Differences In Personality Development Research Articles

Subjective experiences of life events match individual differences in personality development.

The last 2 decades have witnessed increased research on the role of life events in personality trait development, but few findings appear to be robust. We propose that a key to resolving this issue is incorporating individuals' subjective experiences into the study of event-related development. To test this, we developed and administered a survey about event-related personality change to a representative Dutch sample (N = 5,513, Ages 16-95) and linked their responses to 12-year trajectories of measured Big Five development. Most participants (63%) believed that a life event impacted their personality in the past 10 years, on average 5 years presurvey. These participants, even those who experienced the same event, had markedly heterogenous perceptions of how their traits changed and why each event affected their personality. In preregistered analyses, we examined participants' individual personality trajectories before and after the event that they identified as most impactful. Across events, retrospective perceptions of event-related personality change were significantly correlated with short-term and long-term postevent personality trajectories across Big Five traits (mean rs = .22, .28) and preevent trajectories in all traits except agreeableness (mean r = .16). We also found correspondence between perceived and measured development in analyses of the two most commonly reported personality-changing events: health problems and death of a loved one/family member. Finally, we explored associations between personality development and perceived change-inducing event characteristics. Using these findings, we argue that future research into event-related personality development should de-emphasize mean-level change to focus on individuals' varied experiences of whether, when, how, and why life events have affected their personality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Supplemental Material for Subjective Experiences of Life Events Match Individual Differences in Personality Development

Supplemental Material for Subjective Experiences of Life Events Match Individual Differences in Personality Development

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT AMONG CHILDREN STUDYING IN VERNACULAR MEDIUM SCHOOLS IN GUJARAT

The purpose of the paper is to examine if gender is playing any role in the personality development of a child studying in a vernacular medium school. The authors collected the data from children studying in 6th, 7th and 8th classes at 10 vernacular medium i.e., Gujarati medium schools in Gandhinagar district of Gujarat. From each class, 20 students i.e., 60 students per school were randomly requested to fill in the core-self evaluation questionnaire. A total of 600 responses were collected. The impact of gender on personality development was tested using ANOVA (Analysis of variance). The findings show that gender differences do not exist in terms of personality development among school children studying in vernacular medium. The findings of this paper are in complete consonance with the numerous studies highlighting the little or no gender differences in personality development in children.

Developmental trajectories of Big Five personality traits among adolescents and young adults: Differences by sex, alcohol use, and marijuana use.

Individual differences in adolescent personality are related to a variety of long-term health outcomes. While previous studies have demonstrated sex differences and non-linear changes in personality development, these results remain equivocal. The current study utilized longitudinal data (n=831) from the National Consortium on Alcohol and Neurodevelopment in Adolescence to examine sex differences in the development of personality and the association between substance use and personality. Participants (ages 12-21 at baseline) completed the Ten-Item Personality Inventory and self-reported past year alcohol and marijuana use at up to 7 yearly visits. Data were analyzed using generalized additive mixed-effects models and linear mixed-effects models. Findings support linear increases in agreeableness and conscientious and decreases in openness with age and inform on timing of sex-specific non-linear development of extraversion and emotional stability. Further, results provide novel information regarding the timing of the association between substance use and personality, and replicate past reporting of differential associations between alcohol and marijuana use and extraversion, and sex-dependent effects of marijuana use on emotional stability. These findings highlight the importance of modeling sex differences in personality development using flexible non-linear modeling strategies, and accounting for sex- and age-specific effects of alcohol and marijuana use.

Confronting Age, Technology, and My Inferior Function

Ever since Jung wrote Psychological Types, analysts and laymen alike have attempted to apply his theory, in a non-pathologizing way, to better understand differences in personality development. Jung proposed two attitudes (introvert and extravert) and four functions (thinking and feeling; intuition and sensation). He claimed that one function dominated, while the others were less developed, i.e., less conscious. The least developed he called the inferior function, and claimed that it was the source of much distress in a person’s life; however, it also carried the potential for wholeness. This article describes how the author experienced her inferior function on a trip which demanded its constant use. Though humbled by it, she also gained an intimate understanding of why analyst John Beebe believes that the shadow of the inferior function carries the demon/daimon archetype, and why Jung suggested that through our struggle with the inferior function we glimpse wholeness, or God.

Offspring Personality Mediates the Association between Maternal Depression and Childhood Psychopathology.

Offspring of mothers diagnosed with major depression are at increased risk for a wide range of psychological problems. Previous research has shown that individual differences in personality development can be informative for predicting risk and resilience to psychopathology, especially within at-risk populations. In the present study, we examined whether individual differences in offspring personality development during early to middle childhood could account for the association between maternal depression and offspring behavior problems later in childhood. Participants included 64 offspring of mothers diagnosed with major depression and 68 offspring of healthy comparison mothers. Personality was assessed via parent report at ages 3, 4, 5, and 9. Offspring internalizing and externalizing symptoms were assessed at age 9 via parent and teacher report. Results of latent growth curve models indicated that offspring Neuroticism, Conscientiousness, and Agreeableness mediated the link between early maternal depression and later childhood behavior problems, though results varied across maternal and teacher reports. Findings suggest that individual differences in youth personality and personality development are important predictors of emerging psychopathology among offspring of mothers diagnosed with depression.

Personality development through natural language.

Ego level is a broad construct that summarizes individual differences in personality development 1 . We examine ego level as it is represented in natural language, using a composite sample of four datasets comprising nearly 44,000 responses. We find support for a developmental sequence in the structure of correlations between ego levels, in analyses of Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) categories 2 and in an examination of the individual words that are characteristic of each level. The LIWC analyses reveal increasing complexity and, to some extent, increasing breadth of perspective with higher levels of development. The characteristic language of each ego level suggests, for example, a shift from consummatory to appetitive desires at the lowest stages, a dawning of doubt at the Self-aware stage, the centrality of achievement motivation at the Conscientious stage, an increase in mutuality and intellectual growth at the Individualistic stage and some renegotiation of life goals and reflection on identity at the highest levels of development. Continuing empirical analysis of ego level and language will provide a deeper understanding of ego development, its relationship with other models of personality and individual differences, and its utility in characterizing people, texts and the cultural contexts that produce them.

Personality Development since Childhood Associated with Adult Chronic Insomnia: A Study by Wang’s Memory-Tracing Personality Development Inventory (WMPI)

<p><strong>OBJECTIVE: </strong>This study aimed to analyze the deviation in normal personality development in chronic insomnia patients.</p><p><strong>MATERIAL & METHODS:</strong> Eighty-one patients with chronic insomnia and 290 healthy controls were assessed with Wang’s Memory Tracing Personality Development Inventory (WMPI). Differences between the two groups were explored to identify developmental characteristics.</p><p><strong>RESULTS:</strong> Significant differences were found in three phases. During the chronological ages of 3-6 years old, the differences are relatively minor, and manifest in a lower independence level in patients (p<0.05). In older individuals, personality development deficits present mainly as abnormal thinking, excessive interpersonal anxiety, and less independence (p<0.05). Subjects of different ages present with their own developmental characteristics. Generally, patients younger than 36 years of age had a lower developmental level in independence and across emotional dimensions. In summary, there are significant differences in personality development between primary insomniacs and healthy controls (p<0.05).</p><p><strong>CONCLUSION: </strong>Individuals are prone to develop chronic insomnia in adulthood if they exhibit a deviation from normal, or expected, personality development while in childhood. Abnormal development of personality correlates with the incidence of chronic insomnia. Subjects with lower independence in self-cognition tend to pursue perfectionism which may associate with a predisposition for chronic insomnia. Patients at different ages present different characteristics in personality development.</p>

Divorce and personality development across middle adulthood

AbstractThis study tested whether divorce helps explain individual differences in personality development in the years that follow a divorce. The sample consisted of 526 middle‐aged adults aged 42–46 years at the beginning. Personality traits were measured using the NEO‐Five‐Factor Inventory at three measurement occasions over 12 years. First, personality development was characterized by individual differences in change. Second, those individuals who experienced a divorce showed a decrease in extraversion and positive affect over time although nondivorced individuals did not change on these traits. Third, divorce was associated with a decrease in dependability. Fourth, divorce was associated with a decrease in orderliness for individuals who were remarried. The results of this study indicated that divorce had little influence on personality development.

Subjective Age and Personality Development: A 10-Year Study

Personality theory and research typically focus on chronological age as a key indicator of personality development. This study examines whether the subjective experience of age is an alternative marker of the biomedical and psychosocial factors that contribute to individual differences in personality development. The present study uses data from the Midlife in the United States longitudinal survey (N = 3,617) to examine how subjective age is associated with stability and change in personality and the dynamic associations between subjective age and personality traits over a 10-year period. Regression analyses indicated that a younger subjective age at baseline was associated with increases in Openness, Conscientiousness, and Agreeableness; correlated changes were also found. The rank-order stability of Extraversion and Openness and overall profile consistency were higher among those with a younger subjective age at baseline and were also associated with the rate of subjective aging over time. The present study reveals that beyond chronological age, the age an individual feels is related to changes in characteristic ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving over time.

Nature and Nurture in Personality Development

The stability of interindividual differences (i.e., rank-order continuity) in personality traits tends to increase with age until it plateaus in middle adulthood and finally decreases in old age. Rank-order continuity also tends to decrease as the time intervals between occasions of personality assessment increase, irrespective of age. These patterns show that personality development is a lifelong process. Yet the sources of these patterns are unknown. Theories suggest that personality continuity and change may result from environmentally mediated processes of identity development due to age-graded social roles and individual life experiences, but also from biological maturation. Genetically informative longitudinal studies across different age cohorts allow a differentiated picture of genetic and environmental sources. In this article, I give a short overview of the genetic and environmental contributions to rank-order continuity and change in neuroticism and extraversion. Both genetic and environmental factors contribute to personality continuity and change, but genetic factors affect rank-order change only in younger decades of life, whereas environmental influences appear to represent a lifelong source of interindividual differences in personality development.

A random walk down university avenue: Life paths, life events, and personality trait change at the transition to university life.

This longitudinal study examined the relation between continuity and change in the Big Five personality traits and life events. Approximately 2,000 German students were tracked from high school to university or to vocational training or work, with 3 assessments over 4 years. Life events were reported retrospectively at the 2nd and 3rd assessment. Latent curve analyses were used to assess change in personality traits, revealing 3 main findings. First, mean-level changes in the Big Five factors over the 4 years were in line with the maturity principle, indicating increasing psychological maturity from adolescence to young adulthood. Second, personality development was characterized by substantive individual differences relating to the life path followed; participants on a more vocationally oriented path showed higher increases in conscientiousness and lower increases in agreeableness than their peers at university. Third, initial level and change in the Big Five factors (especially Neuroticism and Extraversion) were linked to the occurrence of aggregated as well as single positive and negative life events. The analyses suggest that individual differences in personality development are associated with life transitions and individual life experiences.

Relationships Matter in Personality Development: Evidence From an 8‐Year Longitudinal Study Across Young Adulthood

Personality-relationship transactions were investigated in a general population sample of young German adults with three assessments over 8 years. Four general findings were obtained. First, personality development was characterized by substantive individual differences in change. Second, bivariate latent growth models indicated that individual differences in personality change were substantially associated with change in peer and family relationships. Third, forming a partner relationship for the first time moderated the maturation of personality. This finding was replicated over two subsequent time intervals with independent subgroups. Fourth, higher neuroticism and higher sociability predicted which of the singles began a partner relationship during the next 8 years. The results confirm that individual differences in personality development predict and result from life transitions and relationship experiences.

Attachment Theory: Retrospect and Prospect

This chapter has several major aims. The first is to provide an overview of attachment theory as presented by John Bowlby in the three volumes of Attachment and Loss (1969/1982b, 1973, 1980), giving special emphasis to two major ideas: (1) attachment as grounded in a motivational-behavioral control system that is preferentially responsive to a small number of familiar caregiving figures and (2) the construction of complementary internal working models of attachment figures and of the self through which the history of specific attachment relationships is integrated into the personality structure. These two concepts, but especially the notion of internal working models, will be used in the second section of the chapter to interpret refinements and elaborations of the theory that have been primarily the result of the work and influence of Mary Ainsworth. Topics discussed are maternal and infant contributions to the quality of attachment relationships, stability and change in the quality of attachment relationships, carryover effects from earlier to later relationships, and intergenerational transmission of attachment patterns as an intracultural and cross-cultural phenomenon. An attempt is made to clarify a variety of theoretical points and to discuss others that remain to be clarified. Finally, I consider how recent insights into the development of socioemotional understanding and the development of event representation can be integrated into attachment theory to shed new light on the origins of individual differences in personality development. In doing so, I have also attempted to provide a framework for the studies presented in this volume.

The first abortion - and the last? A study of the personality factors underlying repeated failure of contraception

The causes leading to a second abortion were outlined in a psychological study comparing 30 women expecting a second abortion with 29 women who had successfully prevented conception after a first abortion. It was found that both groups improved their contraceptive practices after the first abortion. However, while the latter group continued with their improved practices, the former group went back to the earlier inefficient or non-existent contraceptive behavior. The inability to improve contraception in the long run was not related to differences in educational level or knowledge about contraceptive techniques but to the developmental level of personality structures. The women expecting their second abortion rated lower in control of impulsivity, emotional balance, realism, self-esteem and stability of life as well as capacity for more integrated personal relationships. The differences in personality development and consequently in the capacity for long-term contraception were found to be due to growth conditions in childhood.

The importance of inner and outer body parts attitudes in the self-concept of late adolescents

The differential roles of inner and outer body parts attitudes in predicting the self-concepts of late adolescents (107 female and 72 male undergraduates) were assessed in order to test derivations from Erikson's notions (1964) about sex differences in the import of inner and out body “space” for personality. To assess knowledge about inner body space, subjects drew and labeled their internal body parts within an asexual frontal outline figure. Affect associated with internal and external body parts was assessed by rating 36 body characteristics in terms of their importance in making subjects attractive, effective people. Subjects responded also to a short self-concept scale. Females demonstrated greater knowledge of their inner body and attached generally higher levels of importance to their internal (and external) body parts than did males. However, completely opposite to the tested Eriksonian notions, inner body parts attitudes predicted self-concepts for males, but not for females. Moreover, more external than internal body parts were significant predictors of females' self-concepts, and the former parts accounted for more variance in self-concept than the latter ones. The results are interpreted to speak against theories which attempt to dichotomize the source of sex differences in personality development into either biologically or societally based contributions.

Personality characteristics of physically impaired adolescents.

Investigated MMPI profile differences between disabled and nondisabled (normals). Comparison of mean raw scores on the MMPI was made by t-tests. A preliminary analysis that compared adolescents with congenital versus traumatic impairment yielded only one significant finding: Scale O (Si) (p is less than .05) for females with congenital impairment. Subsequently, after the congenital and traumatic groups for each sex were combined, t-tests were computed on mean raw scores of the MMPI for each scale between the disabled and nondisabled adolescent groups. The profile patterns of the disabled groups for both sexes were similar; however, the male disabled adolescents had significantly higher scores on Scales 1, 2, 5, 8 and 9, while the disabled female adolescents had significantly higher scores on Scales F, 1, 6, 7, 8 and 9. Inspection of the profiles revealed minimal sex differences among the disabled groups. It was suggested that the common factor of moderate to severe chronic physical impairment may serve to reduce normative sex differences in personality development at least as reflected by the MMPI.

SEX-ROLE AND PARENTAL IDENTIFICATION

It is doubtful that psychological theories have fully posed much less resolved the question of the extent of sex differences in personality development. In this connection Sarason et al. comment: No one to our knowledge has denied they [such sex differences] are pervasive, and yet the problem of degree of pervasiveness has not been critically examined despite its implications for theory, methodology, and the direction of future research (23, p. 260). A perusal of the journals shows that many studies, which include both male and female Ss in the sample, do not make provisions for sex differences in the hypotheses. Where sex differences are found they are, consequently, rationalized post facto. Moreover, often no statistical analysis of sex differences is performed, despite their importance in psychological processes. This paper presents a theoretical formulation which postulates basic sex differences in the nature of sex-role and parental identification, as well as basic differences in the process of achieving such identification. The developmental processes described are considered neither inevitable nor universal. If they are appropriate to the U. S. culture today, they may, nevertheless, be inappropriate for many other cultures and for a significantly altered U. S. culture of the future. This formulation refers to the typical pattern, although recognizing that a typical pattern, if not a myth, is at least an exception. Research findings considered relevant to this formulation are reviewed.