bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Implicit Personality Theory and the Five‐Factor Model
Authors: Borkenau Peter
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
The Big Five have not only been identified in ratings of knowledgeable informants, but also in ratings of strangers, in co‐occurrence likelihood ratings of traits, in semantic similarity ratings of trait pairs, and in prototypieality ratings of acts for traits. This article describes the shared and distinctive characteristics of correlations among trait ratings and implicit personality theory and reviews studies that compare the structure of memory‐based ratings and of on‐line behavior counts. Three hypotheses suggested in the literature to account for these correlations are delineated and discussed: an accurate reflection hypothesis, a distortion hypothesis, and an overlap hypothesis. It is concluded that the distortion hypothesis has been discredited and that an overlap model best accounts for the available evidence. This implies that traits are real and accurately perceived, provided that the judges have the necessary information.
Personality and Psychopathology: An Application of the Five‐Factor Model
Authors: Widiger Thomas A. , Trull Timothy J.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
Our review is concerned with the relationship of the five‐factor model of personality to psychopathology, focusing in particular on Axis II personality disorders and depression. The five factors provide a particularly compelling model for interpreting the Axis II personality disorders as maladaptive variants of normal personality traits. However, we also discuss methodological and conceptual limitations of this application. There has been little research on the relationship of Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness to Axis I mental disorders, but considerable attention has been given to Neuroticism and Extraversion. We focus in particular on the difficulty in distinguishing between the various ways in which personality can relate to depression, either as a predisposition to, a complication of, a pathoplastic effect upon, or a spectrum variant of the mental disorder. We conclude with recommendations for future research.
On Traits and Temperament: General and Specific Factors of Emotional Experience and Their Relation to the Five‐Factor Model
Authors: Watson David , Clark Lee Anna
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
In this article we investigate relations between general and specific measures of self‐rated affect and markers of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness. Replicating previous research, we found strong and pervasive associations between Neuroticism, its facets, and the various negative affects; and between Extraversion, its facets, and the positive affects. Conscientiousness also had a significant, independent relation with general positive affect, but this effect was entirely due to the specific affect of attentiveness, which was more strongly related to Conscientiousness than Extraversion. Conversely, only the achievement facet of Conscientiousness correlated broadly with the positive affects. Finally, hostility had a strong independent association with (low) Agreeableness. The results for Neuroticism and Extraversion further clarify the temperamental basis of these higher order trait dimensions; whereas those obtained for Agreeableness and Conscientiousness illustrate the importance of examining personality‐affect relations at the lower order level.
Manipulation in Close Relationships: Five Personality Factors in Interactional Context
Authors: Buss David M.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
This research had three basic goals: (a) to identify manipulation tactics used in close relationships; (b) to document empirically the degree of generality and specificity of tactical deployment across relationship types (mates, friends, parents); and (c) to identify links between five major personality dimensions and the usage of manipulation tactics. Twelve manipulation tactics were identified through separate factor analyses of two instruments based on different data sources: Charm, Reason, Coercion, Silent Treatment, Debasement, and Regression (replicating Buss et al., 1987), and Responsibility Invocation, Reciprocity, Monetary Reward, Pleasure Induction, Social Comparison, and Hardball (an amalgam of threats, lies, and violence). The Big Five personality factors were assessed through three separate data sources: self‐report, spouse report, and two independent interviewers. Personality factors showed coherent links with tactics, including Surgency (Coercion, Responsibility, Invocation), Desurgency (Debasement), Agreeableness (Pleasure Induction), Disagreeableness (Coercion), Conscientiousness (Reason), Emotional Instability (Regression), and Intellect‐Openness (Reason). Discussion focuses on the consequences of the five personality factors for social interaction in close relationships.
Accuracy in Face Perception: A View from Ecological Psychology
Authors: Berry Diane S. , Finch Wero Julia L.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
It is well documented that people form reliable and robust impressions of a stranger's personality traits on the basis of facial appearance. The propensity to judge character from the face is typically thought to reflect cultural beliefs about mythical relations between aspects of facial appearance and personality. However, recent cross‐cultural and developmental research does not support the mythical, cultural stereotype hypothesis. An alternative explanation of the data is that consensus in face‐based impressions exists because those judgments are partially accurate. In this article, we explore the theoretical rationale for this “kernel‐of‐truth” hypothesis, review research that indicates that first impressions based on facial appearance are partially accurate, and discuss the potential mechanisms that may yield links between aspects of facial appearance and personality.
Childhood Antecedents of Young‐Adult Judgability
Authors: Colvin C. Randall
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
Research has recently demonstrated that the personalities of some individuals are more accurately judged than others, and that these “judgable” persons possess a coherent and identifiable personality structure (Colvin, 1993). In this article, four indices of judgability, based on personality descriptions provided by trained examiners, friends, and self, were derived when subjects were 18 and 23 years of age. A reliable composite of the four indices was related to adolescent and childhood personality ratings. The results reveal (a) rank‐order stability of judgability from age 18 to age 23, (b) that adolescent ego resiliency predicts judgability in early adulthood, and (c) that adolescent ego resiliency mediates the relationship between childhood personality and young‐adult judgability, but only for men. Observed gender differences and similarities are discussed. Overall, the convergence between the results from this study and previous research provides evidence for the construct validity of judgability.
Suppression and Repression to Discrepant Self‐Other Ratings: Relations with Thought Control and Cardiovascular Reactivity
Authors: Davidson Karina W.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
Individual differences in self‐other disagreement may lap phenomena that have been notoriously difficult to assess. For example, subjects who believe they possess a trait while their acquaintances disagree may be exhibiting suppression. Further, subjects who deny a trait while acquaintances believe it is present may be displaying repression. In the first study, both subjects and their closest friends rated the subject's hostility level. Suppressors and repressors were expected to exhibit enhanced thought control, and indeed these individuals were more able not to think about white bears when instructed to do so than individuals for whom there was high hostility agreement. However, this was also true for those with low hostility agreement. Only suppressors demonstrated blood‐pressure hyperreactivity to a hostility‐provoking task as expected; this finding was replicated in a second study employing a different, multi‐item measure of hostility, as well as a marker of low Agreeableness.
Parent and Teacher Ratings in the Assessment and Prediction of Antisocial and Delinquent Behaviors
Authors: Bank Lew , Duncan Terry , Patterson G. R. , Reid John
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
Subjects consisted of a sample of two cohorts of approximately 100 boys each whose behaviors were rated by their parents and teachers. Criterion variables included antisocial behavior, based on parent, child, teacher, and interviewer reports, and delinquency, based on parent and child reports in addition to cumulative arrest data taken from juvenile court records. The data suggest that mothers are focused on the daily, irritating behaviors of their sons. Teachers, on the other hand, appear to focus on a relatively small number of items (e.g., child physically attacks others, associates with deviant peers), and thereby provide ratings that are better predictors of delinquency and arrest. When the mothers' ratings were constrained to include only items that were salient for teachers, their predictive validity coefficients approached the magnitude of the teacher coefficients.
Analyzing Consensus to Personality Judgments: A Variance Components Approach
Authors: Shrout Patrick E.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
Although peer raters of personality traits do tend to agree, the strength of their consensus is often modest. This article focuses on methods for analyzing determinants of consensus. Variance components methods adapted from generalizability theory have some untapped potential for understanding gradations in consensus. The methods allow explicit analysis of how social categories of targets might affect judgments of raters from the same or different social categories. Limitations of the variance components approach are also discussed. The methods are illustrated with artificial data.
Imaginal Dialogues in the Self:Theory and Method
Authors: Hermans Hubert J. M. , Rijks Trix I. , Kempen Harry J. G.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
The story a person tells about his or her life is viewed as a polyphonic novel. This metaphor implies that the self is multivoiced; that is, there is no single “I” as an agent of self‐organization but several, relatively independent “I” positions that complement and contradict each other in dialogical relationships. From this perspective the role ofimaginal figures in the organization of the self is analyzed. A theory and method are presented allowing us to study both the content and the organization of multivoiced self‐narratives. The method is illustrated with two idiographic studies, where people tell their life story not only from the perspective of the familiar “I” but also from the perspective of an imaginal figure with whom they have had a long‐lasting relationship. Finally, it is argued that the metaphor of a polyphonic novel is particularly useful because it allows us to decentralize the Western concept of the self.
Introduction: Social Cognition, Psychodynamic Psychology, and the Representation and Processing of Emotionally Significant Information
Authors: Strauman Timothy J.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT This special issue examines two perspectives on how people comprehend and respond to significant features of their lives: psychoanalytic psychology and social cognition. The articles included present new empirical findings relevant to die overlap of psychoanalysis and social‐cognitive psychology, as well as commentaries from each perspective. This introduction summarizes important conceptual and methodological challenges in the integration of two such distinct approaches to emotionally significant information.
Transference in Interpersonal Relations: Inferences and Affect Based on Significant‐Other Representations
Authors: Andersen Susan M. , Baum Alana
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Based on an information‐processing model of transference and a recent experimental demonstration of transference, defined in terms of “biased inference and memory” (Andersen & Cole, 1990), the present research examined the transfer of affective responses to a new individual, as in schema‐triggered affect (Fiske, 1982). Using idiographic stimulus‐generation procedures and a nomothetic experimental design, we exposed subjects to a description of a new, unknown person, allegedly seated next door. The description resembled either a positively or negatively toned significant other from the subject's own life or from another subject's life. As predicted, and replicating previous work, subjects misremembered the target person as having more representation‐consistent features when the target resembled their own significant other rather than someone else's. Moreover, and also as predicted, subjects transferred more representation‐consistent affect to this same target person. The data are discussed in terms of conceptions of transference and basic aspects of social cognition.
Consistency of Interpersonal Themes for Patients In Psychotherapy
Authors: Crits‐Christoph Paul , Demorest Amy , Muenz Larry R. , Baranackie Kathryn
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT In this study the extent to which patients in psychotherapy display similar interpersonal themes across multiple narratives of their interactions with others was investigated. Interpersonal themes were measured using a new instrument entitled the Quantitative Assessment of Interpersonal Themes (QUAINT) method, which assesses the wishes, responses from others, and responses of self that occur in narratives about interactions with others. For 60 patients in psychotherapy, evidence for repetitiveness of themes was found; the effect was relatively small but was highly statistically significant. Individual differences in the degree of repetitiveness of themes were not related to type of treatment (dynamic vs. cognitive), but they were related to length of time in treatment. The limitations of the study are reviewed and future research directions are outlined.
Expressive and Defensive Behavior during Discourse on Unresolved Topics: A Single Case Study of Pathological Grief
Authors: Horowitz Mardi J. , Milbrath Constance , Jordan Daniel S. , Stinson Charles H. , Ewert Mary , Redington Dana J. , Fridhandler Bram , Reidbord Stephen P. , Hartley Dianna
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Both psychodynamic and social‐cognitive theoretical domains have control process models of behavior but with different ideas about the purpose and loci of control. This study examines expressive and defensive behaviors associated with different topics of discourse in the time‐limited psychotherapy of a woman treated for pathological grief. Conceptually the study is based on a model of defensive control processes that integrates states of mind and person schemas. Theoretically derived measures of discourse topics, verbal and nonverbal defensive behaviors, emotional disclosure, and states of mind were applied to transcripts and videotapes of the entire therapy. Evidence from combined cluster and factor analyses supported the existence of recurring emotionally significant states. Two of these are particularly interesting from a clinical perspective: One, a “shimmering” state of intense emotional expression with concurrent signs of avoidance, was associated with topics identified clinically as stressful, unresolved, and conflictual. The other, a state of more uniformly stifled emotionality, was characteristic of discourse thought of clinically as resistance.
Styles of Inhibiting Emotional Expression: Distinguishing Repressive Coping from Impression Management
Authors: Weinberger Daniel A. , Davidson Martin N.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Although repressors' avoidant coping style seems genuinely defensive, an alternative hypothesis is that repressors are actually distress‐prone impression managers who provide “socially desirable” verbal reports. To establish discriminant validity, 30 repressors and 30 self‐identified impression managers participated in a timed phrase‐completion task. Half of the subjects were encouraged to be emotionally expressive and half to be restrained. Repressors were highly defensive regardless of the social demand, and impression managers only managed to match the repressors' level of distancing during the first segment of the inhibitive condition. Repressors were as physiologically reactive when they made defensive claims as they were when they made more negative disclosures to others. Moreover, when confronted, only the repressors denied that their heart rate elevations might be related to their emotional responses. These findings suggest that repressors' limited emotional expression is more determined by defenses against awareness of affect than by self‐presentational concerns.
Self‐Evaluation Processes: Motives, Information Use, and Self‐Esteem
Authors: Wayment Heidi A. , Taylor Shelley E.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT At least three motives guide self‐evaluation: accuracy, self‐enhancement, and self‐improvement. To satisfy these motives, self‐evaluation may utilize different information sources. Self‐esteem may also moderate self‐evaluation strategies. Participants evaluated the frequency and usefulness of eight types of information for meeting the three motives in two life domains: academics and social life. Personal standards information was reported to be used more frequently than objective or social comparison information and also perceived as most useful for meeting all three motives. Individuals low in self‐esteem reported using more social comparison information than those high in self‐esteem, especially upward social comparison information. Individuals with high self‐esteem reported using personal standards information more often than they used social comparison information, while individuals with low self‐esteem relied equally often on these two types of information. Discussion focuses on the role social comparison information may have for those with unstable self‐concepts.
Self‐Deceptive Coping: Adaptive Only in Ambiguous Contexts
Authors: Johnson Edward A.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Two experiments investigated claims for the efficacy of self‐deceptive coping (e.g., Sackeim, 1983, 1988). In Study I the performance of self‐deceivers on solvable anagrams was found to he remarkably poor relative to that of non‐self‐deceivers after both groups were exposed to unsolvable problems. The starkly unambiguous failure experience may have precluded self‐deception. Therefore, in Study 2 participants were exposed to unsolvable problems either with or without an excuse. Self‐deceivers who encountered failure with an excuse subsequently performed much better on the solvable tasks than those without an excuse. These findings suggest that the use of self‐deception following threat is constrained by the availability of contextual ambiguity (e.g., excuses). The effect of the excuse was not related to participants' mood or attributions for performance.
Gender Characteristics and Relationship Adjustment: Another Look at Similarity‐Complementarity Hypotheses
Authors: Aube Jennifer , Koestner Richard
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT The present study examined how the similarity and complementarity of gender‐related attitudes, behaviors, interests, and personality traits related to partner selection and relationship adjustment in the context of serious, romantic relationships. Results revealed the important role of gender‐related attitudes in relationships, indicating that study participants tended to be paired with partners who held similar attitudes, and that couples who were similar in attitudes had higher dyadic adjustment. Furthermore, the nature of the couples' attitudes affected (a) the extent to which couples were paired on the basis of complementary interests and behaviors, and (b) the relation between partner's gender‐related behaviors and dyadic adjustment. Results support previous research citing the importance of attitude similarity in interpersonal attraction, and demonstrate that these findings can be generalized to ongoing, close relationships.
Personality and Parenting: Exploring the Mediating Role of Transient Mood and Daily Hassles
Authors: Belsky Jay , Crnic Keith , Woodworth Sharon
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT In order to explore the role that transient mood and daily hassles might play in mediating the impact of enduring personality on parenting, naturalistic home observations of mothering and fathering were conducted when firstborn sons were 15 and 21 months of age. Observationally based, behavioral ratings of mothering and fathering were related to three self‐report personality scales (Agreeableness, Neuroticism, Extraversion), administered to parents when their children were 10 months of age, and to self‐reports of transient mood (positive and negative) and daily hassles obtained prior to each observation of family interaction. Results indicated that (a) mothering was more consistently predicted by personality and mood/hassles than fathering; (b) Extraversion played a larger role in predicting fathering than mothering, with the reverse being true of Agreeableness; (c) Neuroticism was the most consistent predictor of men's and women's parenting; and (d) there was little support for affect‐specific linkages between personality, mood/hassles, and parenting. Finally, some evidence of mediation by transient mood and daily hassles emerged, more consistently for mothers than fathers, though more strongly for fathers than mothers. These results are discussed in terms of the primacy of the role of parenting for men and women.
The Many Meanings of Religiousness: A Policy‐Capturing Approach
Authors: Pargament Kenneth I. , Sullivan Mark S. , Balzer William K. , Van Haitsma Kimberly S. , Raymark Patrick H.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT This article reports the results of two policy‐capturing studies that investigated individual differences in the meaning of religiousness. Policy capturing requires judges to respond to a large number of hypothetical scenarios or profiles that differ along a number of potentially relevant cues or attributes. Multiple regression analyses are then conducted to ascertain which cues are influencing each judge's responses. For both studies, 100 profiles were developed describing hypothetical individuals who differed on 10 cues thought to influence perceptions of religiousness (e.g., church attendance, doctrinal orthodoxy), and judges rated each profile on a 9‐point religiousness scale. Judges in Study 1 were 27 Roman Catholic and Protestant college students. Policy‐capturing analyses identified clear individual differences in the cues that afifected judgments of religiousness, and in the self‐insight of the students into their personal policies. To test whether these findings reflected the youth or religious maturity of the sample, the study was replicated with a sample of 22 Catholic and Protestant clergy. Similar results were found in Study 2. In both samples, individual policy capturing did a significantly better job of predicting judgments of religiousness than did self‐described policies or policies created by averaging across judges. Together these findings underscore the diversity of religious meanings and the need for further idiographic investigations in the psychology of religion.
The System‐Topics Framework and the Structural Arrangement of Systems within and around Personality
Authors: Mayer John D.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT The field of personality psychology possesses rich theories and excellent research, but few good means to communicate them. The system‐topics framework is an integratory approach that divides the study of personality into three central topics and their subdivisions: (a) the components of personality, (b) the organization of those components, and (c) the development of those components and their organization over time. The present article describes the system‐topics framework and then examines the addition of a potential new topic useful to an improved exposition of the field: the structural arrangement of the component systems in and around personality. A three‐dimensional model of these systems is created that can synthesize the many spatial metaphors used in earlier personality theory and research. The reasons for integrating this structural model within the system‐topics framework and how such integration can be accomplished are discussed.
Multiple Identities and the Integration of Personality
Authors: Gregg Gary S.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Life‐history interviews show narrators to shift among multiple, often contradictory self‐representations. This article outlines a model that accounts for how a relatively small set of self‐symbols and metaphors can form a grammar‐like system that simultaneously defines and integrates multiple identities. Drawing on generative theories from linguistics, anthropology, and music, the model proposes that this system provides a unitary deep structure that can be configured in various arrangements to yield multiple surface structures. Each “surface” identity constructs an individual's emotions and social relations–and what he or she accepts as “Me” and rejects as “not‐Me”—into a distinct pattern, with identity per se appearing as a dialogic or fugue‐like structure of opposed voices. Study‐of‐lives interviews conducted by the author in urban America and rural Morocco are used to present the model and to demonstrate the pivotal role played by multistable or “structurally ambiguous” symbols in anchoring reversible self‐representations which integrate personality as a system of organized contradiction. The musical analogy is emphasized in order to build a bridge toward current research in cognitive science and toward efforts to formulate a “state integration” theory of personality development.
Commentary: Tending the Garden of Personality
Authors: Winter David G. , Stewart Abigail J.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT In this Commentary for the special issue of the Journal of Personality, we discuss the uses and limitations of taxonomies in personality, drawing on the role of taxonomic efforts in other sciences. We endorse Mc Adams's concept of several “levels” (perhaps three: traits, motives and cognitive structures, and core unity themas or identity) for ordering and arranging the major variables of personality. We argue that these levels should be considered independent and distinct: Each level has its own range of convenience, and no level can be reduced to any other level. We suggest that the concept of conflict—within and across levels—is a useful way to understand certain problematic cases. Finally, we argue that the social macrocontext (gender, class, race, culture, and history) has unfortunately been neglected in most personality theories and taxonomies of variables. We illustrate the importance of social macrocontext with a brief discussion of the case of Maya Angelou.
Variations in Level of Moral Judgment as a Function of Type of Dilemma and Moral Choice
Authors: Carpendale Jeremy I. M. , Krebs Dennis L.
Published: April 2006

This study compares the predictive power of two models of moral judgment: (a) Kohlberg's model, which predicts stage consistency across varying content, and (b) a model that predicts variations in stage as a function of complex interactions between people and social contexts. Forty university students were asked to make and justify choices on three moral dilemmas—a dilemma involving the sale of defective merchandise (selling dilemma) and two dilemmas from Kohlberg's test of moral judgment. Half the participants made hypothetical choices on the selling dilemma; the other half were offered a selfish incentive—money—for concealing the defects in the merchandise. In support of the interactional model, (a) participants scored lower on the selling dilemma than on Kohlberg's test, (b) the monetary incentive affected moral choices, (c) participants justified the choice to conceal defects in the merchandise with significantly lower stage moral judgments than they invoked in support of the decision to disclose its defects, and (d) participants who upheld the choice to disclose supported it with higher stage justifications than those who rejected it. Surprisingly, however, participants who stood to make money disclosed more about the defects in the article and charged less than participants who did not.
On the Nature of Embarrassabllity: Shyness, Social Evaluation, and Social Skill
Authors: Miller Rowland S.
Published: April 2006

In this study, the correlates of embarrassability, or chronic susceptibility to embarrassment, were examined. Competing theoretical models suggest either that embarrassable people should be especially concerned about others' evaluations of them or that they should lack social skills. Further, shyness and embarrassment are typically considered to be closely related states. To test these propositions, 310 participants provided extensive self‐reports of social skill, fear of negative evaluation, self‐esteem, self‐consciousness, and negative affectivity. Regression and factor analyses indicated that, compared to those of low embarrassability, highly embarrassable people are particularly concerned with the normative appropriateness of behavior and are more motivated to avoid rejection from others. In contrast, shyness was best predicted by low social self‐confidence and low social skill. The data best support a social‐evaluation model of embarrassment and argue that embarrassability is linked to the appropriateness of social behavior, and shyness to its effectiveness.
The Effect of Perceived Challenges and Skills on the Quality of Subjective Experience
Authors: Moneta Giovanni B. , Csikszentmihalyi Mihaly
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT This article investigates the effects that perceived challenges and skills in activities have on the quality of everyday life experience. Based on flow theory it was predicted that quality of daily experience would depend on the challenge experienced and skill required in specific situations, as well as on the balance between challenge and skill. The Experience Sampling Method (ESM) was used on a sample of 208 talented adolescents to measure daily variations in four dimensions of experience (concentration, wish to do the activity, involvement, and happiness) in four contexts (in school, with relatives, with friends, and in solitude). The four dimensions of experience were regressed on the predictors challenges, skills, and their absolute difference expressing the balance/imbalance of challenges and skills. Hierarchical linear modeling, explained in detail herein, was conducted on a 1‐week sample of experiences. Findings confirm the prediction of flow theory that the balance of challenges and skills has a positive and independent effect on the quality of experience. Yet some differences of parameter estimates were found between dimensions of experience and between social contexts. These heterogeneities call for a further improvement of the flow model.
Comparing the Accuracy of Personality Judgments by the Self and Knowledgeable Others
Authors: Kolar David W. , Funder David C. , Colvin C. Randall
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT In this article we compare the accuracy of personality judgments by the self and by knowledgeable others. Self‐ and acquaintance judgments of general personality attributes were used to predict general, videotaped behavioral criteria. Results slightly favored the predictive validity of personality judgments made by single acquaintances over self‐judgments, and significantly favored the aggregated personality judgments of two acquaintances over self‐judgments. These findings imply that the most valid source for personality judgments that are relevant to patterns of overt behavior may not be self‐reports but the consensus of the judgment of the community of one's peers.
Themes of Agency and Communion In Significant Autobiographical Scenes
Authors: McAdams Dan P. , Hoffman Barry J. , Day Rodney , Mansfield Elizabeth D.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT In three studies employing over 350 community adults and college students, participants wrote or told narratives of personally important scenes in their lives. The autobiographical accounts were coded for themes of agency and communion, the two general content dimensions in lives and life stories that have been identified by many theorists and researchers. The four agentic themes of self‐mastery, status, achievement/responsibility, and empowerment were positively associated with Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) measures of achievement and power motivation, self‐report scales of dominance and achievement, and personal strivings concerning being successful and feeling strong. Similarly, the four communal themes of love/friendship, dialogue, care/help, and community were positively associated with intimacy motivation, needs for affiliation and nurturance, and personal strivings concerned with warm and close relationships. The results suggest a thematic coherence in personality across the arenas of key autobiographical memories, social motives, and daily goals.
Self‐Concept Clarity and Preferred Coping Styles
Authors: Smith Maureen , Wethington Elaine , Zhan Ginny
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT This study examined the relation between self‐concept clarity and (a) preferred general coping styles, (b) coping with a specific event, and (c) coping with a specific ongoing situation in 175 undergraduate students. The results of the regression analyses for general coping styles indicated that self‐concept clarity made a reliable but weak positive contribution to active coping styles (e.g., planning and taking action) and a strong negative contribution to passive coping styles (e.g., denial). The unique negative contribution of self‐concept clarity to passive coping was replicated with respect to coping with a specific event and to coping with a specific ongoing situation. However, the weaker positive contribution of self‐concept clarity to active coping was not replicated with respect to coping with specific events or specific ongoing situations.
Beliefs m Realistic and Unrealistic Control: Assessment and Implications
Authors: Zuckerman Miron , Knee C. Raymond , Kieffer Suzanne C. , Rawsthome Laird , Bruce Laura M.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT Scales were constructed to measure perceived control over controllable events (realistic control) and perceived control over uncontrollable events (unrealistic control). Internal reliability, test‐retest reliability, and discriminant validity of both scales were adequate. Study 1 measured perceived personal control over hassles that judges rated on general controllability. For hassles very high in controllability, perceived personal control was related to belief in realistic control but not to belief in unrealistic control; for hassles very low in controllability, perceived personal control was related to belief in unrealistic control but not to belief in realistic control. Study 2 showed that participants high in unrealistic control belief (but not those high in realistic control belief) persevered more on a task that was in part uncontrollable. Study 3 showed that the combination of low realistic control belief and high unrealistic control belief predicted poorer future health, particularly for participants who have reported the experience of many negative events and/or hassles. The conditions under which unrealistic control results in maladaptive outcomes are discussed.
Perfectionism and Suicidal Preoccupation
Authors: Adkins Karen Kittler , Parker Wayne
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT One hundred twenty‐nine undergraduate students were assessed for suicidal preoccupation, using the Alabama Adolescent Health Survey (AAHS) and selected cards from the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT). They were also administered the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS) to assess perfectionistic tendencies. Objective scoring of the TAT was found to be highly reliable. Canonical correlational analyses were nonsignificant for a relationship between perfectionism and suicidal themes on the TAT. However, the more direct questions of the AAHS relating to suicide were significantly related to perfectionism. Results suggest that passive perfectionists who procrastinate out of fear of making mistakes are more likely to be preoccupied with suicide, unlike perfectionists whose strivings produce achievement. High personal standards and parental expectations do not appear related to suicidal preoccupations.
Transition from the Early 40s to the Early 50s in Sell‐Directed Women
Authors: Wink Paul
Published: April 2006

How does personality type moderate personality change in middle age? Answers to this question were sought with three observer‐based measures of self‐directedness (autonomy, hypersensitivity, and willfulness) scored from the California Q‐set when the participants in the Mills longitudinal study were age 43. From their early 40s to early 50s, high scorers on autonomy (healthy self‐directedness) increased on California Psychological Inventory measures of impulse control and agency, and continued their involvement in high‐status occupational careers. Despite increases in impulse control, the hypersensitive women had not increased in agency and expressed boredom in major social roles. In their early 50s, high scorers on willfulness increased in agency but not impulse control. In social roles, they perceived themselves as stimulating and creative.
Assessment and Prediction of Stress‐Related Growth
Authors: Park Crystal L. , Cohen Lawrence H. , Murch Renee L.
Published: April 2006

This article reports the development of the Stress‐Related Growth Scale (SRGS) and its use in a study examining determinants of stress‐related positive outcomes for college students. Study 1 analyses showed that the SRGS has acceptable internal and test‐retest reliability and that scores are not influenced by social desirability. Study 2 analyses showed that college students' SRGS responses were significantly related to those provided by friends and relatives on their behalf. Study 3 analyses tested the determinants of stress‐related growth longitudinally. Significant predictors of the SRGS were (a) intrinsic religiousness; (b) social support satisfaction; (c) stressfulness of the negative event; (d) positive reinterpretation and acceptance coping; and (e) number of recent positive life events. The SRGS was also positively related to residual change in optimism, positive affectivity, number of socially supportive others, and social support satisfaction, lending further support to the validity of this new scale. Results have implications for current theory on stress‐related positive outcomes.
Private ‐and Public Self‐Consciousness and Articulation of the Ought Self from Private and Public Vantages
Authors: Nasby William
Published: April 2006

The current research included two studies that examined whether private and public self‐consciousness predicts the extent to which individuals schematically articulate the ought self from private and public vantages. Each study assessed private and public self‐consciousness, and tested recognition memory of trait adjectives, which participants had rated according to either private/ought (Study 1) or public/ought (Study 2) self‐descriptiveness. Across the studies, the convergent and discriminant patterns of false alarms supported the hypotheses that (a) the private and public facets of the ought self resemble bipolar schemas, and (b) private and public self‐consciousness, respectively, predicts the extent to which individuals articulate the ought self from either a private or a public vantage.
Affect Intensity and Individual Differences In Informational Style
Authors: Larsen Randy J. , Billings Douglas W. , Cutler Susan E.
Published: April 2006

Although individuals differ widely in the typical intensity of their affective experience, the mechanisms that create or maintain these differences are unclear. Larsen, Diener, and Cropanzano (1987) examined the hypothesis that individual differences in affect intensity (AI) are related to how people interpret emotional stimuli. They found that high AI individuals engaged in more personalizing and generalizing cognitions while construing emotional stimuli than low AI individuals. The present study extends these findings by examining cognitive activity during a different task‐the generation of information to communicate about life events. Participants provided free‐response descriptions of 16 life events. These descriptions were content coded for five informational style variables. It was found that the descriptive information generated by high AI participants contained significantly more references to emotional arousal, more focus on feelings, and more generalization compared to participants low in AI. These results are consistent with the notion that specific cognitive activity may lead to, or at least be associated with, dispositional affect intensity. In addition, the informational style variables identified in this study were stable over time and consistent across situations. Although men and women differ in AI, this difference becomes insignificant after controlling for informational style variation. Overall results are discussed
Depressive Tendencies and Susceptibility to Anxiety: Differential Personality Correlates
Authors: Kremen Adam M.
Published: April 2006

Although the constructs of depression and anxiety are conceptually and clinically separable, they have been difficult to separate psychometrically. The present study is an attempt to statistically disentangle the two constructs and to evaluate their differential correlates. A common factor analysis of the items in a depression and an anxiety inventory was conducted using data collected from two samples—208 college students and eighty‐seven 18‐year‐olds participating in the Block Longitudinal Study. In both samples two factors, interpreted as depressive tendencies and susceptibility to anxiety, were found; the factor loadings on each factor were highly correlated across the two samples. No sex differences were found in these factor structures. Factor‐based scores comprised of well‐differentiating items were computed for participants in the Block sample. Using partial correlation analyses, observer‐measured as well as self‐report‐based personality correlates of the specific variance associated with depressive tendencies and with susceptibility to anxiety, respectively, were contrasted. The results indicated that a strong interpersonal component discernible in depression was less noticeable in anxiety.
Gordon Allport and the Legend of “Rinehart”
Authors: Winter David G.
Published: April 2006

Gordon Allport's prize‐winning junior‐year essay on the Harvard “Rinehart” legend contains several features that are different from all other versions of the legend, most notably in the motives attributed to Rinehart and the responses of the students to him. These changes, it is argued, reflect the influence of Allport's own personality and values, as manifested in his adult life and academic career.
Personality and Coping: Three Generations of Research
Authors: Suls Jerry , David James P. , Harvey John H.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
This article introduces the Journal of Personality's special issue on coping and personality. It first presents a historical overview of the psychological study of how people cope with stress and identifies three generations of theory and research: (a) the psychoanalysts and the ego development school, which tended to equate personality and coping strategies; (b) the transactional approach, which appeared in the 1960s and emphasized situational and cognitive influences on coping while downplaying the role of individual differences; and (c) the most recent, “third generation,” whose work is represented in this special issue and focuses on the role of personality in coping while maintaining strong operational distinctions among coping, personality, appraisal, and adaptational outcomes. This introduction concludes with a discussion of unresolved conceptual and methodological issues and a brief orientation to the third‐generation articles that follow in this special issue.
The Interactional Context of Problem‐, Emotion‐, and Relationship‐Focused Coping: The Role of the Big Five Personality Factors
Authors: O'Brien Tess Byrd , DeLongis Anita
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACTThis study examined the role that personality and situational factors play in three forms of coping responses: problem‐, emotion‐ and relationship‐focused. Coping responses were strongly associated with whether the situation involved a primarily agentic (work) or communal (interpersonal) stressor. Among communal stressors, the involvement of close versus distant others was also associated with coping responses. Situational factors were linked most strongly with the use of problem‐focused (planful problem solving) and relationship‐focused (empathic responding) modes of coping. Dimensions of personality derived from the five‐factor model (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness) had important associations with coping responses. Coping responses were best predicted by models that included both the additive and multiplicative effects of person and situation factors. Taken together, the findings suggest that a model of coping that considers both agentic and communal dimensions of stressful situations, includes interpersonal dimensions of coping, and considers personality and situation factors in tandem is needed to increase the predictive utility of current models.
Patient Adherence in Chronic Illness: Personality and Coping In Context
Authors: Wiebe John S. , Christensen Alan J.
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACTPrevious reviews have concluded that there is no evidence for a predictable association between person factors and regimen adherence in chronic illness. The brief current review of the literature reveals that past work has been limited by the lack of a common structural theory of personality and the failure to consider the interaction of person factors with disease and treatment context. Application of the five‐factor model of personality to adherence research will reduce divergence in the field and and in the orientation and interpretation of future work. Evidence suggests that an interactive perspective recognizing the moderating influence of contextual factors on the behavioral expression of personality traits will contribute to the prediction of adherence behavior.
The Development of Coping Resources in Adulthood
Authors: Aldwin Carolyn M. , Sutton Karen J. , Lachman Margie
Published: April 2006

ABSTRACT
We examined three community samples to determine whether stressful episodes form a context for the development of coping resources in adulthood. The first study found that 81.9% of a sample of 845 older men reported drawing upon prior experiences in coping with a recent problem. Content analysis revealed that only 22.7% drew upon similar stressful episodes; the rest drew upon problems from work, the military, illnesses, deaths, etc. The second study replicated the earlier findings in 102 men and women, ages 24 to 84, who reported on a recent low point in semistructured interviews. In addition, 75% reported long‐term effects, equally split between negative, positive, and mixed effects. Those individuals who perceived advantages from the low point were significantly more likely to report positive long‐term effects. The third study replicated the findings from the first two studies in a sample of 941 men and women ages 23 to 62. Path analyses showed that coping strategies differentially predicted perceived positive or negative outcomes, which in turn predicted current mastery and depression levels. While the findings are cross‐sectional and causality cannot be inferred, they are nonetheless supportive of the effects of stress and coping on personality.