Should economic psychology care about personality structure?

Abstract

Since economic psychology is primarily interested in (a) how people in general react to the economic aspects of their environment, and (b) how these reactions change the economic components of their environment, as yet individual differences are not an important issue in economic-psychological research. After a brief look at how economic psychology used to deal with individual differences in the past, some suggestions are given, based on literature from social psychology, economic psychology, and personality research, on how economic psychology should deal with in the future. Information on personality structure can be used for predicting economic behavior in addition to attitude measures and as moderators of predictions from attitude measures. With respect to the applicability of the model of ‘economic man’ individual differences in emotionality vs. rationality are discussed. It is further stated that the development and change of socio-economic systems is very much dependent on the frequency distribution of personality structures in the social system and on the proper matching of role structures and personality structures. Finally, this paper points to differential effects of socio-economic conditions on people's well-being depending on their personality structure.