Agreeable Individuals Research Articles

Agreeableness and Conflict Management in Daily Life: The Impact of Prosocial Traits on Psychological Adaptation

This paper explores the role of agreeableness, a key personality trait characterized by prosocial behaviors such as empathy, altruism, and cooperation, in conflict management and psychological adaptation in daily life. Agreeable individuals, driven by a focus on harmony and understanding, tend to employ constructive conflict resolution strategies that prioritize relational well-being and mutual respect. These strategies reduce interpersonal tensions, promote trust, and enhance relational satisfaction. Furthermore, agreeableness contributes significantly to psychological adaptation by fostering positive social interactions, enhancing emotional regulation, and promoting adaptive coping mechanisms, which together support resilience in the face of life’s challenges. The broader implications of agreeableness extend beyond individual relationships, influencing organizational dynamics, community engagement, and societal harmony by reducing conflict, fostering inclusivity, and bridging ideological divides. This paper highlights the importance of agreeableness in shaping both personal well-being and social cohesion, emphasizing its role in promoting a more empathetic, cooperative, and resilient society.

Feelings as a currency of care: A role for agreeableness in emotional reactivity.

The personality trait of agreeableness is linked to a number of core tendencies (e.g., empathy, warmth) that operate in a feeling-based manner. Following considerations of this type, it is proposed that the motivations and characteristics of agreeable individuals, relative to disagreeable individuals, should render them more receptive to emotional events and more responsive to them for this reason. Potential links between agreeableness and emotional reactivity were assessed in two studies involving four samples (total N = 517) in which participants continuously rated their feeling states in response to a variety of affective images. Agreeableness did not predict the speed with which emotional reactions began, but agreeable individuals exhibited higher-magnitude peak intensities, regardless of whether stimuli were appetitive (pleasant) or aversive (unpleasant) in nature. The findings provide novel insights into the personality trait of agreeableness, emotional reactivity phenomena, and the dynamic processes that link agreeableness to emotion.

Individual differences in the neural representation of cooperation and competition

Much evidence links the Big Five’s agreeableness to a propensity for cooperation and aggressiveness to a propensity for competition. However, the neural basis for these associations is unknown. In this functional magnetic resonance imaging study, using multivariate pattern analysis of data recorded during a computer game in which participants were required to construct target patterns either in cooperation or in competition with another person, we sought to determine how individual differences in neural representations of cooperative and competitive behavior relate to individual differences in agreeableness and aggressiveness. During cooperation, agreeableness was positively correlated with the consistency of spatial patterns of neural activation in the left temporoparietal junction (TPJ) and showed positive correlations with inter-subject similarity in the dynamics of neural responses in the posterior default mode network hub and areas involved in the regulation of attention, movement planning, and visual perception. During competition, aggressiveness was positively correlated with the consistency of spatial patterns in the left and right TPJ and showed positive correlations with neural dynamics in visual processing and movement regulation areas. These results are consistent with the assumption that agreeable individuals are more involved in cooperative interactions with others, whereas aggression-prone individuals are more involved in competitive interactions.

Does personality matter? Exploring its moderating role on the relationship between neighbourhood ethnic outgroup-size and preferences for Brexit

ABSTRACT Prior research has examined the relationship between ethnic outgroup-size at the neighbourhood level and Brexit support, yet there is a lack of understanding on the factors that moderate these effects. This paper critically extends prior debate by focusing on how personality traits moderate not only the extent to which the levels (2011) of ethnic outgroup-size in individuals’ residential neighbourhoods but also the increase thereof (2001-2011) are associated with individuals’ preferences about the 2016 Brexit referendum. Using data from Understanding Society, we find that two personality traits, agreeableness and openness, are key moderators affecting the above-mentioned relationship. High-agreeable and high-open individuals are less likely than low-agreeable and low-open individuals to support Brexit. However, while the gap between low and highly agreeable individuals shrinks as ethnic outgroup-size increases, the gap widens between those higher vs. lower in openness. Our findings highlight the multifaceted role of personality traits as a driver of heterogeneous effects on political behaviour. In sum, this paper shows that analysing the complex and intertwined nature of both contextual and individual factors is fundamental for a better understanding, not only of the Brexit referendum but, more broadly, of anti-immigrant sentiment.

Who Is Interacting With Whom? Assessing the Relationship Between Personality Traits and Preferences for Interaction Partners in Real Life

Individuals have different preferences to interact with other persons. These preferences may vary depending on the personality of a person and the perceived personality of their interaction partner(s). Using ecological momentary assessment (EMA), we tested whether the perception of personality traits in others predicts participants’ preferences for social interactions in everyday life, and how these preferences are shaped by individual personality traits (extraversion, neuroticism, agreeableness) of the participants themselves. More specifically, we hypothesized that the preference to interact may increase if the interaction partner is perceived as extraverted and agreeable and may decrease if the other is perceived as scoring high on neuroticism. Based on mixed findings regarding preferences for similar vs. dissimilar personality profiles of interaction partners, we further expected interactions between participants’ personality and the interaction partners’ personality in relation to the preference to interact. To test these hypotheses, 130 participants answered up to six surveys on a smartphone on seven consecutive days. As predicted, higher levels of partner extraversion and agreeableness were related to increased preference to interact, while partner neuroticism showed the opposite effect. Similarly, participants scoring high on agreeableness showed higher and participants scoring high on neuroticism showed lower preferences to interact. Analyses regarding the interactions between the participants’ and the partners’ personality traits revealed that extraverts preferred other extraverts and agreeable individuals preferred interaction partners with perceived neuroticism. In conclusion, this study showed that the preference to interact with a person has a differential function depending on the personality traits of the interacting persons.

Risk Tolerance in Investment Decisions: Are Personality Traits the Real Triggers?

Purpose: Investment decisions of investors are strongly influenced by their risk tolerance. Previous research suggests that risk tolerance is influenced by various social, economic, demographic and psychological factors. This research aims to extend the investigative line of inquiry regarding the influence of one such psychological factor, that is, personality, on the risk tolerance of small investors without limiting their asset class or classifying them into any groups. Design/Methodology/Approach: A quantitative research method is used to measure personality traits and risk tolerance in the investment decisions of small investors in Kashmir. The study uses a structured questionnaire adopted in parts from various established scales to collect data from small investors. Correlations and multiple regression have been used to arrive at the results. Findings: Results of the study indicated that extrovert and open-to-experience individuals showed tolerance to risk. In contrast, conscientious, neurotic and agreeable individuals were risk-averse in the geographical location considered for this study. The results imply that financial advisors must consider the personality traits of investors when giving investment advice to small investors. Practical Implications: It becomes essential for financial planners and advisors to follow an investor-centric approach wherein they consider the personal characteristics of individuals when giving investment advice, and they must design the portfolios/investment avenues according to the investors’ personalities. The results of this study show that investors with different characters have different risk-taking capabilities, and a particular investor will feel comfortable investing in a specific risk-class asset. Originality/Value: There is no study or research about the influence of personality traits on risk tolerance in investment decisions in this particular geographical area, that is, Kashmir. Therefore, this study will contribute significantly towards understanding investor behaviour and help financial advisors and investment bankers suggest appropriate investment avenues.

Just Playing the Role of Good Study Participants? Evaluative Conditioning, Demand Compliance, and Agreeableness

Evaluative Conditioning (EC) is the change in liking of stimuli due to their co-occurrence with other valenced stimuli. Recent research has shown stronger EC effects for more agreeable individuals. Because EC procedures are prone to demand characteristics, we hypothesized that more agreeable individuals might simply play the role of good study participants and therefore show stronger EC effects. We tested this in two preregistered experiments (N = 700). In Experiment 1, self-reported Agreeableness and a behavioral measure of Demand Compliance moderated EC. However, Agreeableness and Demand Compliance were uncorrelated, and the moderations were independent. Experiment 2 used an instructional EC paradigm, showing only a moderation by Demand Compliance but not Agreeableness. Our studies imply that although EC effects are related to Demand Compliance, more agreeable participants are not more likely to comply with demand characteristics in EC experiments.

Do good things happen to good people? Agreeable individuals are more likely to be depressed under competition (¿Le pasan cosas buenas a la gente buena? Las personas agradables son más propensas a deprimirse en situaciones de competencia)

ABSTRACT There is no consistent conclusion on the relationship between agreeableness and depression, which may arise from researchers not adequately accounting for the influence of the social environment. At present, the world is a competitive world, between countries and between people. Therefore, the present study proposed that perceived competitiveness could moderate the relationship between agreeableness and depression. Furthermore, guilt may be an important mediating factor between agreeableness and depression. The present study explored these hypotheses using a Chinese sample (N = 602, 51% males, M = 21.73). The results indicated that agreeableness negatively predicted depression, but agreeable individuals were more likely to be depressed when they perceived high competitiveness. In addition, agreeableness can predict depression through the mediating role of guilt. When agreeable individuals live in a fiercely competitive environment, they will experience more guilt, which could lead to depression. Chinese culture values and respects agreeableness. However, good people will encounter a greater risk of depression when facing a competitive environment. Thus, the impact of the prevailing competitive environment on agreeable individuals’ mental health needs more attention.

0067 Dreams and Personality Influence Creativity

Abstract Introduction Theoretically, during dreaming, weak associations are explored, and information is combined in novel ways, which could lead to increased creativity during waking. However, little research has explored direct relationships between dreaming and objective measures of creativity and the ability to creatively solve problems. Furthermore, personality influences dream recall frequency (DRF) and other aspects of dreaming, suggesting that the relationship between dreaming and creativity may vary based on personality. The goal of the current experiment was to determine if DRF is related to creativity and creative problem-solving, and if these relationships are influenced by personality traits. Methods Seventy-six participants completed questionnaires about dreaming and the Big 5 personality traits (neuroticism, conscientiousness, openness, extraversion, agreeableness) and completed creativity and creative problem-solving tasks. Two tasks measured creativity. In one task, participants generated as many possible uses for an object as they could in one minute. In the other, they generated novel captions for five cartoons. Creative problem-solving was measured using two classic insight problem sets: the matchstick and compound remote associates tasks. Correlations were conducted to determine if DRF is related to any personality traits and multiple regressions were conducted to determine whether DRF or any personality traits predict creativity or creative problem-solving. Results DRF was negatively correlated with agreeableness, such that individuals higher in agreeableness recalled fewer dreams. The multiple regression analyses revealed that both DRF and conscientiousness are significant predictors of divergent thinking. Neither DRF nor any personality traits predicted creative problem-solving. Conclusion These results indicate that agreeableness reduces the frequency of dream recall, perhaps because agreeable individuals try to find problem solutions immediately while awake so they do not worry about them later. Consistent with current theories, frequently recalling dreams increased creativity, suggesting that the exploration of weak or novel relationships during dreaming increases creativity while awake. Conscientiousness also predicted creativity, suggesting that self-sufficient people tend to be more creative. However, frequently recalling dreams did not increase the ability to creatively solve problems. Collectively, these results suggest that personality influences dreaming behaviors and that frequent dreaming and conscientiousness promote creativity. Support (if any)

The democratic personality? The big five, authoritarianism and regime preference in consolidated democracies

Research frequently contends that support for democracy is a comparatively stable attitude. A previously neglected explanation for this finding is that regime preferences rest on deeply rooted psychological foundations. This article develops theoretical arguments about how the big five personality traits relate to democratic regime preferences in consolidated democracies, and presents empirical evidence using original survey data for six Western European countries. The results show that democratic regime support is substantively higher for more open, conscientious and agreeable individuals, but slightly lower for more extraverted and neurotic individuals. In addition, it highlights that it is important not to conflate support for democracy with authoritarianism, which the previous literature has frequently turned to for personality roots of anti-democratic sentiments. While authoritarianism also goes along with lower openness to experience, conscientiousness displays an opposite relationship, increasing pro-democratic attitudes but also individuals’ levels of authoritarianism. Thus, findings on authoritarianism should not be automatically translated to regime preferences.

How Personality and Communication Patterns Affect Online ad-hoc Teams Under Pressure.

Critical, time-bounded, and high-stress tasks, like incident response, have often been solved by teams that are cohesive, adaptable, and prepared. Although a fair share of the literature has explored the effect of personality on various other types of teams and tasks, little is known about how it contributes to teamwork when teams of strangers have to cooperate ad-hoc, fast, and efficiently. This study explores the dynamics between 120 crowd participants paired into 60 virtual dyads and their collaboration outcome during the execution of a high-pressure, time-bound task. Results show that the personality trait of Openness to experience may impact team performance with teams with higher minimum levels of Openness more likely to defuse the bomb on time. An analysis of communication patterns suggests that winners made more use of action and response statements. The team role was linked to the individual's preference of certain communication patterns and related to their perception of the collaboration quality. Highly agreeable individuals seemed to cope better with losing, and individuals in teams heterogeneous in Conscientiousness seemed to feel better about collaboration quality. Our results also suggest there may be some impact of gender on performance. As this study was exploratory in nature, follow-on studies are needed to confirm these results. We discuss how these findings can help the development of AI systems to aid the formation and support of crowdsourced remote emergency teams.

Socially desirable responding within the context of privacy-related research: A personality perspective

Background: Socially desirable responding within the context of self-reported surveys is a well-known and persistent problem that plagues quantitative studies. Such forms of responding are particularly problematic within the context of personality-based studies that investigate privacy-related decision-making. In such instances, certain respondents may feel pressured to provide socially desirable responses, which reduces the overall quality of the collected data.Objectives: The objective of this study was to evaluate the extent to which the Big Five personality traits (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism) elicit socially desirable responses within the context of privacy-related decision-making.Method: To evaluate their hypotheses, the authors empirically situate their study within the context of respondents’ intended use of Facebook privacy settings. To this end, 576 survey responses were analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).Results: It was found that some personality traits were indeed significantly related to socially desirable responding – albeit not always as expected. For example, highly agreeable individuals were unlikely to provide socially desirable responses: choosing honest responses. Neuroticism, on the other hand, had the opposite effect.Conclusion: Based on the results, the authors conclude that neurotic individuals seem predisposed towards responding in a socially desirable manner within the context of privacy-related surveys. The authors, therefore, advise researchers within the field of privacy-based personality studies to take care when analysing their results.

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Personality trait and subjective work experience fit (P-SWE fit) as an explanation for voluntary turnover

ABSTRACT The aim of the present study was to show that examining the interactions between personality traits and subjective work experience (SWE) can be an interesting approach to understanding turnover. During the months following their enlistment, 186 resigning and 77 nonresigning military personnel were questioned about six SWE dimensions. During the recruitment process, they had undergone a Big Five personality test. Logistic regression analyses were conducted to study the effects of personality and SWE on turnover. Binomial generalized linear models enabled us to identify interaction effects between personality traits and SWE. These showed that open individuals who feel a high level of specialty satisfaction are less likely to quit. Similarly, individuals with high levels of neuroticism or conscientiousness are more inclined to resign if the environment is perceived to be stressful. The same applies to agreeable individuals who have negative perceptions of their interpersonal relationships. This study highlights the complexity of voluntary turnover and the need to investigate the transactions between personality and contextual characteristics with nonlinear models.

Personality and early susceptibility to COVID-19 in the United Kingdom.

This paper takes advantage of a unique dataset with a prospectively longitudinal, nationally representative sample (n = 5,178) that began in 1958 and has information on COVID‐19 health status in 2020 to examine the effect of Big Five personality traits on compliance with social distancing requirements and contraction of COVID‐19. The results show some consistency with epidemiological recommendations (Conscientious individuals were more likely to maintain social distance and less likely to contract COVID‐19; men were less likely to comply and more likely to contract) but more inconsistency (Agreeable individuals were more likely to comply with social distancing requirements yet more likely to contract COVID‐19; Open and Neurotic individuals were no less likely to comply yet more likely to contract COVID‐19). The results highlight the importance of Big Five personality factors for behaviour in the global pandemic and may call into question the universal effectiveness of social distancing requirements for all individuals. However, the small number of confirmed cases of COVID‐19 during the early months of the pandemic requires caution in interpretation of the results. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement.

Personality-based normative feedback intervention for energy conservation

Residential sector is considered as a key to energy conservation due to its significant share and fast growth. Normative feedback has been widely implemented in residential sector for its low cost and high effectivity. However, the potential of energy saving generated from the method has not been fully achieved, as the influence of personality traits and benchmark setting strategy on individual behavioral response has been overlooked. Therefore, this paper incorporates personality traits into the analysis of individual behavior patterns, and proposes a personality-based normative feedback mechanism which optimizes the benchmarks setting strategy in real time by optimal control algorithm. The agent-based modelling method is adopted to develop improved Deffuant-optimal control (DOC) model and to simulate the personality-driven energy conservation of residents under the proposed intervention mechanism. The study finds that intervention effect of the dynamic benchmark setting strategy is superior to normative feedback with fixed benchmarks in terms of energy savings and response agility, and individuals with different personality traits are significantly different in behavioral characteristics. Increase in openness promotes the residents to save energy quickly, and agreeableness has an inverted U-shaped relationship with residents' response agility. Open-minded and agreeable individuals perform well in energy saving while showing stronger boomerang effect. In addition, residents are classified according to their behavioral response patterns and personality traits, in order to analyze the time-dependent response characteristics and boomerang effect of different groups of individuals. The DOC model is evaluated by energy conservation experiments conducted in residential communities of Hangzhou, China. The proposed intervention mechanism improves the effectivity of normative feedback in both short-term and long-term, and provides an innovation approach for optimizing energy demand side management.

Representation of social content in dorsomedial prefrontal cortex underlies individual differences in agreeableness trait

Personality traits reflect key aspects of individual variability in different psychological domains. Understanding the mechanisms that give rise to these differences requires an exhaustive investigation of the behaviors associated with such traits, and their underlying neural sources. Here we investigated the mechanisms underlying agreeableness, one of the five major dimensions of personality, which has been linked mainly to socio-cognitive functions. In particular, we examined whether individual differences in the neural representations of social information are related to differences in agreeableness of individuals. To this end, we adopted a multivariate representational similarity approach that captured within single individuals the activation pattern similarity of social and non-social content, and tested its relation to the agreeableness trait in a hypothesis-driven manner. The main result confirmed our prediction: processing social and non-social content led to similar patterns of activation in individuals with low agreeableness, while in more agreeable individuals these patterns were more dissimilar. Critically, this association between agreeableness and encoding similarity of social and random content was significant only in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, a brain region consistently involved during attributions of mental states. The present finding reveals the link between neural mechanisms underlying social information processing and agreeableness, a personality trait highly related to socio-cognitive abilities, thereby providing a step forward in characterizing its neural determinants. Furthermore, it emphasizes the advantage of multivariate pattern analysis approaches in capturing and understanding the neural sources of individual variations.

Overeducation and wages: the role of cognitive skills and personality traits

ABSTRACT This article investigates the extent to which personality traits and cognitive skills can be seen as potential determinants of overeducation, and can explain the overeducation wage penalty. Using a representative survey of the Polish working-age population with well-established measures of cognitive skills and personality traits, I find that accounting for personality and cognitive skills does not change the size and the statistical significance of overeducation wage penalty estimates. My results also demonstrate that personality is one of the contributors to the risk of being overeducated among workers aged 18–29, but not among workers aged 30–68. Among younger workers, agreeable individuals are more likely to be overeducated, while conscientious individuals are less likely to be overeducated. Moreover, lower numeracy skills are associated with higher probability of being overeducated.

The role of personality in the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of students in Germany during the first weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic.

We examined how the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of 6,957 students from Germany, assessed between March 16 and April 21, 2020, when COVID-19 became a serious health concern in Germany, varied by personality. The Big Five personality traits—openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and emotional stability—were assessed with the International Personality Item Pool. Students were asked whether they kept up with the COVID-19 news, followed specific governmental rules and recommendations (washing hands more, using public transport less, avoiding larger crowds, and restricting meetings with family/friends), hoarded supplies, felt less secure in public places, or expected financial losses due to the crisis. Logistic regressions adjusted for sociodemographic factors and cognitive abilities revealed that more conscientious (odds ratio (OR) = 1.133) and more agreeable (OR = 1.285) students kept up with the news more. More agreeable students were also more likely to wash their hands more often/intensively (OR = 1.262), use public transport less (OR = 1.182), avoid crowds (OR = 1.320), and restrict meetings with family/friends (OR = 1.410). Other Big Five traits were not associated with these behaviors, except that less emotionally stable individuals tended to use public transport less often (OR = 1.162). Additionally, less emotionally stable students, in particular, more often bought more supplies than usual (OR = 1.322), felt insecure in public spaces (OR = 1.597), and expected financial losses (OR = 1.270). Moreover, less open (OR = 0.876) and more conscientious (OR = 1.235) students more often felt insecure in public spaces, and more extraverted individuals more often expected financial losses (OR = 1.180). Taken together, our findings suggest that more agreeable individuals, in particular, tend to comply with governmental rules and recommendations to fight COVID-19, whereas less emotionally stable individuals, in particular, tend to hoard supplies, feel insecure, and fear financial losses due to the crisis.

Taking the ups and downs at the rollercoaster of love: Associations between major life events in the domain of romantic relationships and the Big Five personality traits.

Personality predicts how we interact with others, what partners we have, and how happy and lasting our romantic relationships are. At the same time, our experiences in these relationships may affect our personality. Who experiences specific major relationship events, and how do these events relate to personality development? We examined this issue based on data from a nationally representative household panel study from Germany (N = 49,932). In this study, the occurrence of major relationship events (moving in with a partner, marriage, separation, and divorce) was assessed yearly, and the Big Five personality traits were measured repeatedly in 2005, 2009, 2013, and 2017 with the short version of the Big Five Inventory. We applied multilevel analyses to simultaneously model selection effects as well as different types of personality changes in the years before and after these events in the total sample and separately in women and men. Our findings revealed that less agreeable individuals were more likely to experience each of the examined relationship events. Moreover, each event was associated with personality changes, which only occurred after (not before) these events and considerably varied by event and gender. Individuals who moved in with a partner, got married, or separated from a partner primarily experienced changes in openness in the first year thereafter, and individuals who separated from a partner or got divorced became less emotionally stable in the following years. However, there was little evidence for "maturation" effects, except that individuals who moved in with a partner (especially men) became more conscientious in the following years. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).