From understanding others' needs to prosocial action: Motor and social abilities promote infants' helping

In the present study, we test the main hypothesis that infants' understanding of others' needs translates into helping behavior, when critical motor and social competencies have emerged, early in the second year. We assessed the understanding of others' needs in an eye‐tracking paradigm and the helping behavior of 10‐ (n = 41) and 16‐month‐olds (n = 37). Furthermore, we assessed the motor and social abilities of 16‐month‐olds. Critically, while infants understood others' needs already at 10 months, fine motor and social interaction skills moderated the link between infants' prosocial understanding and helping behavior at 16 months. This provides first evidence that infants' helping behavior relates to their understanding of others' needs. Furthermore, we found that fine motor, gross motor, and social interaction skills predicted early helping behavior by themselves. These findings highlight that the emergence of infants' helping behavior is the result of a developmental system that includes infants' understanding of others' needs and also their motor and social competencies. The link between infants' understanding of others' needs and their early helpful actions provide further support for the prosocial nature of early helping behavior.     

The Influence of Personality-Related Variables on Microspatial Consumer Research

Abstract

The results of a study designed to investigate whether microspatial shopping behavior is related to variables reflecting the personality of consumers are presented. Data were gathered by questionnaire from 166 households in Maidstone, England. The number of shops usually considered during spatial search, termed the evoked set, was used as a diagnostic variable measuring consumer search. Rating scales were used to assess the following four personality-related variables: consumers' interest in shopping, their perceptions of risk, the social status of the purchase, and the perceived time pressure they faced. We found that perceived risk and interest had the greatest influence on the number of shops considered during spatial search in terms of the sizes of consumers' evoked sets. Also, the study revealed a complex interaction between perceptions of risk and time pressure that influenced the extent of spatial search. The analysis serves to suggest that there is some influence of personality-related variables on microspatial search behavior. This view runs counter to results at the macrospatial scale.     

Importance of having agreeable friends in adolescence (especially when you are not)

Using the actor–partner interdependence model, we examined whether adolescent's agreeableness, best friend's agreeableness, and the interaction between adolescent‐friend agreeableness are important for interpersonal functioning. Adolescents (N = 158) in fifth to eighth grades who were part of best friend pairs completed personality and friendship measures. Adolescents' adjustment and victimization experiences were assessed by peer nominations. For boys, best friend's agreeableness moderated the relationship between the target boy's agreeableness and overt victimization, relational victimization, and externalizing problems. For girls, best friend's agreeableness moderated the relationship between the target girl's agreeableness and internalizing problems and prosocial skills. This study provides an initial glimpse into how traits of friends can influence outcomes beyond what would be expected from adolescents' personality alone.     

Coping strategies and quality of life in women with advanced breast cancer and their family caregivers

Abstract

This study examines the effects of personal resources of both heart patients and their close social partners on patients' coping and quality of life. Generalized personal resources (self-efficacy beliefs, dispositional optimism, self-regulation competence) and outcomes were assessed by questionnaire 1–3 days before surgery (n = 122) and again six months later (n= 50). Outcome variables were coping styles, social resources (social support and social integration), emotional states, and further measures of quality of life. Patients' personal resources were dominant in the prediction of most of the outcomes. Partners' resources were uniquely related to social support, social integration, and quality of life as perceived by the patients. Further, partners' personality resources predicted changes in patients' loneliness and energy levels during the six-month interval.     

Personality Factors S,E, and M,and their Measurement

Terms such as often, usually, and sometimes frequently modify items found in personality questionnaires. Semantic style refers to individual differences in the quantitative meanings subjects give such terms. This study investigated the relation between semantic style variables and questionnaire measures of social desirability, extraversion, and neuroticism. Significant associations were found for two of these three personality scales: social desirability and neuroticism. If semantic style is shown to be pervasive and appreciable in its influence on questionnaire response, its systematic control should become a psychometric goal of some importance. Techniques are discussed for thus achieving more valid questionnaire measures.     

Predicting social behavior from personality traits

The classic view of traits as dispositions was examined and a number of ambiguities noted. When clarified, implications for predicting social behaviors from personality variables were derived. Two types of behavioral criterion were delineated, and it was argued that personality measures should be systematically related to multiple act criteria, but not necessarily to single act criteria. It was suggested that behaviors could be treated as items on a behavioral measure of personality and that standard scaling criteria be applied in identifying behaviors that should be related to a given trait dimension. In attempting to identify behaviors which are linearly related to a personality trait, the application of Bayes theorem was shown to be of theoretical interest. Two indices, a validity index and a linearity index, were derived from Bayes theorem and it was shown that validity is a necessary but not sufficient condition for linearity.     

Personality and work-home interaction among dual-earner couples in South Africa: Testing an actor-partner interdependence model

This study aimed to investigate the effect of personality on work-home interaction crossover effects among dual-earner couples in South Africa. The participants were dual-earner couples (n = 264; 132 couples) with young children. They completed measures on work-home interaction and personality. Multilevel modelling was used to analyse predictions for six personality variables and four work-home interaction outcome variables. Additionally, we examined interaction effects between husbands’ and wives’ actor effects, as well as between their partner effects. Results suggest only wives’ Extraversion, Emotional Stability, and Openness positively influenced husbands’ experience of work-home interaction. Work-home personality crossover actor effects were more pronounced for wives. Partner effects were stronger for husbands in that an increase in Extraversion in wives will increase husbands’ experience of positive home-work interaction. A gendered effect appears to influence work-home interaction among South African working couples; this knowledge is important for interventions to establish balanced work and home lives.     

A note on relations between trait and state measures of arousal

Analysis of Eysenck Personality Inventory measures of personality and measures of mood obtained by the Nowlis Mood Adjective Check List revealed four main factors. Neuroticism was associated with a cluster of mood variables related to anxiety and depression and extraversion to a cluster related to self -confidence, but not to activation. Implications for the use of these measures in cognitive and other research are indicated.     

Need for Cognition and Cognitive Performance From a Cross-Cultural Perspective: Examples of Academic Success and Solving Anagrams

The cross-cultural validity of the Need for Cognition Scale and its relationship with cognitive performance were investigated in two studies. In the first study, the relationships between the scale and university entrance scores, course grades, study skills, and social desirability were examined. Using the short form of the Turkish version of the Need for Cognition Scale (S. Gülgöz & C. J. Sadowski, 1995) no correlation with academic performance was found but there was significant correlation with a study skills scale and a social desirability scale created for this study. When regression analysis was used to predict grade point average, the Need for Cognition Scale was a significant predictor. In the second study, participants low or high in need for cognition solved multiple-solution anagrams. The instructions preceding the task set the participants' expectations regarding task difficulty. An interaction between expectation and need for cognition indicated that participants with low need for cognition performed worse when they expected difficult problems. Results of the two studies showed that need for cognition has cross-cultural validity and that its effect on cognitive performance was mediated by other variables.     

Reduction of Perceived Social Distance as an Explanation for Media's Influence on Personal Risk Perceptions: A Test of the Risk Convergence Model

The risk convergence model proposes reduction of perceived social distance to a mediated personality as a mechanism through which the mass media can influence audiences' personal risk perceptions. As an initial test of the model, this study examined whether 5 audience variables known to facilitate media effects on personal risk perceptions—identification, parasocial interaction, personal relevance, transportation, and perceived realism—would exert their influences through the reduction of perceived social distance. The results indicate that reduction of perceived social distance fully explained the process of identification and transportation influencing personal risk perceptions, while partially mediating the relationship between personal relevance and personal risk perceptions. Theoretical and practical implications for health risk communication and entertainment education are discussed.     

SELECTING A COST-EFFECTIVE SCREENING MEASURE FOR THE ASSESSMENT OF PRESCHOOL SOCIAL WITHDRAWAL

The utility of teacher judgment (rankings, ratings) and peer judgment (sociometric ratings) were studied as screening variables for preschool social withdrawal/responsiveness. Observational measures of preschoolers' interaction were used as the validation criterion based upon theoretical, empirical, and practical considerations related to development of a multipurpose behavioral assessment system. Results indicated that teacher rankings of students' verbal interaction frequencies (1) were most highly correlated to interaction rate in two preschool settings, (2) had test-retest reliability consistently above Rho = .80, and (3) were useful in that 77% of teachers using this procedure could identify their least socially responsive student within five rankings. The peer nomination sociometric rating was the least reliable measure at retest (Rho = .35) and showed consistently the lowest correlation with observational indices of interaction partner preferences, e.g., reciprocal rate (Rho = .29 to .39). The tendency for relationships among screening measures and the criterion to increase at retest suggested a training effect on screening accuracy. The use of teacher rankings in combination with observational measures to confirm selection accuracy and for monitoring treatment progress is discussed as a cost-effective behavioral assessment procedure for preschool social withdrawal/responsiveness.     

Deduction from if-then personality signatures

Personality signatures are sets of if-then rules describing how a given person would feel or act in a specific situation. These rules can be used as the major premise of a deductive argument, but they are mostly processed for social cognition purposes; and this common usage is likely to leak into the way they are processed in a deductive reasoning context. It is hypothesised that agreement with a Modus Ponens argument featuring a personality signature as its major premise is affected by the reasoner's own propensity to display this personality signature. To test this prediction, Modus Ponens arguments were constructed from conditionally phrased items extracted from available personality scales. This allowed recording of (a) agreement with the conclusion of these arguments, and (b) the reasoner's propensity to display the personality signature, using as a proxy this reasoner's score on the personality scale without the items used in the argument. Three experiments (N = 256, N = 318, N = 298) applied this procedure to Fairness, Responsive Joy, and Self-Control. These experiments yielded very comparable effects, establishing that a reasoner's propensity to display a given personality signature determines this reasoner's agreement with the conclusion of a Modus Ponens argument featuring the personality signature.     

Parents' education and children's achievement: The role of personality

The reasons for the positive association between families' background variables, such as parents' education, and children's academic achievement have not fully been clarified yet. The present study investigates children's intelligence and personality as potential mediators. A sample of 580 German high school students (mean age: M = 17.0; SD = 0.7) indicated the highest education of their parents and completed measures assessing their own personality and intelligence. Children's academic achievement was operationalized by grade point average. Children's intelligence, openness to experience and, marginally, conscientiousness partially mediated the association between parents' education and children's academic achievement. Even after controlling for children's intelligence, the mediating effects of those personality traits held. Results are discussed with regard to potential underlying processes. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Perceived Social Support and Big Five Personality Traits in Middle Adulthood: a 4-Year Cross-Lagged Path Analysis

Previous studies have shown that the Big Five personality traits are significantly associated with perceived social support and these associations are positively associated with agreeableness, extraversion, and emotional stability. However, it is not yet clear whether these associations hold longitudinally or how these variables may predict each other over time. To investigate the co-development of personality traits and perceived social support, a cross-lagged path model design was used on a sample of adults (N = 1309) measured on two occasions 4 years apart. The results indicated that while emotional stability predicted perceived social support 4 years later, perceived social support also predicted emotional stability, extraversion, agreeableness, openness, and conscientiousness 4 years later. Our findings suggest that perceived social support may be a resource that has an impact on the development of personality traits known to be associated with social skills as well as the quality and frequency of social interactions in middle adulthood.

     

The ‘Right’ Side of Creativity: Creative Personality and Social Risk-Taking Predict Political Party Affiliation

Factors that predict political party affiliation are of particular importance in research due to the wider implications in politics and policy making. Extending this line of work, the idea that creativity predicts party affiliation was tested using 2 conceptualizations of creativity: creative personality and creative ideation. Participants (N = 406) based in the United States completed measures of creativity, socio-political attitudes, and domain specific risk-taking, and indicated their party affiliation. Results revealed a significant link between creative personality and political party affiliation. Furthermore, in addition to the socio-political attitudes, this link was explained, in part, by individuals’ social risk-taking. Specifically, individuals with higher scores on creative personality were more likely to affiliate to the Democratic party, whereas the reverse was true for affiliation to the Republican party. This article provides new insights into factors that predict political party affiliation and presents wider social implications of the findings.     

TEACHING SOCIAL/VOCATIONAL SKILLS TO RETARDED ADULTS WITH A MODIFIED TABLE GAME: AN ANALYSIS OF GENERALIZATION

In this study, a social skills training program for institutionalized mildly or moderately retarded adults was extended to include skills relevant to vocational settings. Target behaviors involving a verbal action or reaction within six skill areas were taught using a commercially available board game, Sorry, and a specially designed card deck. The training program featured response specific feedback, self-monitoring, individualized reinforcers, and individualized performance criterion levels. Using a multiple baseline across two groups (n = 3 per group), the game contingencies increased social/vocational skills in all targeted areas. Generalization was assessed in two settings: a simulated workshop in which pre and post measures were taken and in the institutional workshop where the residents worked. The posttraining simulated workshop results revealed that the residents' newly learned skills had generalized. However, repeated generalization measures of the residents' social interactions in the institutional workshop were equivocal as were measures of their productivity.     

Exploitation in Older Adults: Personal Competence Correlates of Social Vulnerability

ABSTRACT

Clinical assessment of older people at heightened risk of financial exploitation (also termed social vulnerability) is a difficult task. There are a number of previously untested domains of personal competence which could influence social vulnerability in later life. In this study, intellectual, cognitive, and social-cognitive functioning was assessed in a combined sample of dementia patients (n = 31) and neurologically healthy individuals (n = 68) aged 50 years or over. Informants provided assessments of participants' social functioning, personality, and social vulnerability. In the combined sample, multiple regression analyses revealed significant relationships between each personal competence domain and (lower) social vulnerability, apart from personality which was non-significant. General cognitive functioning and, in particular, executive functioning showed significant overlap with social vulnerability after controlling for memory and age. Social measures were also important correlates of vulnerability, indicating that both neurocognitive and social cognitive deficits may contribute to financial exploitation in later life.     

Predicting Military Performance from Specific Personality Measures: A validity study

This study examined the criterion‐related validity of the dimensions of a customized personality inventory in predicting different aspects of military performance. A cross‐validity study was also carried out to establish the stability of the obtained regression weights. The sample consisted of 733 non‐commissioned officers who filled out the personality inventory. Three different measures of performance (i.e., commendations, reprimands, and cumulative ranking) were used as the criteria in validating the inventory. Among the 11 dimensions of the inventory, emotional stability, directing and monitoring, self‐discipline, and military bearing predicted commendations; determination was the only predictor for reprimands, and cumulative ranking was predicted by determination and adaptability. The cross‐validity procedure showed that the obtained regression weights were stable, providing further support for the validity of the personality measures. Results yielded support for the argument that specific personality measures could be respectable predictors of different aspects of military performance.     

Race Prejudice and Economic Beliefs

Abstract

Following Yinger's assertion that the association between racism and personality variables is “exaggerated” and Heaven's findings that in South Africa white racism is associated with specific attitudes toward economic issues, the present study investigated the relationship between British race prejudice and economic beliefs. A British sample (N = 72) was administered an Attitudes toward West Indians scale, various personality and attitudinal measures, as well as an economic locus of control scale. Results showed racism to be significantly related to authoritarianism and the external/denial subscale of that scale. Further step-wise regression analysis showed scores on the authoritarian attitudes scale and the external/denial subscale to be significant predictors of prejudice.