Determinants of Interjudge Agreement on Personality Traits: The Big Five Domains, Observability, Evaluativeness, and the Unique Perspective of the Self

ABSTRACT We examined several determinants of interjudge agreement on personality traits. The findings, which were cross-validated in two samples, suggest that agreement is a function of four factors: which Big Five content domain the trait represents, how observable relevant behaviors are, how evaluative the trait is, and whether the self is one of the judges. Agreement was highest for traits related to Extraversion and lowest for traits related to Agreeableness. More observable and less evaluative traits elicited higher interjudge agreement. On average, self-peer agreement was lower than peer-peer agreement. However, this effect was limited to evaluative traits; for neutral traits, self-peer agreement was as high as peer-peer agreement. These findings suggest that self- and peer perception proceed through similar processes for neutral traits but not for highly evaluative traits, raising the possibility that self-perceptions become distorted when the trait is affectively charged.     

Situation Trait Relevance, Trait Expression, and Cross-Situational Consistency: Testing a Principle of Trait Activation

An interactionist principle of trait activation is proposed, emphasizing situation trait relevance (i.e., opportunity for trait expression) as a moderator of trait–behavior relations and cross-situational consistency (CSC). One hundred fifty-six students completed trait measures and expressed intentions in 10 scenarios targeted to each of five traits (e.g., risk taking). Trait–intention correlations within scenario sets were themselves correlated with mean situation trait relevance ratings provided by 26 proficient judges; CSCs in intentions (45 correlations per trait) were correlated with an index of shared trait relevance in situation pairs. In support of trait activation, (a) trait–intention relations for three traits were higher in more relevant situations (e.g., second-order r = .66 for risk taking) and (b) CSCs were higher in scenarios jointly high in targeted trait relevance (e.g., second-order r = .55 for risk taking). Discussion highlights applications of trait activation in diverse research domains.     

Quasi-statistical inference in rating behavior I. Preliminary investigations

Bem and Allen (1974) have suggested that trait consistency-ratings can function as a moderator variable, with regard to the cross-situational validity of trait position-ratings. The present study attempts to consider the relationship between these two types of self-ratings. A model of “man the quasi-statistician” was proposed which yields the predictions that (a) consistency-ratings will vary positively with the polarization-estimate from position-ratings and (b) the extent of correlation will be a function of the degree of polarization associated with a given class of trait.In two experiments, position-ratings and consistency-ratings were obtained over a series of dimensions. The predictions were confirmed in both studies. In addition, Experiment II provided evidence for a correspondence between intuitive and formal estimates of central tendency polarization, although this was not the case for dispersion. The results were discussed as bearing on the model and as relating to the findings of Bem and Allen (1974).     

人格判断的准确性:特质特性的作用

特质特性是影响人格判断准确性的重要调节变量。已有的研究表明,可观察性高的特质容易判断,判断的准确性和一致性也更高;特质的可评估性干扰了自我知觉的准确性,与中性特质相比,可评估性特质的自我—他人一致性更低;与清晰特质相比,模糊特质的自我—同伴判断间的一致性更低,且随特质模糊性的增加而递减。不仅如此,特质特性经常与其他因素如熟悉度交互作用于人格判断的准确性,在考查特质特性的作用时,必须提高研究的生态效度,将该变量与特性匹配、特质分类、个体差异及文化差异等因素综合起来考虑。     

Relationship quality,trait similarity,and self-other agreement on personality ratings in college roommates

Previous research has shown that the level of self-other agreement for personality trait ratings increases with the length of acquaintanceship between the target and the informant. These findings emerge exclusively from studies of well-acquainted pairs in natural relationships and relative strangers interacting in laboratory and classroom settings. The present study examines self-other correlations for trait ratings using the NEO Five Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI; Costa & McCrae, 1992) with 103 pairs of previously unacquainted female college roommates. Assessments were obtained at approximately 2 weeks and again at approximately 15 weeks subsequent to the roommates' initial introduction. Self-other correlations increased for all five NEO-FFI scores and agreement correlations for Conscientiousness were significantly higher than for Extraversion at both occasions. Differences in relationship quality did not moderate self-other agreement for any of the traits. However, better relationship quality was associated with higher other-ratings of Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness and lower other-ratings of Neuroticism after controlling for self-ratings on the same trait. Higher similarity in self-ratings of Neuroticism and Openness was associated with higher self-other agreement for these ratings, and similarity in Conscientiousness was associated with higher relationship quality. These results are considered in light of existing theories of differential trait observability and the effects of unique contexts on trait perception.     

Low accuracy in judgments of others' psychological well-being as seen from a phenomenological perspective

The generally low degree of agreement between self-ratings on personality traits and ratings by others may be interpreted from the viewpoint that self-reports reflect people's experience of themselves but not necessarily their behaviors. A detailed analysis of self and other ratings on subjective well-being as a central dimension of human experience is consistent with this phenomenological view. Ratings of well-being were not significantly correlated with rated behaviors either in self-ratings or in ratings by others. Screening subjects in terms of avowed consistency and observability on a trait did not improve self-other agreement for well-being, nor did it replicate the individual trait effects reported by Kenrick and Stringfield (1980). Judgments by others were found to have poor interjudge reliability and to reflect biases associated with projection of own well-being and a halo effect organized around the subject's perceived friendliness or likability. It was demonstrated that pooling the judgments of several observers should not and does not lead to accurate prediction of the phenomenal personality, and that accuracy may generally depend on the level of self-disclosure.     

The accuracy of roommate ratings of behaviors versus beliefs

We evaluated the accuracy of peer ratings of roommates’ personality characteristics, against roommate self-ratings, as a function of rating domain observability. Instead of the usual ratings of broad personality traits, however, our domains represented peer ratings of narrow exemplars of personality traits. Specifically, we compared roommate ratings on (a) observable trait-related behaviors with (b) unobservable trait-related attitudes or beliefs. We observed greater self-peer agreement in rating behaviors, in general, than in rating beliefs. We also observed greater tendency of raters to adopt an assumed similarity heuristic when judging their roommates’ attitudes and beliefs than their behaviors. We discuss the contribution of these findings to understanding the determinants of accuracy in personality judgments and developing best practices for personality assessment.     

A failure to replicate the Bem and Allen study of individual differences in cross-situational consistency

Bem and Allen (1974) purportedly found evidence that, by using self-report measures of cross-situational consistency as moderator variables, it was possible to substantially increase the size of correlation coefficients computed among measures of each of two personality traits. The present study was undertaken to (a) replicate the Bem and Allen finding on a larger set of personality traits, (b) determine if the results hold differentially for self-report, other-report, and objective personality measures, and (c) compare different methods for dividing subjects into high and low consistent groups. One hundred twelve subjects (64 men and 48 women) were divided into high and low consistent groups using three different methods. Within each group correlations were computed among and between 6 self-report measures, 10 other-report measures, and when possible a few objective measures, for each of eight traits. In general, none of the methods of consistency classification replicated the Bem and Allen finding. In cases where the high consistent group had a larger average correlation among the measures than their low consistent counterparts, the size of that difference was negligible. Moreover, there were about as many instances in which the low consistent group actually had larger average correlations. Finally, there was essentially no agreement among the various consistency classification methods in dividing subjects into high and low consistent subsamples.     

The person-situation debate: A critical multiplist perspective

Critical multiplism is an approach to question and method choice predicated on the only partial validity of most current social science practices In the first part of this paper, the approach is described, and note is made of many of its advantages but also of two of its limitations Critical multiplism is then applied to the person-situation debate The analysis reveals that major protagonists in the debate have often discussed different versions of what appears to be the same question, and they usually agree when they define the questions similarly The major real difference concerns predictions about the extent of cross-situational consistency in behaviors This entails at least two subquestions (1) how consistent is the same molecular behavior across situations? and (2) how crosssituationally stable are different molecular behaviors presumed to indicate the same latent trait? Data from Peake (1982) reported in Mischel and Peake (1982) are then reanalyzed For molecular behaviors within the trait of conscientiousness, the central tendency of the cross-situational correlation is between 30 and 50, while for the nine different behaviors measured as most prototypical of the latent trait of conscientiousness it is in the 30 to 40 range While these values are higher than those of Mischel and Peake (1982), comparable analyses of their friendliness data failed to replicate the results for conscientiousness, cautioning us not to overgeneralize estimates of cross-situational consistency from any of the analyses currently available     

Attributions of stability and relevance of personality traits

This experiment tested a number of hypotheses derived from trait theory, attribution theory and interactional psychology. Forty subjects rated the stability and relevance of 60 pre-selected traits of three role-related people and themselves in four specific social situations. The traits were categorized beforehand in terms of their structural, motivational and content properties, and whether they were positive or negative. There was a significant difference in the perceived stability of positive and negative traits between liked and disliked people; positive traits being seen as significantly more stable in liked people and less stable in disliked people. However, subjects did not attribute significantly less stability to their own behavioural traits than to those of others in the same situations. It was also demonstrated that trait labels are seen to be differentially relevant for describing people in different social situations. The results are discussed in terms of the work on stability and cross-situational consistency in trait and attribution theory and person-situation research.     

The effects of self-monitoring and self-reported consistency on the consistency of personality judgments made by strangers and intimates

How consistent are strangers' and intimates' judgments of stimulus people's personalities, and how is this interjudge consistency affected by stimulus persons' assessed self-monitoring and self-reported behavioral consistency? To answer these questions, 38 stimulus subjects rated themselves on the personality dimensions of extraversion and anxiety and also rated their cross-situational consistency on these dimensions. Strangers, friends, mothers, and fathers of stimulus persons also rated them on extraversion and anxiety. The results indicated that: For judgments of anxiety there was lower interjudge consistency for high than for low self-monitoring stimulus subjects. For judgments of extraversion there was no difference in interjudge consistency for low and high self-monitoring stimulus subjects. The results also showed that anxiety was a more “private” trait in that intimates' but not strangers' judgments correlated with stimulus subjects' self-reported anxiety (r = .50 and r = .11, respectively), while extraversion was a more “public” trait in that both intimates' and strangers' judgments correlated with stimulus subjects' self-reported extraversion (r = .42 and r = .51, respectively). These results suggest that self-monitoring of stimulus persons affects interjudge consistency of peroonality judgments particularly for “private” traits such as anxiety, which are most subject to expressive control and inhibition.     

Thin slices of behavior as cues of personality and intelligence

Self-reports, peer reports, intelligence tests, and ratings of personality and intelligence from 15 videotaped episodes were collected for 600 participants. The average cross-situational consistency of trait impressions across the 15 episodes was .43. Shared stereotypes related to gender and age were mostly accurate and contributed little to agreement among judges. Agreement was limited mainly by nonshared meaning systems and by nonoverlapping information. Personality inferences from thin slices of behavior were significantly associated with reports by knowledgeable informants. This association became stronger when more episodes were included, but gains in prediction were low beyond 6 episodes. Inferences of intelligence from thin slices of behavior strongly predicted intelligence test scores. A particularly strong single predictor was how persons read short sentences.     

Prediction and Cross-Situational Consistency of Daily Behavior across Cultures: Testing Trait and Cultural Psychology Perspectives

Trait and cultural psychology perspectives on the cross-situational consistency of behavior, and the predictive validity of traits, were tested in a daily process study in the United States (N = 68), an individualistic culture, and the Philippines (N = 80), a collectivistic culture. Participants completed the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (Costa & McCrae, 1992) and a measure of self-monitoring, then reported their daily behaviors and associated situational contexts for approximately 30 days. Consistent with trait perspectives, the Big Five traits predicted daily behaviors in both cultures, and relative (interindividual) consistency was observed across many, although not all, situational contexts. The frequency of various Big Five behaviors varied across relevant situational contexts in both cultures and, consistent with cultural psychology perspectives, there was a tendency for Filipinos to exhibit greater situational variability than Americans. Self-monitoring showed some ability to account for individual differences in situational variability in the American sample, but not the Filipino sample.     

The timeline of threat processing in repressors: more evidence for early vigilance and late avoidance

Evidence is mixed concerning whether individuals with a repressive coping style can actually selectively avoid threatening stimuli. Recent research (Calvo & Eysenck, 2000) on repressors’ threat processing suggests that it is necessary to take into account the timeline of this bias. A spontaneous trait inference paradigm was used here to test the hypothesis that repressors would, relative to others, be less likely to infer unfavorable and threatening traits. However, if pressured to make trait inferences quickly, it was predicted that they would be less likely than others to infer favorable and unthreatening traits. Repressors and nonrepressors were presented with passages that could have supported positive or negative trait inferences. In Study 1, they were asked to respond to trait words as quickly as possible but were not held accountable for doing so. In Study 2, time pressure was increased to capture uncorrected trait inferences. Results indicated that repressors were more likely to make positive trait inferences than others when simply asked to respond quickly. Under time pressure, this bias disappeared. Results point to the importance of taking into account an important moderator between coping style and threat, namely, the stage of processing at which differences in threat processing are being assessed.     

Modeling Common Traits and Method Effects in Multitrait-Multimethod Analysis

Method effects often occur when constructs are measured by different methods. In traditional multitrait-multimethod (MTMM) models method effects are regarded as residuals, which implies a mean method effect of zero and no correlation between trait and method effects. Furthermore, in some recent MTMM models, traits are modeled to be specific to a certain method. However, often we are not interested in a method-specific trait but in a trait that is common to all methods. Here we present the Method Effect model with common trait factors, which allows modeling “common” trait factors and method factors that represent method “effects” rather than residuals. The common trait factors are defined as the mean of the true-score variables of all variables measuring the same trait and the method factors are defined as differences between true-score variables and means of true-score variables. Because the model allows estimating mean method effects, correlations between method factors, and correlations between trait and method factors, new research questions may be investigated. The application of the model is demonstrated by 2 examples studying the effect of negative, as compared with positive, item wording for the measurement of mood states.     

Exploring the relations between traits and emotions

The relationships among traits and among emotions have been well researched and are well known, but few experimental probes of the relationships between traits and emotions have been undertaken. The present investigation sought to describe the relations that exist between traits and emotions. The Comrey Personality Scale (a trait inventory) and the Profile of Mood States (an emotion inventory) were administered to 140 students and the subscales were correlated using canonical procedures. The resulting canonical correlations may be specified in bipolar summary form as follows: Neurotic-Stable was found to be correlated with Depressed-Hopeful; Introverted-Extraverted was found to be correlated with Quiescent-Vigorous; and Empathic-Egocentrical was found to be correlated with Content-Confused. Furthermore, the predictive strength between the trait set and the emotion set was reasonably good, although substantially better when traits rather than emotions served as the predictors.     

The Relevance of Big Five Trait Content in Behavior to Subjective Authenticity: Do High Levels of Within‐Person Behavioral Variability Undermine or Enable Authenticity Achievement?

ABSTRACT Individuals vary their behavior from moment to moment a great deal, often acting “out of character” for their traits. This article investigates the consequences for authenticity. We compared 2 hypotheses—trait consistency, that individuals feel most authentic when acting in a way consistent with their traits; and state‐content significance, that some ways of acting feel more authentic because of their content and consequences, regardless of the actor's corresponding traits. Three studies using experience‐sampling methodology in laboratory and natural settings, with participants ages 18–51, strongly supported the state‐content significance hypothesis and did not support the trait‐consistency hypothesis. Authenticity was consistently associated with acting highly extraverted, agreeable, conscientious, emotionally stable, and intellectual, regardless of the actor's traits. Discussion focuses on possible implications for within‐person variability in behavior and for the nature of the self‐concept.     

A latent state-trait anxiety model and its application to determine consistency and specificity coefficients

Abstract

In the present study the consistency model (Steyer, 1987) was applied to data gathered with the German version of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (Laux, Glanzmann, Schaffner, and Spielberger, 1981). The questionnaire was presented twice to 64 university students with an interval of two months between first and second testing. The consistency and specificity coefficients, estimated by LISREL (Jöreskog and Sörbom, 1984), support the state-trait distinction. The state variables have high specificity and consistency coefficients; the trait variables, in contrast, have high consistency coefficients but low or even negligible specificity coefficients. The discussion points out the advantages of the consistency model over the stability model; the most important advantage is that the theoretical structure of the consistency model is more appropriate for the type of application considered. It contains a state factor for each occasion of measurement and a trait factor common to all occasions of measurement. In the stability model, only latent states, but no latent traits occur. Consistency, specificity, and reliability can be identified as proportions of variance determined by latent variables specified in the model. Therefore, data analysis provides statistics concerning the practical significance of the trait and of the effects of situations and/or interactions.     

The problem of communicating Zen understanding: A microanalysis of teacher-student interviews in a North American Zen monastery

Sometimes the dialogue which you read inkoans or the dialogue that takes place in the interview room doesn't make sense, it's not intended to make sense because it's not a rational, linear sequential thing, thisBodhidharma, whatever you think it is it's not. It's not an idea, it's not a concept, it's alive and it's working. How to see that, how to express that is what the dynamics of interview, ofDharma talk are about.