Human personality is a very heterogeneous term and hence there are multiple distinctly different definitions of “personality” in the psychology literature.
[15] Allport FH. Teleonomic description in the study of personality. Journal of Personality. 1937 Mar 1;5(3):202-14.
McClelland (1951), defined personality as “the most adequate conceptualization of a person’s behavior in all its detail”.
[16] Boyatzis RE. Competencies in the 21st century. Journal of management development. 2008 Jan 4;27(1):5-12.
Menninger (1953) proposed it as “the individual as a whole, his height and weight and love and hates and blood pressure and reflexes; his smiles and hopes. It means all that anyone is and that he is trying to become.”
[17] Klein GS. The Menninger Foundation research on perception and personality, 1947-1952: a review. Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic. 1953 May 1;17(3):93.
Sarason (1966) defined, “personality as an area of investigation rather than as an entity, real or hypothetical”.
[18] Sarason IG, Smith RE, Diener E. Personality research: Components of variance attributable to the person and the situation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1975 Aug;32(2):199.
Byrne (1974) defined personality as “psychology’s garbage bin such that any research which doesn’t fit other existing categories”.
[19] Byrne D. An introduction to personality: Research, theory, and applications.. Prentice-Hall; 1974.
Hall and Lindzey (1970) in their book, “Theories of Personality”, proposed that “it is their conviction that no substantive definition of personality can be applied with any generality”.
[20] Hall CS, Lindzey G. Theories of personality.
[21] Lindzey GE, Hall CS. Theories of personality: Primary sources and research.
McCrae and Costa (1990) defined personality as “Dimensions of individual differences in tendencies to show consistent patterns of thoughts, feelings and actions”.
[22] Costa Jr PT, McCrae RR. Personality disorders and the five-factor model of personality. Journal of personality disorders. 1990 Dec;4(4):362-71.
Another practical definition could be “Personality may be defined as an individual’s unique constellation of psychological traits and states and hence, personality assessment includes the measurement of traits and states.”
[23] Cohen RJ, Montague P, Nathanson LS, Swerdlik ME. Psychological testing: An introduction to tests & measurement. Mayfield Publishing Co; 1988.
Before proceeding further ,we must acquaint ourselves with terms like ‘traits’, ‘types’ and ‘states’.
PERSONALITY TRAITS
Oxford dictionary defines ‘trait’ as a distinguishing quality or characteristic, typically one belonging to a person. The word trait is derived from a Latin word ‘tractus’. An early sense was ‘stroke of the pen or pencil in a picture’, giving rise to the sense of a particular feature of mind or character’ (mid 18th century).
The description and assessment of personality relies heavily on trait terms (such as “warm,” “reserved,” “trusting,” and “imaginative”). Intellectuals such as Gordon Allport (1937) have proposed to view personality traits as real physical entities that are “bonafide mental structures in each personality”.
[24] Zuroff DC. Was Gordon Allport a trait theorist?. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1986 Nov;51(5):993.
Raymond Cattell (1950) also conceptualized traits as “mental structures,” but according to him “structure” did not imply actual physical status.
[25] Cattell RB, Heist AB, Heist PA, Stewart RG. The objective measurement of dynamic traits. Educational and Psychological Measurement. 1950 Jul 1;10(2):223-47.
Guilford (1959), defined trait as “any distinguishable, relatively enduring way in which one individual differs from another.”
[26] Guilford JP. Factors and factors of personality. Psychological Bulletin. 1975 Sep;82(5):802.
The term ‘relatively’ was used as a qualifier to emphasize that it was very difficult to predict precisely, how a particular trait manifests itself, which to some extent, is situation-dependent, eg. Paul may be viewed as “dull” and “cheap” by his wife but as “charismatic” and “spendthrift” by his secretary.
Allport (1937) addressed the issue of consistency across-situations or lack of it-as follows, “Perfect consistency will never be found and must not be expected as people tend to be ascendant and submissive only towards those bearing traditional symbols of authority and prestige and aggressive towards others. The ever changing environment leads to surfacing of one trait now and another later to a state of active tension.”
[15] Allport FH. Teleonomic description in the study of personality. Journal of Personality. 1937 Mar 1;5(3):202-14.
Research demonstrating a lack of cross—situational consistency in traits such as honesty [27] Beck L, Ajzen I. Predicting dishonest actions using the theory of planned behavior. Journal of research in personality. 1991 Sep 30;25(3):285-301. punctuality [28] Dudycha GJ. An objective study of punctuality in relation to personality and achievement. Columbia university; 1936.conformity [29] Hollander EP, Willis RH. Some current issues in the psychology of conformity and nonconformity. Psychological Bulletin. 1967 Jul;68(1):62.[30] attitude toward authority[31] Burwen LS, Campbell DT. The generality of attitudes toward authority and nonauthority figures. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. 1957 Jan;54(1):24. are the types of studies typically quoted by those who have been critical of the concept of traits in personality theory.
PERSONALITY STATES
The term ‘state’ refers to the brief display of some trait. In other words, the use of the word “trait” presupposes a relatively enduring behavioral disposition, while the term “state” is indicative of a relatively temporary predisposition.
[32] Huang JL, RYAN A. Beyond personality traits: A study of personality states and situational contingencies in customer service jobs. Personnel Psychology. 2011 Jun 1;64(2):451-88.
[33] Bleidorn W. Linking personality states, current social roles and major life goals. European Journal of Personality. 2009 Oct 1;23(6):509-30.
Thus, for example, Susan may be in an anxious state before her exams, although trait wise she is described as a confident girl.
PERSONALITY TYPES
Personality types refer to the psychological classification of different types of individuals. Types are said to involve qualitative differences between people, whereas traits might be construed as quantitative differences.
[34] Cloninger CR, Bayon C, Svrakic DM. Measurement of temperament and character in mood disorders: a model of fundamental states as personality types. Journal of affective disorders. 1998 Oct 1;51(1):21-32.
According to type theories, introverts and extraverts are two fundamentally different categories of people while according to trait theories, introversion and extraversion are part of a continuous dimension, with many people in the middle. Perhaps the most primitive personality typology was the humoral theory of Hippocrates which proposed four humours black bile (melaina chole), yellow bile (chole), phlegm (phlegma), and blood. [6] Clark LA, Watson D. Temperament: A new paradigm for trait psychology. Handbook of personality: Theory and research. 1999;2:399-423.
Then Centuries later, the personality theorist Alfred Adler would differentiate personality types in a way that represented different combinations of social interests in the form of Ruling type, Getting type, Avoiding type and Good man type.
[35] Ewen R. An introduction to theories of personality. Psychology Press; 2014 Jan 21.
Another personality theorist, William Sheldon and his associates
[36] Sheldon WH, Stevens SS. The varieties of temperament; a psychology of constitutional differences.
[37] Hunt EE. Measures of adiposity and muscularity in man: some comparisons by factor analysis. Techniques for measuring body composition. National Academy of Science-National Research Council, Washington. 1961:192-211.
proposed a personality typology based on body built- the Endomorph, the Mesomorph, and Ectomorph. These body types were associated with specific predispositions and temperaments. The Endomorph, for example, was said to have a “viscerotonic” disposition, which implied, among other things, a love of good food and good company and general even-temperedness. The Mesomorph is “somatotonic” action-oriented, adventuresome, and dominating, among other things. The Ectomorph is “cerebrotonic” which is physically and emotionally restrained, future-oriented, and introverted.
THEORIES OF PERSONALITY
Before more sophisticated psychological theories of personality were published, the ancient Greeks (circa. 460 BCE) had drawn attention to inherited “humours” that bears some relation to endocrine secretion. This gave rise to four descriptive terms of personality: sanguine, melancholic, choleric and phlegmatic.
[6] Clark LA, Watson D. Temperament: A new paradigm for trait psychology. Handbook of personality: Theory and research. 1999;2:399-423.
PSYCHOLOGICAL THEORIES OF PERSONALITY
1. Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory (1940) emphasised the importance of early-childhood development and the constant inter-play among an individual’s motives, drives, needs and conflicts as played out by the Id, Ego and Superego. [38] Hale Jr NG. The rise and crisis of psychoanalysis in the United States: Freud and the Americans, 1917–1985. Oxford University Press; 1995.
2. Roger’s Phenomenological Theory (1947), stressed on the understanding of how the individual experiences the world around them and experiences their self. Deviating from Freudian notions of conflict as a motivator, Rogers concentrated on the need of individuals to self-actualise as motivation for behaviour. [39] Smith MB. The phenomenological approach in personality theory: some critical remarks. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. 1950 Jul;45(3):516.
3. In Personal Construct Theory, (Kelly 1955), the basic contention was that how people choose to perceive, interpret and conceptualise the world. [40] Kelly G. Personal construct psychology.
4. Behavioural Approaches to personality- Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning, [41] Aleksandrova-Howell M, Abramson CI, Craig DP. Coverage of Russian psychological contributions in American psychology textbooks. international Journal of Psychology. 2012 Feb 1;47(1):76-87.Skinner’s Operant Conditioning (1974) [42] Delprato DJ, Midgley BD. Some fundamentals of BF Skinner’s behaviorism. American Psychologist. 1992 Nov;47(11):1507.and Dollar and Miller’s (1950) Stimulus-Response Theory, [43] Miller G. Human memory and the storage of information. IRE Transactions on Information Theory. 1956 Sep;2(3):129-37. all emphasised learning and testing of individual hypotheses in many situations. However, it was noticed that there was a tendency for behavioural approaches to be too simplistic and not taking into account the mental processes at play within individuals.
5. Social-Cognitive approaches to personality- Bandura’s (1977) and Mischel’s (1994) social-cognitive approaches [44] Bandura A. Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological review. 1977 Mar;84(2):191
[45] .Mischel W, Shoda Y. A cognitive-affective system theory of personality: reconceptualizing situations, dispositions, dynamics, and invariance in personality structure. Psychological review. 1995 Apr;102(2):246.retain the learning aspect of behaviour, but removed the issue of rewards (thus learning without rewards).
6. Cognitive approaches to personality by Ellis (1975), Beck (1991), Nelson et al and Ducharme focussed even more strongly on mental processes, especially on how people store and retrieve information and perceives the world around them through hierarchical mental models.
[46] Ellis A. Rational-emotive therapy: Research data that supports the clinical and personality hypotheses of RET and other modes of cognitive-behavior therapy. The Counseling Psychologist. 1977 Mar 1;7(1):2-42.
[47] .Beck AT. Cognitive therapy: A 30-year retrospective. American psychologist. 1991 Apr;46(4):368.
[48] Nelson-Gray RO, Huprich SK, Kissling GE, Ketchum K. A preliminary examination of Beck’s cognitive theory of personality disorders in undergraduate analogues. Personality and Individual Differences. 2004 Jan 31;36(1):219-33.
[49]. Ducharme MJ. The Cognitive-Behavioral Approach to Executive Coaching. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research. 2004;56(4):214.
THE TAXONOMY OF BIG FIVE TRAITS
Taxonomy is a systematic framework for distinguishing, ordering, and naming types and groups within a subject field. [50] John OP, Angleitner A, Ostendorf F. The lexical approach to personality: A historical review of trait taxonomic research. European journal of Personality. 1988 Sep 1;2(3):171-203.
It permits researchers to study specified classes of instances, instead of examining separately every individual instance, and it serves to facilitate the communication and accumulation of empirical findings about these classes and their instances by offering a standard nomenclature. Personality psychologists have long been trying to establish a system that can conveniently describe human personality with the intent to use this system in improving general understanding of personality and thereafter its disorders. One of the most acceptable models is what is known as the Digman’s (1990) Five-factor model of personality [51] Digman JM. Personality structure: Emergence of the five-factor model. Annual review of psychology. 1990 Feb;41(1):417-40. which incorporates five different variables often referred to as the “Big 5”. The five factors were extroversion, Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and openness [52] Ewen RB. Personality: A Topical Approach-Theories, Research, Major Controversies, and Emerging Findings. Psychology Press; 1998 Mar 1. Digman (1990) was a strong proponent of the five-factor theory being the most wholesome model for the description and practical application of personality, however there appeared a need for these factors to be clearly defined in order to describe personality. Indeed, this process led to some differences in which H. J. Eysenck, a renowned psychologist dissented from the five-factor theory. Eysenck (1991) instead proposed a three factor model as he felt that there was a considerable overlap in the five factors and their correlates. His theory was called the PEN model (which stand for psychoticism, extroversion, Neuroticism) [53] Costa PT, McCrae RR. Primary traits of Eysenck’s PEN system: three-and five-factor solutions. Journal of personality and social psychology. 1995 Aug;69(2):308.or sometimes is even shortened to the two factor E-IN model (extroversion-introversion, Neuroticism). There were many supporters of PEN model; however the Big Five model dominates the field of current psychological research.
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The Approach and Discovery of the Big Five
The lexical hypothesis is a widely used guiding theory in personality psychology which suggests that enquiring about the everyday psychological ideas that people perceives of themselves and of other individuals could be a suitable method for the scientific measurement of personality.
[54] Block J. The five-factor framing of personality and beyond: Some ruminations. Psychological Inquiry. 2010 Feb 26;21(1):2-5.
[55] Westen D, Shedler J. A prototype matching approach to diagnosing personality disorders: Toward DSM-V. Journal of personality disorders. 2000 Jun 1;14(2):109.
[56] Uher J. Personality psychology: Lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts reveal only half of the story—Why it is time for a paradigm shift. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science. 2013 Mar 1;47(1):1-55.
The Lexical hypothesis is defined by two postulates. The first states that those personality characteristics that are most important in people’s lives will eventually become a part of their language. The second follows from the first, stating that more important personality characteristics are more likely to be encoded into language as a single word.[50] John OP, Angleitner A, Ostendorf F. The lexical approach to personality: A historical review of trait taxonomic research. European journal of Personality. 1988 Sep 1;2(3):171-203. Klages (1926), Baumgarten (1933) and Allport and Odbert (1936), resorted to the natural language as a source of markers for a scientific taxonomy. Thus, the personality vocabulary of a natural language provided an extensive set of attributes. [57] Hofstee WK, De Raad B, Goldberg LR. Integration of the big five and circumplex approaches to trait structure. Journal of personality and social psychology. 1992 Jul;63(1):146.
Allport and Odbert (1936) conducted a very exhaustive and influential lexical study of the personality-relevant terms in an unabridged English dictionary.[58] Allport GW, Odbert HS. Trait-names: A psycho-lexical study. Psychological monographs. 1936;47(1):i. They included all the terms that could be used to “distinguish the behavior of one human being from that of another” which amounted to almost 18,000 terms. Keeping in mind that dealing with such huge number is not feasible; Allport and Odbert (1936) tried to bring some order by classifying them into four major categories. .[50] John OP, Angleitner A, Ostendorf F. The lexical approach to personality: A historical review of trait taxonomic research. European journal of Personality. 1988 Sep 1;2(3):171-203.
a) Personality traits (e.g., sociable, aggressive, and fearful), which they defined as “generalized and personalized determining tendencies–consistent and stable modes of an individual’s adjustment to his environment”.
b) Moods, activities and temporary states, such as afraid, rejoicing and elation.
c) Highly evaluative judgments of personal conduct and reputation, such as excellent, worthy, average, and irritating.
d) Physical characteristics, capacities and talents, terms of doubtful relevance to personality, and terms that could not be assigned to any of the other three categories.
These categories illustrates that the personality lexicon in the natural language embrace a huge variety of concepts in the form of their enduring traits , their internal states, physical states, by the activities they engage in, by the effects they have on others etc. Although Allport and Odbert (1936) and Norman (1967) arranged these terms into mutually exclusive categories but critical analysis by Allen & Potkay (1981) revealed that the categories overlap and do not have clear boundaries, leading to conclusion that distinctions between classes of personality descriptors are arbitrary and should be abolished.
[59] Allen BP, Potkay CR. On the arbitrary distinction between states and traits. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1981 Nov;41(5):916.
For practical utility, John and Srivastava felt that taxonomy must provide a systematic framework for distinguishing, arranging, and naming individual differences in people’s behavior and experience .[60] John OP, Srivastava S. The Big Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and theoretical perspectives. Handbook of personality: Theory and research. 1999;2(1999):102-38. Allport and Odbert’s (1936) classifications provided some initial structure for the personality lexicon but Cattell (1943) used their list as a starting point for his multidimensional model of personality structure.[61] Cattell RB. The description of personality. I. Foundations of trait measurement. Psychological review. 1943 Nov;50(6):559.Because of the exhaustive and unmanageable size of that list for research purposes, Cattell (1943, 1945) began with a subset of 4,500 trait terms and further reduced it to a mere 35 variables using clustering procedures. Cattell conducted several factor analyses on these small set of variables and narrowed them down to 12 personality factors, which eventually became part of his 16 Personality Factors (16PF) questionnaire. .[62] Cattell RB, Eber HW, Tatsuoka MM. Handbook for the sixteen personality factor questionnaire (16 PF): In clinical, educational, industrial, and research psychology, for use with all forms of the test. Institute for Personality and Ability Testing; 1970.Cattell also claimed that these factors showed excellent congruity across various testing methods such as self-reports, ratings by others, and objective tests.
[51] Digman JM. Personality structure: Emergence of the five-factor model. Annual review of psychology. 1990 Feb;41(1):417-40..
Cattell did a pioneering work of creating a relatively short list of variables which stimulated other researchers to examine the dimensional structure of trait ratings. Several investigators were involved in the discovery and clarification of the Big Five dimensions. Fiske (1949) deduced a simplified description from 22 of Cattell’s variables which were derived from self-ratings, ratings by peers and ratings by psychological staff members.
[63] Fiske DW. Consistency of the factorial structures of personality ratings from different sources. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. 1949 Jul;44(3):329.
These Big Five dimensions were found to be valid and reliable and were later known as the “Big Five”. Tupes and Christal (1961) reassessed these descriptions from varied samples, ranging from daily labourers with no more than high-school education to graduates. [64] Tupes EC, Christal RE. Recurrent personality