Assertive toddler, self-efficacious adult: Child temperament predicts personality over forty years

Abstract

The study deals with the prediction of adult personality from behaviors observed in the nursling and toddler stages. The sample consisted of 83 participants (35 men and 48 women aged from 38 to 44 years) who had taken part in the longitudinal research of children and agreed to participate in the follow-up study of adults. For description of child behavior the set of 34 rating scales was used during each testing session. Factor analysis with mean scores of rating scales for the age of 12–30 months yielded three factors: positive affectivity, negative affectivity, and disinhibition. Only child disinhibition showed to be significant predictor of adult personality characteristics: disinhibition is connected to extraversion and generalized self-efficacy. We suggest that a modest connection between child temperament and adult personality characteristics is due to the fact that personality formation is largely influenced by social factors. The finding that the child disinhibition holds – as the only one – a certain connection with personality traits in adulthood we explain by the fact that this dimension is most purely temperamental trait, activity being its substantial component.