Determinants of Inconsistent Personality Descriptions: Trait and Target Effects

Abstract

ABSTRACT The determinants of inconsistent trait use were examined in four studies that investigated the effects of personality domain, target, and trait features on the use of inconsistent trait pairs in descriptions of the self and others. Inconsistencies were defined as the endorsement of both poles of a descriptively and evaluatively antonymic trait pair from the same personality domain (e.g., “friendly” and “rude”). Across the first three studies, inconsistencies were found to be most frequent for the domain of Emotional Stability and least frequent for the domain of Intellect. Descriptions of the self included more inconsistencies than did descriptions of other targets, who varied on the dimensions of liking and familiarity. In the final study, the association between inconsistent use and the trait features of observability, stability, causality, and desirability was examined. Together, these studies identified three determinants of the systematic use of inconsistent trails in personality descriptions: target of description, social desirability of the trait pair, and personality domain.