 174 Hofman, M. A., 360
Isaacowitz, D. M., 292, 294, 298, 300
Harris, K. J., 134 Hogan, J., 88
Isen, A. M., 383, 387
Harter, S., 108–110, 114 Hogan, R., 30, 88, 93–95, 98–99
Iyengar, S. S., 88
Hartung, C. M., 322 Hojat, M., 96
Izard, C. E., 384
Hasselbach, P., 276 Holahan, C. K., 73
Hassett, J. M., 331 Holden, R. R., 82
Hatfield, E., 320 Holleran, K., 293 J
Hathaway, S. R., 323, 343 Hollon, S. D., 293 Jack, R., 96
Hauk, P. A., 275 Holloway, R., 136 Jacklin, C. N., 323, 327–328, 330
Hawkins, L. B., 136 Holmes, D. S., 219 Jackson, C. J., 183
Hawley, C. W., 180 Holroyd, K. A., 275 Jackson, D. N., 32, 49–50, 82
Hayes, A. M., 292 Holt, K., 215, 247 Jacobs, K. W., 198
Hayne, H., 219 Hommer, D., 193 Jacobson, L., 342
Hazan, C., 233–235, 370–371 Hong, T. B., 276 Jaffee, S. R., 162, 366
Healy, W., 24 Hoodenpyle, T. G., 136 James, H., 122
Heath, C., 56 Hooker, C. I., 196 James, W., 3, 68, 118, 121–122, 133, 136
Heatherington, L., 330 Horgan, J., 205, 229 Jang, H., 250
Hebb, D. O., 179 Hörmann, H., 96–97 Jang, K. L., 151, 158, 162
Heckel, R. V., 277 Horney, K., 228 Janoff-Bullman, R., 216
Heckhausen, J., 278 Horowitz, L. M., 294 Jaycox, L. H., 293, 306
Hedberg, D. A., 217 Hotz, A. S., 68 Jenkins, J. M., 136
Hedge, J. W., 93 Hough, L. M., 91 Jewell, L. N., 276
Hedges, L. V., 320 Houran, J., 99–100 Jiang, Y., 199
Heesacker, M., 327 Houston, B. K., 379 Jimenez, M. C., 220
Heilbrun, A. B., 87–88 Houston, D. M., 285 Johannesen-Schmidt, M. C., 328
Heine, S. J., 278, 295 Howells, G. N., 256 John, O. P., 7, 12, 29–30, 32, 35–40, 42,
Heinrichs, M., 331 Hoyle, R. H., 126, 197, 376 53, 55–56, 59, 68, 80–81, 83–84,
Helmreich, R. L., 64, 343–344 Hoyt, M. F., 276 177
Helms, J. E., 113 Hu, L., 302 Johns, E. F., 40
Helson, R., 73 Hu, N., 360 Johnson, A. M., 150–152
Henderson, A. J. Z., 130 Hu, S., 360 Johnson, B. T., 315, 328
Henley, T. B., 339 Hudson, J. I., 219 Johnson, C. L., 371
Henry, P. C., 290 Huesmann, L. R., 66 Johnson, S. P., 312, 339
Heppner, W. L., 126 Hull, J. G., 379 Johnson, W., 141–142, 145, 151, 162,
Herek, G. M., 352 Human, L. J., 135 185, 200
Herlocker, C. E., 124 Hume, C. S., 364–365 Joiner, T., 384, 388
Hernandez, E., 226 Hunt, R. W., 199 Joiner, T. E., 285, 292–293, 383
Herpertz, S. C., 331 Huppin, M., 362 Jones, E. E., 134
Hesse, E., 233 Hur, Y., 40 Jones, M., 136
Hetherington, E. M., 145 Hurlburt, A. C., 331 Jones, S., 163
Hiatt, D., 96 Hutton, D. G., 127 Jordan, C. H., 129
 Author Index 475

Joseph, J. E., 199 Kihlstrom, J. F., 213, 226 La Guardia, J. G., 261
Jost, J. T., 220 Kim, C., 301 Lahey, B. J., 157–158, 164
Joussemet, M., 261 Kim, E. S., 307 Lai, C., 144
Jovanovic, J., 342 Kim, U., 52 Lake, M. A., 338
Joyce, N., 99–100 Kim, Y., 244 Lakey, C. E., 126
Judge, T. A., 95, 128 Kindermann, T., 261 LaMay, M. L., 320
Julian, J. W., 277 King, L., 391 Lambird, K. H., 129
Jung, C., 29, 209–210, 228 King, L. A., 118–119 Lamon, S. J., 320
Jussim, L., 342 Kinsey, A. C., 353–354, 356 Lampe, C., 56
Kirk, K. M., 359 Landry, R., 261
Kirkpatrick, M., 366 Lange, R., 99
K Kitayama, S., 114–117 Langer, E. J., 297
Kabat-Zinn, J., 168 Kite, M. E., 313–314 Långström, N., 359–360
Kacmar, K. M., 134 Klassen, P., 365 Larsen, J., 389
Kaemmer, B., 84 Klein, F., 354 Larsen, R. J., 191, 333, 391
Kaestner, E., 197, 376 Klein, L. C., 371 Laumann, E. O., 356–357
Kahn, A. S., 334 Kling, K. C., 330, 342 Lavallee, L. F., 124
Kahn, S., 377 Klonsky, B. G., 342 Lawrence, N. K., 128
Kamen-Siegel, L., 291 Kluckhohn, C., 2 Lazar, N. A., 176
Kamp, J. D., 91 Knievel, E., 197 Leach, M. M., 50
Kang, D. H., 304 Knight, G. P., 323 Leary, M. R., 121, 135
Kao, C. F, 85 Knight, K. M., 126 Lee, J. W., 158
Kao, E. M., 295 Knight, R. T., 189, 196 Lee, K., 30, 41, 49
Kaplan, N., 233 Knutson, B., 181, 193, 196 Lee, S., 92
Karau, S. J., 328 Ko, S. J., 22 Lee, S. J., 118, 134
Karen, R., 229–230, 233 Kobasa, S. C., 377–378, 389 Lee, S. W. S., 116
Karney, B. R., 374 Koestner, R., 247–248, 252, 261 Lee, Y., 295
Karraker, K. H., 338 Kohn, P. M., 199 Lefcourt, H. M., 274–277, 378
Kasen, S., 70 Kohut, H., 228 Lefkowitz, M. M., 66
Kashy, D. A., 134 Koop, C., 262 Legerstee, M., 109
Kaslow, N. J., 285, 292 Koopmans, J. R., 158 Lehman, D. R., 215–216, 278, 295
Kasser, T., 244, 268 Koposov, R. A., 199 Lehman, J. M., 302
Katcher, A., 224 Kopp, C., 109 Lehnart, J., 71
Katz, P. A., 338 Koppitz, E. M., 91 Leigh, B. C., 211
Kay, A. C., 220 Kowert, P. A., 59 Lenney, E., 330
Keiser, R., 61 Kozak, M., 207 Lennon, R., 314, 326
Kelly, G., 273 Krafft-Ebing, R., 361 Lens, W., 242
Kelly, T. H., 199 Krämer, N. C., 134–135 Leon, A., 177
Keltner, D., 56, 383, 387–388 Kraxberger, B. E., 135 Leone, C., 136
Kelts, D., 118 Kremen, A. M., 379–380 Lepper, M. R., 88, 252–253
Kemeny, M. E., 304, 389 Kreuger, J. I., 123 Lesch, K. P., 196
Kemmelmeier, M., 116 Krueger, R. F., 8, 43, 141–142, 145, 151, Letzring, T. D., 380
Kemper, C. A., 304 158, 162, 200 Leung, K., 54
Kendler, K. S., 359 Krug, S. E., 40 LeVay, S., 360
Kenrick, D. T., 333 Krull, D. S., 25 Levenson, R. W., 383, 385
Keough, K., 113 Kuhlman, D. M., 324 Levin, R. A., 134
Kerkhof, A. J., 71 Kuhn, M., 106, 114 Lewin, K., 22–23
Kernberg, O., 228 Kuncel, N. R., 315 Lewis, M., 109
Kernis, M. H., 55, 124, 126, 236 Lewis, P., 275
Kessler, R. C., 359 Liben, L. S., 312
Ketelaar, T., 191 L Liberman, A., 216
Ketron, J. L., 49 LaBeouf, S., 204 Lichtenstein, P., 161, 359
Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., 301 LaForge, M. C., 287, 294 Lieberman, M. D., 176
Kiehl, E. M., 379 LaFrance, M., 327 Lifton, R. J., 14
476 Author Index

Lightdale, J. R., 336 Magnuson, V. L., 360 McCrae, R. R., 24, 32, 35–39, 41, 43,
Lilienfeld, S. O., 90–91 Maier, S. F., 280–283, 296 48–49, 53–54, 56–57, 61, 64,
Linden, M. V. D., 36 Main, M., 232–233 68–69, 75, 81, 85–87, 131, 151,
Lindhorst, T. P., 118 Makhijani, M. G., 328, 342 177, 191, 197, 322, 326, 339–340,
Lindquist, M. A., 176 Malcolm, J., 360 379, 383
Lindzey, G., 90 Mancuso, R. A., 385 McCullough, M. E., 389–390
Ling, Y., 331 Manly, J. B., 259 McCutchan, A. J., 304
Link, K. E., 196 Mann, T., 129 McDaniel, M. A., 94–95
Linn, M. C., 320–322 Mannarelli, T., 22 McDowell, A. A., 108
Lippa, R. A., 315–316, 320, 324, Manoogian, S. T., 250 McEwen, B. S., 389
330–331, 353, 361–362 Manstead, A. S. R., 327 McGhee, D. E., 211
Lisansky, J., 52 Marchand, G., 261 McGill, K. L., 124
Litle, P., 197 Marcia, J. E., 130 McGue, M., 151
Liu, X., 199 Marin, G., 52 McGuffin, P., 142–144, 148, 154–156
Liverant, S., 277 Marino, L., 108 McGuire, W. J., 296
Livesley, W. J., 151, 158 Markon, K. E., 43, 158 McKee, K. J., 285
Locher, J. L., 278 Marks, G., 304 McKinley, J. C., 323, 343
Loehlin, J. C., 32, 148, 156 Marks, M. J., 370 McKnight, J., 360
Loevinger, J., 81–82 Markus, H. R., 114–118, 120–121, 130, McKusick, V. A., 153
Loftus, E. F., 219, 226 278 McNally, R. J., 219
Logan, C., 43 Marlow, D., 85, 93 McNamara, L., 197
Lokken, K. L., 173 Marnetoft, S., 276 McNaughton, N., 181, 184–185
Lorch, E. P., 197 Marsden, P. V., 353 McPartland, T. S., 106, 114
Lord, W., 78 Marsh, H. W., 123 Mead, G. H., 111
Lowell, F. L., 90 Marsh, S. C., 277 Mednick, M. T., 330
Lowery, C. R., 84 Marshall, E., 360 Medvec, V. H., 26
Lubman, D. I., 189 Marshall, J. C., 188–189 Meehl, P. E., 84
Luborsky, L., 285 Marshall, M. A., 302 Meek, R., 118
Luciano, M., 177 Marten, K., 108 Meeus, W. H. J., 61
Luhtanen, R., 123 Martin, C. E., 353 Meltzhoff, A. N., 109
Lummis, M., 342 Martin, N., 178 Mendel, G. J., 152–154
Lumsden, M. A., 96 Martin, N. G., 359–360 Metalsky, G. I., 282, 287, 292–293, 296
Lunney, G. S., 338 Martin, N. J., 275 Meyer, G. J., 79
Lustina, M. J., 113 Martin, R. A., 277 Meyer, I. H., 353
Lynam, D., 199 Maschke, P., 96–97 Meyer, M., 25
Lyubomirsky, S., 391 Maslow, A., 13, 244 Meyer-Bahlburg, H. F. L., 361
Massie, E. D., 219 Michael, R. T., 356
Masson, J. M., 225–226 Michaels, S., 356
M Masten, A. S., 375 Michel, A., 331
MacCallum, R. C., 31, 301 Mathy, R. M., 363 Mikels, J. A., 388
Maccoby, E. E., 323, 327–328, 330 Matthews, G., 185 Mikulincer, M., 229–231, 233, 256
MacDonald, A. P., 276 Matthews, K. A., 301 Milam, J. E., 304
MacDonald, D. A., 50 Mawer, S., 153–154, 163 Millar, K., 96
Machiavelli, N., 29, 89 Mawson, A. R., 198, 376 Millar, R., 276
Machover, K., 91 Mayer, J. D., 49 Miller, A. H., 306
Mack, D. E., 261 McAdams, D. P., 33, 75, 226 Miller, D., 220
Macmillan, M., 204 McCartney, K., 158, 160–161 Miller, D. C., 324, 366
MacMurray, J., 158 McCarty, C. A., 278 Miller, J. D., 197
Macy, R. J., 118 McCauley, M. H., 32 Miller, J. L., 134
Maddi, K. L., 377–378 McClarty, K. L., 129 Miller, N., 323, 356
Maddi, S. R., 377–378, 389, 391 McClay, J., 56 Miller, P. C., 275
Madey, S. F., 216 McClearn, G. E., 144 Mills, J., 15
Madrid, G. A., 158 McClelland, D. C., 90–91 Mills, S. R., 211
Magaña, J. R., 355 McCloy, R. A., 91 Millsap, R. E., 82
Magee, M., 366 McCown, W., 61 Minchoff, B., 388
 Author Index 477

Mischel, W., 273, 331 National Opinion Research Center Oreland, L., 199
Miserandino, C., 301 (NORC), 353, 356 Ortigo, K. M., 204
Miserandino, M., 256, 261, 306 Naumann, L. P., 29 Ortiz, F. A., 52
Missuz J., 113 Neale, M. C., 359 Osilla, K. C., 374
Mitchell, S., 228 Neeb, M., 197–198 Overmier, J. B., 280
Miyakawa, A., 196 Needles, D. J., 284–285, 299 Owens, P., 277
Miyake, A., 113 Neiderhiser, J. M., 161 Oyserman, D., 116–118, 120–121, 131
Moffitt, T. E., 69–71, 129, 164, 379 Nesler, M. S., 134 Ozer, D. J., 315
Mohlman, J., 186 Nettle, D., 181 Ozer, E. M., 389
Mohr, J. J., 233 Neuman, W. L., 130
Molinuevo, B., 192 Neumann, W., 276
Moltó, J., 184, 187 Newman, L. S., 217 P
Momenan, R., 193 Newman, R., 375 Pakenham, K. I., 276
Monahan, M., 287 Neyer, F. J., 71 Palmgreen, P., 197
Monroe, S. M., 157 Ng, S., 41 Paradise, A. W., 124
Montag, C., 185 Ng, T. W. H., 276–277 Pardo, Y., 192
Montemayor, R., 110–111 Ng, W., 11–12 Paris, J., 158
Montgomery, G. H., 276 Nicco, A., 164 Park, C. L., 389
Moore, C. A., 273 Nichols, T. E., 176 Park, N., 272
Moore, D. S., 312, 339 Niebuhr, R., 303 Parks, C., 364
Moran, G., 275 Nietzsche, F., 375 Pashler, H., 172, 174
Morgan, C. D., 56, 90 Nisbett, R. E., 252 Pastorelli, C., 256
Morris, M. E., 22 Nix, G., 259 Paterson, A. D., 364
Moskowitz, D. S., 336 Nolen-Hoeksema, S., 287–288, 293, 322, Patrick, B. C., 254
Moskowitz, J. T., 383, 389 389 Patrick, B. P., 244
Motley, M. T., 209 Nord, W. R., 275 Patrick, H., 261
Mount, M. K., 64, 93–94 Norem, J. N., 293 Patrick, W., 295
Mroczek, D. K., 68, 71–73 Norman, P., 276 Pattatucci, A. M., 360
Mueller, P., 283 Norman, W. T., 32, 38, 49, 177 Patterson, C. J., 366
Mulhearn, S., 61 Nosek, B. A., 211 Patton, W., 302
Munafò, M. R., 157 Nowell, A., 320 Paulhus, D. L., 91–93, 101, 134
Muris, P., 204 Nowicki, G. P., 383 Paunonen, S. V., 49–50
Murphy, S., 276 NPR, 95 Pausch, R., 377
Murray, H. A., 2, 56, 90, 244 Nunnally, J. C., 81 Pavlov, I. P., 184
Muscarella, F., 358 Nurius, P., 118 Peckham, W., 364
Musek, J., 40–41 Pek, J., 389
Musson, D. M., 64 Pelham, B. W., 25
Mustanski, B. S., 360–361, 367 O Peltonen, L., 153
Mutch, C., 43 Oda, M., 95 Penzien, D. B., 275
Myers, D. G., 387, 389, 391 Odbert, H. S., 23, 30, 32, 41, 54 Peplau, L. A., 355, 357, 362–363,
Myers, H. F., 251 Oddone, E. Z., 276 366–367, 369–370
Myers, I. B., 32 Oettingen, G., 285 Perlman, K., 82
Myors, B., 61–62 Ogunfowora, B., 49 Perry, D. G., 346
Ohm, S. C., 345 Perry, V. G., 275
Oishi, S., 53–55 Persky, H., 196
N Okdie, B. M., 62 Perugini, M., 41
Nagata, D. K., 295 O’Leary, M. R., 275 Petersen, A. C., 321–322
Najmi, S., 219 Olin, C. H., 188 Petersen, J. L., 320
Nakamura, J., 249 Oliva, P. S., 219 Peterson, C., 272, 282–283, 285–288,
Narusyte, J., 161 Oliver, M. B., 320, 332, 367 291–293, 295–296, 299–300,
Nasby, W., 28, 226 Omoregie, H., 130 306–307, 378
National Council on Measurement in Omura, K., 193 Peterson, J. B., 43
Education, 80 Ones, D. S., 37, 95–97 Petty, R. E., 83, 85
National Health and Social Life Survey Ong, A. D., 380, 382–383, 389 Phares, E. J., 274–275
(NHSLS), 356 Oppermann, R., 276 Phillips, J. B., 48
478 Author Index

Pickering, A. D., 181, 183–184, 191, 199 Reed, G. M., 389 Rowe, J. L., 276
Piedmont, R. L., 50–51 Reeve, J., 250, 263 Roy, R., 366
Pierce, W. D., 253 Reeves, E. G., 98 Rubenzer, S. J., 37, 57–59
Pillard, R. C., 359–360 Regan, P. C., 369–370 Rubinstein, G., 64
Pines, H. A., 277 Reich, J. W., 391 Ruble, D., 109
Piotrowski, C., 95 Reid, D. W., 275 Ruble, D. N., 110
Pittman, T. S., 134 Reid, M. W., 157 Ruchkin, V., 199
Plaut, V. C., 339 Reilly, P. R., 163 Rudman, L. A., 342
Plomin, R., 72, 144–145, 147–148, Reilly, R. R., 82 Rushton, J. P., 40
151–154, 156, 158–161, 163–165 Reis, H. T., 236, 244 Rutter, M., 164, 232, 366
Plotnik, J. M., 108 Reiss, D., 108 Ryan, R. M., 5, 126, 242–245, 247, 250,
Poehlman, T. A., 211 Reitz, H. J., 276 252–253, 257–264, 266,
Poline, J., 176 Reivich, K. J., 285–289, 293 268–269, 384, 389
Pomeroy, W. B., 353–354 Renoir, A., 388
Pontari, B. A., 134 Rentfrow, P. J., 24, 31–32, 59–61, 99
Pontius, A. A., 334 Renwick, S. J. D., 43 S
Poortinga, Y. H., 278 Rettew, D., 286–289 Sackett, P.R., 95–96
Pope, H. G., 219 Reuter, M., 185 Sadava, S. W., 299
Posada, G., 232 Revelle, W., 10–11, 185 Sadka, V., 285
Potter, J., 68 Reverby, S. M., 14 St. Rose, A., 339
Powell, C., 306 Reznick, J. S., 250 Saleh, W. E., 277
Powis, D., 96 Rhodewalt, F., 379 Salovey, P., 49
Pratt, J., 312 Rice, G., 360 Saltzer, E. B., 274
Prentice, D. A., 336 Richardson, J. L., 304 Sampson, S. M., 173
Pressly, P. K., 327 Richter, L., 299, 303–304 Sande, G., 275
Price, J. L., 334 Riemann, R., 151–152, 158 Sanna, L. J., 216
Prior, H., 108 Riggs, D. S., 219 Santana, M. A., 111
Prociuk, T. J., 275 Riketta, M., 124 Satterfield, J. M., 286–288, 294
Proudfoot, J. G., 290–291, 296, 306 Risch, N., 360 Saucier, G., 29–30, 39, 41, 43, 49–50,
Pryor, D. W., 371 Roberts, B. W., 65–73, 88, 315 53–54
Pullman, H., 71 Robins, C. J., 292 Saunders, D. R., 59
Pyszczynski, T., 215 Robins, R. W., 8, 36, 39, 70, 79, 129, Sauser, W. I., 95
379–381, 391 Savin-Williams, R. C., 351, 353–356, 371
Q Robinson, E. M., 108 Savory, E., 194, 200
Robinson-Whelen, S., 301 Sawin, L. L., 346
Quigley, B. M., 134
Rodin, J., 291, 297 Scarr, S., 158, 160–161
Quinn, D. M., 113, 342
Roese, N. J., 216 Schacter, D. L., 226
Quinn, P. C., 312
Rofé, Y., 220 Schafer, W. D., 324
Rogers, C., 28, 236, 244, 258 Schaffer, A., 109
R Rogers, L., 113, 342 Scheier, M. F., 289, 296, 298–304, 306,
Rahim, M. A., 275 Rorschach, H., 56, 84, 90 378–379
Rahman, Q., 359 Rose, R. J., 145–146 Schein, E., 13–14
Rajaratnam, N., 80 Rosen, L., 197 Schilling, E. A., 191
Rajecki, D. W., 277 Rosenberg, M., 85, 123, 131 Schleicher, D. J., 136
Ramanaiah, N. V., 379 Rosenberg, S., 28 Schlenker, B. R., 134
Ramchand, R., 374 Rosenberg, S. E., 124 Schmidt, F. L., 95
Rammsayer, T. H., 179, 196, 199 Rosenthal, R., 342 Schmitt, D. P., 52, 127, 339–341
Ramsay, D., 109 Rosqvist, J., 284–285, 287, 298, 301 Schmitt, N., 82
Raudsepp, L., 71 Ross, D. F., 338 Schmitz, N., 276
Rawlings, D., 60–61, 199 Ross, T. P., 211 Schmukle, S. C., 211
Rawlings, R. R., 193 Rosse, J. G., 134 Schneider, B., 250
Rawsthorne, L., 259 Rothbaum, F. M., 278 Schneider, D. J., 219
Read, C., 275 Rothstein, M. G., 93, 95 Schnitker, S. A., 50
Read, N. W., 28, 226 Rotter, J. B., 89, 254, 274–275 Schroth, M. L., 198
Realo, A., 339 Rowatt, W. C., 134 Schuerger, J. M., 68
 Author Index 479

Schulman, P., 287, 290, 293 Siegler, I. C., 72 Spencer, M. B., 113
Schultz, R., 278 Sievers, H., 195 Spencer, S. J., 113, 129, 342
Schultz, W. T., 226 Silva, P. A., 67, 72–73 Spiro, A., 71–72
Schumaker, J. B., 121 Silverberg, N. D., 211 Splinter, T. A. W., 97
Schutter, D. J. L. G., 173 Silvetoinen, K., 144 Sprecher, S., 320
Schwartz, J. L. K., 211 Simion, F., 109 Srivastava, S., 59, 68–69
Schwartz, R. D., 56 Simms, L. J., 80, 82, 87 Stack, A. D., 218
Schwarz, A., 108 Simons, J., 242 Stacy, A. W., 211
Scollon, C. N., 69–70 Simons, R. F., 199 Stanley, J. C., 80
Scratchley, L. S., 124 Simonton, D. K., 28, 59, 226 Stanton, A. L., 301–302
Sczesny, S., 335 Simpson, A. K., 374 Stapp, J., 343
Sears, R. R., 73 Simpson, J. A., 136 Stayton, S., 204
Seashore, C. E., 188 Sinha, D., 52 Stecher, M. D., 134
Seavey, C. A., 338 Skinner, B. F., 28 Steed, L., 275
Sechrest, L., 56 Skinner, E., 261 Steele, C. M., 113, 339, 342
Sedikides, C., 226 Skinner, E. A., 254 Steen, T. A., 272, 285
Seeman, M., 274, 296 Smedley, B. D., 251 Steer, R. A., 84
Segall, M., 276 Smillie, L. D., 183–185, 192 Steffen, V. J., 323
Segall, M. H., 278 Smith, B., 384 Stein, J. I., 48
Segerstrom, S. C., 304 Smith, C., 276, 366 Steinfield, C., 56
Selander, J., 276, 378 Smith, C. A., 384 Stelmack, R. M., 68–69, 179, 196, 199
Seligman, M. E. P., 272–273, 280–283, Smith, C. P., 130 Stemmler, G., 185
285–296, 298–300, 306, 308 Smith, E. R., 11 Stephenson, M. T., 197
Selye, H., 377 Smith, G., 163 Steptoe, A., 304
Semmel, A., 287 Smith, K., 275 Sternberg, R. J., 49, 332, 339, 342
Sepekoff, B., 354 Smith, N. G., 118–119 Steunenberg, B., 71
78 Members of the Personality Profiles Smith, S. R., 13, 80, 82, 87 Stevenson, H. W., 92, 342
of Cultures Project, 53 Smith, T. W., 353, 357, 376 Stijnen, T., 97
Seward, D., 251 Smither, J. W., 82 Stinson, D. A., 124
Shaffer, D. R., 145, 224 Smits, D. J. M., 183 Stinson, L. L., 136
Shakespeare, W., 134, 140, 274, 283 Sneed, J., 70 Stipek, D., 109
Sharpe, J. P., 379 Snell, C. M., 339 Stoffey, R. W., 82
Sharps, M. J., 334–335, 339 Snider, P. R., 301–302 Stone, D., 266
Shatté, A. J., 285 Snow, C., 99 Stouthamer-Loeber, M., 379
Shaver, P. R., 229–237, 256, 370 Snyder, C. R., 84, 389–390 Strahan, E. J., 31
Shaw, J. D., 134 Snyder, E., 361 Strategic Services, U. S. O. of, 56–57
She, Y., 277 Snyder, M., 85, 135–137 Strelau, J., 152, 181
Shea, D., 276 Society for Industrial and Organizational Strickland, B. R., 274–275, 277
Sheldon, K. M., 244, 259, 268 Psychology, 94–95 Strul, S., 64
Shelley, M., 276 Soenens, B., 242 Stuck, G. B., 275
Shenk, J. W., 73–74 Soldz, S., 74 Stürmer, T., 276
Shenkel, R. J., 84 Sole, M. L., 379 Sugden, K., 157–158
Sheridan, P. M., 364 Solomon, J., 232 Suh, E. J., 336
Sherman, A. M., 313 Sommer, K. L., 214 Sullivan, H. S., 228
Sherman, J. W., 8, 79 Sorensen, K. L., 276 Sullivan, Q., 320
Shernoff, D. J., 250 Sorman, P. B., 124 Suls, J., 56, 215
Shernoff, E. S., 250 Sosis, R. H., 274, 279 Sutton, S. K., 191
Shevlin, M., 276 Soto, C. J., 12, 29, 55–56, 80–81, 83–84 Swaab, D. F., 360
Shields, S. A., 123, 327 Spalding, L. R., 362–363 Swann, W. B., 24–25, 129
Shiner, R. L., 67, 72 Spangler, G., 232 Swanson, D. P., 113
Shoda, Y., 273 Spanier, G. B., 99 Swartz, S. J., 113
Showers, C. J., 126, 342 Spector, P. E., 275–276 Swede, S. W., 28, 226
Shrauger, J. S., 124 Spence, I., 312 Sweeney, P. D., 277, 283, 285, 291
Sidorowicz, L. S., 338 Spence, J. T., 343–346 Symes, M., 275
Siebertand, E. R., 331 Spencer, A., 366 Sympson, S. C., 390
480 Author Index

T Twisk, J. W., 71 Voyer, D., 321–322

Tafoya, T., 355 Tyssen, R., 96–97 Voyer, S., 321
Tanford, S., 277 Vul, E., 172, 174, 176
Tangney, J. P., 383 U
Target, M., 229 W
Udry, J. R., 331
Tatsuoka, M. M., 30 Uhlmann, E. L., 211 Wacker, J., 185
Taylor, S. E., 215–216, 278, 304, 331, Uleman, J. S., 213 Wade, C., 173
371, 389 Unemori, P., 130–133 Wade, E., 220
Taylor, S. F., 380 Unger, R. K., 317, 332, 343 Wager, T. D., 176
Tchividjian, L. R., 135 U.S. Department of Labor Employment Wagner, K. D., 285, 292
Teasdale, J. D., 282 and Training Administration, 95 Walder, L. O., 66
Tedeschi, J. T., 134 Urlings-Strop, L. C., 97 Waldron, M., 145
Tellegen, A., 41, 84 Uttal, W., 173, 189 Walker, C., 304
Te Nijenhuis, J., 40 Wall, A., 251
Tennen, H., 299, 384, 391 Wall, S., 231
TerBogt, T. F. M., 61 V Wallace, K. A., 380
Terman, L., 73 Vaidya, J. G., 71 Wallen, K., 331
Terracciano, A., 53, 339 Vaillant, C. O., 74 Waller, N. G., 41
Terry, K., 120–121 Vaillant, G. E., 73–74, 205, 214, 219, 291 Wallston, B. S., 274
Tetlock, P. E., 28, 226 Valentine, J. C., 128 Wallston, K. A., 274
Tett, R. P., 91 Vallerand, R. J., 251 Walsh, V., 173
Thayer, C. R., 96 Van Aken, M. A. G., 69, 71–72 Walton, G. M., 113
Themmen, A. P. N., 97 Van Baal, G. C. M., 158 Walton, K. E., 69–71
Thibodeau, R., 220 Vandello, J. A., 117 Wanek, J. E., 96–97, 99
Thomas, J. R., 320 VanderLaan, D. P., 358 Ware, E. E., 275
Thomas, M. D., 339 Van der Linden, D., 40 Warner, M., 352
Thomas, V. G., 330 Van Engen, M. L., 328 Warren, N. C., 99
Thorn, B. E., 173 Van Hulle, C. A., 366 Waters, E., 231
Thornton, K. M., 288 Vansteenkiste, M., 242–243, 246, 268 Watson, D., 33, 43, 71, 80, 82, 87, 176, 191
Thornton, N., 288 Van Treuren, R. R., 379 Waugh, C. E., 380
Thorton, L. M., 359 Vasey, P. L., 358 Wawrzyniak, A. J., 304
Thrash, T. M., 177 Vazire, S., 62, 91–92, 101 Webb, E. J., 56
Thurman, H., 270 Vedantam, S., 163 Webster, R., 204
Tice, D. M., 123, 125, 127, 134 Veniegas, R. C., 362–363 Wegener, D. T., 31
Tiggemann, M., 293 Venkatapathy, R., 276 Wegner, D. M., 207–208, 219
Toma, C. L., 134 Venter, J. C., 154 Weinberg, M. S., 366–367, 371
Tomarken, A. J., 194 Vernon, M. L., 235 Weinberger, J., 204
Torrubia, R., 184–185, 187–188, 192 Vernon, P. A., 150 Weingardt, K., 211
Torva, M., 350 Verosky, S. C., 196 Weinstein, N. D., 216, 299
Tracy, J. L., 8, 79 Vidal, G., 350 Weintraub, J. K., 302
Trafimow, D., 115–116 Viechtbauer, W., 69–70, 315 Weisz, J. R., 278
Trapnell, P. D., 134 Villanova, P., 285 Wellborn, J. G., 245, 261
Triandis, H. C., 52, 115 Vincent, N., 275 Wells, Y. V., 118
Trochim, W. M. K., 83 Virnelli, S., 379 Welton, A. L., 334
Trost, M. R., 333 Viswesvaran, C., 95 Wenzlaff, R. M., 207
Trull, T. J., 42 Viswesvaran, V., 95 Westen, D., 4, 204–206, 212–214, 220,
Trzesniewski, K. H., 129 Vitouch, O., 333 228–229, 237, 333
Tsaousis, I., 43 Vogel, D. A., 338 Wester, S. R., 327
Tugade, M. M., 375, 380–383, 385, Vogel, D. L., 327 Wheeler, R. E., 194
387–388 Vohs, K. D., 123 Whisenhunt, C. R., 124
Turken, A. U., 387 Von Ah, D., 304 Whitam, F. L., 363
Turkheimer, E., 143, 145, 151, 155, 200 Vonk, R., 126 White, K. P., 275
Turnley, W. H., 134 Voracek, M., 333, 339 White, T. L., 183, 219
Twenge, J. M., 279, 314, 345–346 Vox, M., 96 Whitfield, S. L., 195
 Author Index 481

Whittle, S., 189–190 Witkin, H. A., 273 Young, T. J., 59

Wicklund, R. A., 111 Woike, B. A., 130 Youngblood, J., II, 113
Widiger, T. A., 322 Wolf, H., 18 Yu, D. L., 287, 293
Wiemann, S., 95 Wolf, T. J., 354 Yücel, M., 189
Wiggins, J. S., 43, 78, 82, 84, 92, 96 Wolitzky, D. L., 228 Yunger, J. L., 346
Wilcox, T., 331 Wood, D., 65
Willerman, L., 364 Wood, J. M., 90
Williams, B., 379 Wood, J. V., 124 Z
Williams, C. J., 371 Wood, W., 328, 335–337, 339, 346 Zalk, S. R., 338
Williams, G. C., 261–262 Woods, R., 331 Zanna, M. P., 129
Williams, J. E., 313–314, 331, 341 Wright, C. I., 174–175, 192–193 Zarrella, K. L., 68
Williams, J. K., 334 Wright, R., 124 Zautra, A. J., 384, 391
Williams, W. M., 331 Wrightsman, L. S., 89 Zeidner, M., 277
Williamson, D., 61 Wu, R., 277 Zeifman, D., 371
Wills, G. I., 61 Wundt, W., 42, 188–189 Zeigler-Hill, V., 126
Wilson, E. O., 358 Wynd, C. A., 276 Zermatten, A., 36
Wilson, J., 285 Zhang, J., 52
Wilson, K. G., 275 X Zhang, L., 279
Wilson, M., 324 Ziegler, R., 124
Xenikou, A., 290
Wilson, P. M., 261–262 Zimbardo, P. G., 336
Wilson, T. D., 314 Zinbarg, R. E., 186
Wilt, J., 185 Y Zivnuska, S., 134
Winchester, Y., 198 Yarczower, M., 219 Zone, J. B., 379
Winefield, A. H., 293 Yarkoni, T., 63, 172, 176 Zucker, K. J., 362–365
Winefield, H. R., 293 Yavari, C., 110–111 Zuckerman, M., 169, 176–177, 179, 181,
Wink, P., 73 Ybasco, F. C., 390 196–200, 324, 376
Winkielman, P., 172, 174 Ye, M., 277 Zullow, H. M., 285–287
Winter, D. G., 28–29, 59 Yee, D., 342 Zurbriggen, E. L., 313
Winter, S., 134–135 Yik, M. S. M., 54 Zurcher, L. A., 117
Wise, D., 284–285, 287, 298, 301 Yoder, J. D., 334 Zweigenhaft, R. L., 60–61
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 SUBJECT INDEX

Note: Page numbers with t indicate anhedonia, 191 autonomous orientation, 260
tables; those with f indicate figures. antagonism, 37 autonomy
anxiety, gender and, 327–328 fostering, 244–245
A Anxiety-Adjustment, 39. See also locus of causality and, 254
achievement Neuroticism overview of, 244–245
in athletics, explanatory style and, anxiety and defense mechanisms, in work setting, 266t
288–289 213–220 avoidant attachment, 231
locus of control and, 275 denial, 215–216 avoidant coping, 302
in school, explanatory style and, displacement, 217–218
287–288 isolation, 215 B
acquiescent responding, 92 projection, 217 Barnum Effect, 79, 84
active genotype–environment correla- rationalization, 220 behavioral approach system (BAS),
tion, 160 reaction formation, 214–215 182–186
actualizing tendency, 244 repression, 219–220 behavioral genetics, 141
Adjective Check List, 88t sublimation, 218–219 behavioral inhibition system (BIS),
adoption and twin studies, 148–151 undoing, 216–217 182–186
Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), 233 anxious-ambivalent attachment, 232 behavioral residue, 22
adulthood arousability, 179–180, 369–370 Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI),
attachment styles in, 233–234, 233t arrangement or selection of stimuli, 90 343–347, 345t
personality functioning and attach- ascending reticular activating system beneficence, 15
ment, 234–237 (ARAS), 179 beta, 40, 42, 43
temperament in, 72–73 association techniques, 90 Big Five, 32–40
agency, 314 assumption of representativeness, 148 Agreeableness, 35, 37, 38t
aggression, gender and, 323–324 athletic achievement, explanatory style confusion for names of, 38–39
Agreeableness, 35, 37, 38t in, 288–289, 288f, 289f Conscientiousness, 35, 37–38, 38t
Ah-Q, 55 attachment theory, 229–237 cross-cultural application of, 53–57
alleles, 153 attachment and adult personality development over life span, 65–74
alpha, 40, 42–43 functioning, 234–237 in everyday life, 57–64
amae, 52 attachment patterns for life, 232–233 Extraversion, 34, 35, 36, 36t
Americans with Disabilities Act, 98 attachment styles in adulthood, four temperaments and, 42–43, 42t,
amotivation, 257, 258f 233–234, 233t 43f
amygdala, 193, 195 history of, 229–232 key aspects of personality missing
anal expulsive personality, 222 Attributional Style Questionnaire from, 39–40
anal retentive personality, 222 (ASQ), 285, 292, 295 missing factors from, 49–52, 49t
anal stage, 222 attributive self-descriptions, 114 Neuroticism, 34, 35–36, 36t
androgens, 361 authentic self-presentation, 134 Openness, 35, 36–37, 36t
androgynous, 245 autonomic nervous system, 169 trait resilience, 380–381, 381f

483
484 Subject Index

biobehavioral model of sexual orienta- central traits, 27 optimistic beliefs and physiological
tion, 367–371 cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), 169 functioning, 304–306, 305f
biochemical activity, 195–196 challenge test, 173–174 optimists take action, 303
dopamine and Extraversion, 195–196 change, 65 coping strategies, optimism and,
impulsive sensation seeking, 199 chimpanzees and self-recognition, 302–303
in neuroscience, 173–174 106–108 correlational designs
serotonin and Neuroticism, 196 China, personality traits in, 54–55 adoption and twin studies, 148–151
biological explanations of sexual orien- clear purpose integrity tests, 96 fMRI studies, 174–176
tation, 358–365 cognitive foundations, 5 correlational studies, 10
brain structures, 360–361 cognitive foundations of personality, correlation coefficient, 9
evolution, 358–359 271–309 correlations, 174–176
genetics, 359–360, 359t dispositional optimism cortex, 192–194
prenatal factors, 361–365 explanatory style, 283–295 counterfactual thinking, 216–217
biopsychosocial model, 339–342, field studies and natural manipula- counterproductive work behaviors, 95
340–341f tions, 296–297 criterion validity, 82–83
bipolar scale, 343 learned helplessness, 280–283 Cronbach’s alpha, 80
birth order (fraternal), sexual orienta- locus of control, 274–279 cross sex-typed, 345
tion and, 364–365 cognitive unconscious, 213 Crowne-Marlow Social Desirability
bodily responses collectivism, 115–116, 117t Scale, 85, 93
impulsive sensation seeking, 198–199 collectivistic cultures, 115 cultural differences
in neuroscience, 169 Common Rule, 15 in explanatory style, 295, 295f
boredom susceptibility, 197 communion, 314 in locus of control, 278–279
brain activity competence cultural impact on self-concept,
differences in cortex, left-right asym- fostering, 248–250 113–117
metry, and amygdala, 193–195 overview of, 244–245 collectivism, 115–116
in impulsivity and sensation seeking, self-efficacy theory and, 254–256 independent selves, 116–117
199 competitiveness, 37 individualism, 115–116
in neuroscience, 171–173 completion techniques, 90 interdependent selves, 116–117
brain structure complexes, 209 cultures, five factors in, 53–57
differences in cortex and amygdala, computer axial tomography (CAT), personality traits in China, 54
192–193 170 triangulation and types of data,
in neuroscience, 170–171 computerized tomography (CT), 170 55–57
sexual orientation and, 360–361 conscience, 212
broaden-and-build theory, 384, 384f Conscientiousness, 35, 37–38, 38t
building blocks of personality, 3–5 consistency, 65, 67–68, 68f, 69t D
cognitive foundations, 5 constitutional predisposition models, data collection, 55–57
genetics, 4 376 L data, 56
intrapsychic foundations, 4 construction techniques, 90 O data, 56
neuroscience, 4 construct validity, 82 S data, 55
regulation and motivation, 4–5 content analysis, 130–133 T data, 56
self and identity, 4 continuity, 65 defense mechanism, 214
traits, 4 control condition, 10 deindividuation, 336, 336f
controllability, optimism and judging, denial, 215–216
303–304, 304f dependent variable, 10–11
C controlled orientation, 260 depression, explanatory style and,
California Q-set, 32 convergent validity, 83 292–294, 294f
cardinal traits, 27–28 conversion reaction, 214 development, 65
careers and personality traits, 63–64 coping, dispositional optimism and, development of personality over life
case study method, 226–228 301–306 span, 65–74
castration anxiety, 222 optimism and coping strategies, accumulated changes in traits, 70f
catharsis, 218 302–303 change, 65
causality orientations, 260, 261t optimism and judging controllability, consistency, 65, 67–68, 68f, 69t
CAVE technique, 285–287, 286f, 286t, 303–304, 304f continuity, 65
288 optimistic beliefs and expectations, definitions, 65–67
central nervous system, 169 301–302, 301t development defined, 65
 Subject Index 485

Grant Study of Harvard Graduates, Emotional Stability, 35, 38, 39, 40, 42 brain structure differences in cortex
73–74 emotion-focused coping, 302 and amygdala, 192–193
individual change, 66–67 emotions differences in cortex, left-right
individual differences in, 71–72 gender and, 326–327, 328t asymmetry, and amygdala,
longitudinal study, 66 positive, 383–388, 383t 193–195
maturation, 69–71 empathy, gender and, 325–326 dopamine and, 195–196
mean-level change, 66–67 employment tests, 93–95, 94t Eysenck’s PEN model of personality,
meta-analysis, 68 environmentality, 144 33, 34, 178–179
normative change, 68–71 environmental theories of sexual orien- in five factors, 36, 36t
personality coherence, 65–66 tation, 366 neurology of, 179
survival curves, 72f environment and genes, 156–162 extreme responding, 92
temperaments, 72–73 contributions to personality, 141t extrinsically motivated, 242
dialectic, 156–162 dialectical synthesis, 156–162 extrinsic motivation, 258
genotype–environment correlation, estimating heritability and,
143, 156–162, 158–162 146–148
genotype–environment interaction, genotype–environment correlation, F
143, 156–158 143, 156, 158–162 facets, 35
discriminant validity, 83 genotype–environment interaction, of Agreeableness, 37, 38t
disguised purpose integrity tests, 96 143, 156–158 of Conscientiousness, 38, 38t
disinhibition, 197 shared and nonshared, 145–146 of Extraversion, 36, 36t
disorganized/disoriented, 232 epigenetics, 154 in Hierarchical Model of Human
displacement, 217–218 equal environments assumption, 148 Personality, 41f
dispositional optimism, 298–307 erogenous zone, 221 of Honesty-Humility, 41
coping and, 301–306 eros, 206 in NEO-PI-R, 35–36
making people more optimistic, Erotophilic Disposition, 52 of Neuroticism, 35, 36t
306–307 evoked potential (EP), 171 of Openness, 36, 36t
measures of, 300, 300t evolution, sexual orientation and, face validity, 82
optimism and coping strategies, 358–359 factor analysis, 30–31, 32t
302–303 evolutionary psychology, 332–334 factor loadings, 31–32
optimism and judging controllability, exemplification, 134 faking bad, 91
303–304, 304f exon, 154 faking good, 91
optimistic beliefs and expectations, exotic becomes erotic (EBE) theory, feared self, 118
301–302, 301t 366–367 feeling types, 29
optimistic beliefs and physiological expectations, optimistic beliefs and, feminine sex-typed, 345
functioning, 304–306, 305f 301–302, 301t feminist theory, 332
optimists take action, 303 experience seeking, 197 field-dependent, 273
dizygotic (DZ) twins, 147 experimental condition, 10 field-independent, 273
dopamine and Extraversion, 195–196 experimental control, 10 field studies, 296–297
double-blind technique, 304–305 explanatory style, 283–295 fight-flight-freeze system (FFFS),
Draw-A-Person (DAP) test, 91 achievement in athletics, 288–289, 182–186
dream analysis, 207–208 288f, 289f filial piety, 52
achievement in school, 287–288 five-factor model (FFM), 32, 35–40,
cultural differences in, 295, 295f 41. See also Big Five
E measures of, 285–287, 286f, 286t gender differences and similarities in,
effect size, 315–317 optimistic and pessimistic, 283–285, 322–323, 322t
efficacy expectation, 254–255 284t gender similarities and differences in,
ego, 211–213 physical health and, 291–292 322–323, 322t
ego ideal, 212–213 psychological health (depression) heritability of, 151, 152t, 158
ego-resilience, 379 and, 292–294, 294f in principles of personality, 32,
Ego-Resiliency Scale, 379, 380t social behavior and, 294–295 35–40, 41
eigenvalue, 31 work behavior and, 290–291, 291f five factors
electroencephalogram (EEG), 171 expression techniques, 90 in cultures, 53–57
electromyography (EMG), 169 external regulation, 258 in NEO-PI-R, 35–36
emotional attachment system, 370–371 Extraversion fixation, 221
Emotional Investment, 52 biochemical activity, 195–196 flow, 248–250
486 Subject Index

fluid sexuality, 350–351, 368f in empathy, 325–326 heterogeneity of high-self-esteem, 127

forced-choice format, 89 in helping behavior, 328 heteronormativity, 352–353
four temperaments, 42–43 in influenceability, 328–329 HEXACO model, 41–42
Eysenck’s representation of, 42, 43f in leadership, 328 Hierarchical Model of Human Person-
physiognomic representation of, 42, meta-analysis of, 315–319t, 317–322, ality, 41f
43f 321t homosexuality. See sexual orientation
fraternal birth order effect, 364–365 in risk taking, 324–325, 324t Honesty-Humility, 41
free association, 206–207 in self-esteem and self-confidence, hoped-for self, 118
Freud and psychoanalysis, 204–229 330, 330f hopelessness model of depression,
anxiety and defense mechanisms, stereotypes, 314, 314t, 342 282–283
213–220 gender identity, 346 hospital stay, trauma in, 230
instincts, 205–206 gender inversion, 361–362 humanistic tradition, 243–244
personality, 211–213 gender nonconformity, 361–363 humor, 209
psychodynamic theory since Freud, Gender Orientation, 52 H-Y antigens, 365
228–229 gender socialization, 331 hypothesis, 8
psychosexual stages, 220–226 generalizability, 80t, 84, 87 hysterical character, 223
unconscious, 206–209 general personality factor (GPF), 40–41
Freudian slip, 209 genes, 154 I
fully functioning, 236–237 genetics, 4, 139–165 id, 211–213
functional magnetic resonance imaging adoption and twin studies, 148–151 identification, 212
(fMRI), 172, 174–176 environmentality, 144 identified regulation, 259
fundamental psychological needs, environment and, 156–162 identity
243–252 nature and nurture as allies, 142–143 in adolescence, 111–112
autonomy, 246–247 research, 163–164 milestones in, 108t
competence, 248–250 science of, 152–155 social identity, 133–137
relatedness, 250–252 sexual orientation and, 359–360, 359t identity crisis, 112
shared and nonshared environments, idiographic approach, 25–29
145–146 applied, 28–29
G genital stage, 224 definition of, 25
galvanic skin response (GSR), 169 genotype–environment correlation, vs. nomothetic approach, 25–27
gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), 143, 156, 158–162 traits in, 27–28
173 researching, 161–162 illusion of control, 278
gender, definition and assessment of, types of, 159–161, 159t impersonal orientation, 260
343–346 genotype–environment interaction, Implicit Association Test (IAT), 211
gender compatibility, 346 143, 156–158 impression management, 134
gender conformity pressure, 346 genotypes, 140 impulsive sensation seeking, 198
gender differences, causes of, 330–342, global vs. specific, 284 Impulsivity, 196
331t Glueck study, 74 biochemical activity, 199
biopsychosocial model, 339–342, Grant Study of Harvard Graduates, bodily responses, 198–199
340–341f 73–74 brain activity, 199
evolution, 332–334 guessing penalty, 187–188 independent selves, 116–117
social constructionism, 337–338, independent variable, 10–11
338f H indigenous traits, 52, 54
social context, 334–335, 335f happiness, pursuit of, 268 individual change, 66–67
social role theory, 335–337, 336f hardiness in resilient people, 377–379 individualism, 115–116, 117t
gender differences and similarities in health, personality’s impact on, individualistic cultures, 115
five-factor model, 322–323, 322t 374–376, 374f, 375f influenceability, gender and, 328–329
gender differences in personality and health behavior models, 376 informed consent, 15
behavior, 311–348 health behaviors, 262–263 infrequency scale, 92
in aggression, 323–324 helping behavior, gender and, 328 ingratiation, 134
in anxiety, 327–328 heritability, 143–155 instincts, 205–206
beliefs about, 313–314 of common personality characteris- institutional review board (IRB),
causes of, 330–342, 331t tics, 151–155 15–16
effect size and, 315–317 estimating, 146–148 integrated regulation, 259
in emotions, 326–327, 328t of five-factor model, 151, 152t, 158 integration, 5
 Subject Index 487

integrity tests, 95–96 leadership, gender and, 328 Need for Cognition Scale, 83t, 85
Intellect, 40 learned helplessness, 280–283 Need for Relatedness at College Ques-
intellectualization, 215 left-right asymmetry, 194 tionnaire (NRC-Q), 251t
intelligence, 49–50 legal issues in personality tests, 97–99 Need Satisfaction Scale, 265t
interactional stress moderation models, levels, 11–12 negative genotype–environment cor-
376 lexical approach, 30 relation, 160
interactionist theories of sexual orienta- libido, 206 negative possible selves, 119–121
tion, 366–371 lie scales, 92 neo-Freudians, 228
biobehavioral model of love and life-altering experiences, 71 NEO Personality Inventory-Revised
desire, 367–371 life data, 13 (NEO-PI-R), 84–87
exotic becomes erotic (EBE) theory, linear regression line, 174 of Chinese, 54–55
366–367 locus of causality, 254 cross-cultural replication of, 39, 53
interdependent selves, 116–117 locus of control, 254, 274–279 facets of five factors, 35–36
intergroup bias, 346 achievement and, 275 factor structure of, 86t
internal consistency reliability, 80 cultural differences in, 278–279 five factors in, 35–36, 39
Internal-External Locus of Control measures of, 274–275, 275t generalizability of, 87
Scale, 274–275, 275t physical and psychological health of music preferences, 59–61, 60t, 62f
internal vs. external, 283 and, 276–277 on Openness across cultures, 53
internal working models, 230 social behavior and, 277–278 of presidents, 57–59, 58–59f
Interpersonal Relatedness, 55 then and now, 279 reliability of, 85, 85t
interrater reliability, 81 work behavior and, 276 on religiosity, 50
intimidation, 134 loneliness, 154–155 validity of, 85, 86t
intrapsychic foundations, 4 longitudinal study, 66 neurological correlates of personality,
intrapsychic foundations of personality, looking glass self, 111–112 191–199
203–239 Extraversion and Neuroticism,
attachment theory, 229–237 M 192–196
Freud and psychoanalysis, 204–229 Machiavellianism Scale, 89 impulsivity, 196
Implicit Association Test, 211 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), sensation seeking, 197–198, 197t
psychobiography, case study and, 170–171 neurological theories of personality,
226–228 manifest content, 207 176–191
trauma in hospital stay, 230 masculine sex-typed, 345 Eysenck’s PEN Model, 178–181
word association method, 209–211 maternal immune hypothesis, 365 Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory
intrinsically motivated, 242 maternal immune response, 365 (RST), 181–186
intrinsic interest, 252–254 maturation, 69–71 neuroscience, 4, 169–174
intrinsic motivation, 258 mean-level change, 66–67 biochemical activity, 173–174
intrinsic regulation, 258 measurement approach, 30 bodily responses, 169
introjected regulation, 258–259 membership knowledge, 346 brain activity, 171–173
intron, 154 Mendelian inheritance, 153–154 brain structure, 170–171
Introversion, 34, 36 meta-analysis, 68, 315–319t, 317–322, 321t neuroscience of personality, 167–202
Introversion-Extraversion, 39 Minnesota Multiphasic Personality conclusions, 200
isolation, 215 Inventory (MMPI), 85, 98 guessing penalty and, 187–188
mirror test, 107–108 neuroimaging and, 188–191
J moderate responding, 92 neurological correlates of personality,
job interview questions, 98 monoamine oxidase (MAO), 173 191–199
junk DNA, 154 monozygotic (MZ) twins, 146–147 neurological theories of personality,
justice, 15 motivated unconscious, 213 176–191
motivation types, 258–260 phrenology and, 188–191
K music preferences and personality Neuroticism
Kinsey Heterosexual-Homosexual Scale, traits, 59–61, 60t, 62f biochemical activity, 195–196
353–354, 354f Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, 32 brain structure differences in cortex
MZA twins, 147–148 and amygdala, 192–193
L differences in cortex, left-right asym-
latency stage, 223 N metry, and amygdala, 193–195
latent content, 207 narrow traits, 33 in Eysenck’s PEN model of personal-
L data (life data), 56 nature-nurture issue, 142–143 ity, 33, 34, 178–179
488 Subject Index

Neuroticism (continued) peripheral nervous system, 169 self-report, 87–89

in five factors, 35–36, 36t Personal Attributes Questionnaire success stories, 96–97
neurology of, 181 (PAQ), 343–347, 344t, 345t pessimistic explanatory style, 283–285,
serotonin and, 196 personality, 211–213 284t
neuroticism, 11–12 building blocks of, 3–5 phallic character, 223
neurotransmitters, 173 development over life span, 65–74 phallic stage, 222–223
nomothetic approach, 25–27, 29–44 gender and, 311–348 phenotype, 143
definition of, 25 heritability of common characteris- philotimo, 52
vs. ideographic approach, 25–27 tics, 151–155 phrenology, 188–191
lexical approach in, 30 markers of neurological and physi- physical health
measurement approach in, 30 ological differences in, 170t explanatory style and, 291–292
theoretical approach in, 29 structural model of personality, locus of control and, 276–277
for universal principles of 211–213 physical qualities, 114–115
personality, 32–43 study of, 7–17 physiological functioning, optimistic
noncontent responding, 92 topographic model of personality, 213 beliefs and, 304–306, 305f
nonindependence error, 172 universal principles of, 32–43 pleasure principle, 212
nonshared environment, 145–146 personality assessment, 77–103. See also positional cloning, 155
norepinephrine, 173 personality tests positive emotions, 383–388, 383t
normative change, 68–71 generalizability, 80t, 84, 87 broaden-and-build theory of, 384f
normative heterosexuality, 352–353 matchmaking and, 99–101 build enduring social connections,
methods, 79t 387
O NEO-PI-R, 84–87 foster adaptive ways of coping,
objective self-awareness, 111 reliability, 80–81, 85 383–388, 384f
object relations theory, 228 validity, 81–84, 85 increase flexibility in thinking,
observational study, 8 personality coherence, 65–66 385–387, 385–387f
observation data, 12 personality cues, 22–24, 23t increase future well-being, 388
O data (observation data), 56 Personality of Everyday Life repair effects of negative emotions,
Oedipus complex, 222 dispositional optimism, 306–307 385, 385f
Openness, 35, 36–37, 36t, 49, 53 gender stereotypes, 342 positive genotype–environment
optimally challenging, 248 genetic research, 163 correlation, 160
optimism. See dispositional optimism guessing penalty, 187–188 positive possible selves, 118–119
optimistic explanatory style, 283–285, 284t happy people, 391 positron emission tomography (PET),
oral incorporative personality, 222 heteronormativity, 352–353 172
oral sadistic personality, 222 job interviews, 98 possible selves, 118–121
oral stage, 222 online presence, 63 negative, 119–121
outcome expectation, 254 physical cues, 44 positive, 118–119
overjustification effect, 252 relatedness in college students, 251 posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD),
overt integrity tests, 96 self-handicapping, 125 374
trauma in hospital stay, 230 preemployment tests, 97
P personality psychology, 1–19 prenatal factors in sexual orientation,
parallel-forms reliability, 80 book organization, 6 361–365
parapraxes, 208–209 building blocks of personality in, 3–5 fraternal birth order, 364–365
parasympathetic division, 169 integration, 5 gender nonconformity, 361–363
passive genotype–environment correla- study of, 7–17 hormonal theories, 361
tion, 159 personality pyramid, 26–27, 26f maternal immune response, 365
path analysis, 256–257 personality questionnaires, 8–9 stressors during development, 364
path diagram, 256–257 personality research, 79t presidents, personality traits of, 57–59,
patterned responding, 92 Personality Research Form, 32 58–59f
penis envy, 223 personality tests, 87–103 primary control, 278
PEN Model of Personality, 178–181 forced-choice format, 89 primary process thinking, 212–213
dimensions, overview of, 178–179 integrity testing, 95–96 problem-focused coping, 301,
neurology of Extraversion, 179–181 legal issues, 97–99 302–303
neurology of Neuroticism, 181 performance-based, 87, 90–91 proceptivity, 369–370
three superfactors, 33–35, 33t, 34t response sets, 91–93 projection, 217
performance-based tests, 87, 90–91 selection and, 93–95 psychic energy, 205
 Subject Index 489

psychoanalysis case study and psychobiography, in school-aged children, 109–111

Freud and, 204–229 226–228 self-concept, 106–122
psychobiography, 226–228 effect size and meta-analysis, self-esteem, 123–133
psychodynamic theory since Freud, 315–317 then and now, 121–122
228–229 factor analysis, 30–31, 32t self and identity, 4, 105–138. See also
psychological health field studies and natural manipula- identity; self
explanatory style and (depression), tions, 296–297 self-concept, 106–122
292–294, 294f NEO-PI-R, 84–87, 85t, 86t cultural impact on, 113–117
locus of control and, 276–277 path analysis, 256–257 development, 106–113
psychosexual stages, 220–226 qualitative data and content analysis, possible selves and, 118–121
anal stage, 222 130–133 self-concept clarity, 124–126
genital stage, 224 scatterplots, correlations, and fMRI self-confidence, gender and, 330, 330f
latency stage, 223 studies, 174–175 self-determination theory, 241–270
oral stage, 222 triangulation and types of data, 55–57 applied, 261–268, 261t
phallic stage, 222–223 true experiment, 10–12 connection between personality
problems with, 224–226 resilience, 373–392, 376–388 theories, 254–256
summary of, 221t characteristics of resilient people, definition of, 242
Psychoticism, 33, 34, 178–179 376–388 fundamental psychological needs,
defined, 375 243–252
Q habits of resilient people, 388–391, 389t self-regulation, 257–261
hardiness, 377–379 Tae Bo study, 268–269
qualitative methods, 130–133
positive emotions, 383–388 self-efficacy, 254–256
quantitative methods, 130–133
trait resilience, 379–383 self-efficacy theory, 254–256
quasi-experimental design, 296–297
to trauma, 374–376, 374f, 375f self-esteem, 123–133
respect for persons, 14–15 gender and, 330, 330f
R response sets, 91–93 heterogeneity of high self-esteem,
random assignment, 10 Rorschach inkblot test, 90 127
rationalization, 220 Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, 85, 123 level, 123–124
reactant responding, 92 rotating the factors, 31 myths and realities of, 126–129
reaction formation, 214–215 self-concept clarity, 124–126
reactive genotype–environment correla- S stability, 124
tion, 159–160 safe haven, 231 self-fulfilling prophecies, 342
reality principle, 212 scatterplots or scattergrams, 174–176 self-handicapping, 125
redundancy department, 81t schema, 209 self-monitoring, 135–137
reflected appraisals, 111 school achievement, explanatory style self-monitoring scale, 135t
reflex action, 212 in, 287–288 self-presentation, 133–135
regulation and motivation, 4–5 scientific method, 7–8 self-presentational tactics, 134–135
Reinforcement Sensitivity S data (self-report data), 55 self-promotion, 134
reinforcement sensitivity theory (RST), secondary control, 278 self-recognition
181–186 secondary process thinking, 212 in babies, 108–109
neurological systems in, 182–186 secondary traits, 27 in chimpanzees, 106–108
summary of, 184t secure attachment, 231 self-regulation, 257–261
relatedness secure base, 231 causality orientations, 260, 261t
attachment theory and, 256 selection, personality tests and, 93–95 motivation types, 258–260
in college students, 251 selective placement, 148 self-report data, 12
fostering, 250–252 selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors self-report tests, 87–89
overview of, 244–245 (SSRIs), 157, 161–162 sensation seeking, 196–199. See also
Relationship Exclusivity, 52 self impulsive sensation seeking
reliability, 80–81, 85 in adolescents, 111–112 biochemical activity, 199
religiosity, 50 in adults, 112–113 bodily responses, 198–199
Ren Qing, 55 in babies, 108–109 brain activity, 199
repression, 219–220 chimpanzees and self-recognition, Sensation Seeking Scale, 196–198, 197t
Research Methods Illustrated 106–108 Sensitivity to Punishment and Sensitiv-
adoption and twin studies, milestones in, 108t ity to Reward Questionnaire
148–151 possible selves, 118–121 (SPSRQ), 187–188t
490 Subject Index

serotonin and Neuroticism, 196 stereotype threat, 113, 342 topographic model of personality, 213
sexual attraction, 354 Strange Situation, 231 trait resilience, 379–383, 380t
Sexual Attractiveness, 52 strategic self-presentation, 134 traits, 4, 21–45
sexual behavior, 354–355 stressors during development, sexual applied to everyday life, 57–64
sexual desire system, 370–371 orientation and, 364 careers and, 63–64
sexual identity structural model of personality, cross-culturally, in China, 54–55
defined, 355 211–213 definition of, 24–25
transitions of young women, 350–351, study of personality, 7–17. See also idio- development over life span, 65–74
351t graphic approach; nomothetic Grant Study of Harvard Graduates,
sexuality, 51–52 approach 73–74
sexual orientation, 349–372 correlational designs, 9–10 idiographic approach to study of,
biological explanations of, 358–365 current research findings in, 17 25–29
cultural standards, 355–356 data and personality assessment indigenous, 52, 54
defined, 354 types, 12–13 intelligence as, 49–50
determinants, 357–371 ethics of, 13–16 of music preferences, 59–61, 60t, 62f
environmental theories, 366 of everyday life, 44 nomothetic approach to study of,
estimates of, 356–357 experimental designs, 9–10 25–27, 29–44
fluidity of, 350–351, 368f factor analysis, 30–31, 32t of presidents, 57–59, 58–59f
heteronormativity, 352–353 observational studies, 8–9 religiosity as, 50
interactionist theories, 366–371 personality questionnaires, 8–9 sexuality as, 51–52
Kinsey Heterosexual-Homosexual research methods illustrated, 10–12 theoretical and practical conclusions,
Scale, 353–354, 354f scientific method, 7–8 75
myths and misperceptions about, sublimation, 218–219 web pages and, 61–63
351–353, 352t superego, 211–213 transactional stress moderation models,
in Sexy Seven, 52 Supernumerary Personality Inventory, 49 376
Sexual Restraint, 52 supplication, 134 transcranial magnetic stimulation
Sexy Seven, 52 suppression, 219 (TMS), 173
shared environment, 145–146 Surgency. See Extraversion transference, 204
Short Test of Musical Preferences symbolic behaviors, 209 transformational coping, 378
(STOMP), 31, 59–60, 60t sympathetic division, 169 trauma, responses to, 230, 374–376
Snyder Self-Monitoring Scale, 85 triadic design, 280–281, 281t
social behavior triangulation, 55–57. See also data
explanatory style and, 294–295 T collection
locus of control and, 277–278 Tae Bo study, 268–269 true experiment, 10
social constructionism, 337–338, 338f T data (test data), 56 twenty statements test (TST), 106, 110,
social context of gender differences, temperament. See also Extraversion; 111, 114t
334–335, 335f Impulsivity; Neuroticism two-factor theories of personality,
social identity, 133–137 in adult personality, predicting, 42–43
self-monitoring, 135–137 72–73 alpha, 40, 42–43
self-presentation, 133–135 in neurological theories of personal- beta, 40, 42, 43
socially desirable responding, ity, 176–178
92–93 temporal consistency reliability, 80 U
social role theory, 335–337, 336f temporary states, 24 UCLA Loneliness Scale, 154
social self-descriptions, 114 Ten-Item Personality Inventory (TIPI), unconscious, 206–209
somatic nervous system, 169 24t dream analysis and, 207–208
spiritual transcendence, 50–51 test data, 12–13 free association and, 206–207
Spiritual Transcendence Scale (STS), test-retest reliability, 80 humor and, 209
50, 51t Thanatos, 206 parapraxes and, 208–209
split-half reliability, 80 Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), symbolic behavior and, 209
sports behaviors, 263–266 90–91 undifferentiated, 345
stable versus unstable, 284 theoretical approach, 29 undoing, 216–217
State Hope Scale, 390t thinking types, 29 unidimensional scale, 343
stereotypes, 314, 314t, 342 thrill and adventure seeking, 197–198 universal principles of personality, 32–43
 Subject Index 491

Big Five, 32, 35–40 W Y

Extraversion, 34 web pages and personality traits, 61–63 yoking, 280–281, 281t
four temperaments, 42–43, 42t, 43f wish fulfillment, 212
general personality factor, 40–41 word association method, 209–211
HEXACO model, 41–42 work behavior
Neuroticism, 34 explanatory style and, 290–291, 291f
Psychoticism, 33, 34 locus of control and, 276
V in self-determination theory,
266–268
validity, 81–84, 85
variance, 31