Differentiating categorical and dimensional data with taxometric analysis: are two variables better than none?

Taxometric analyses have proven helpful for distinguishing categorical and dimensional data. Many taxometric procedures require at least 3 variables for analysis. What if a construct is defined by only 2 conceptually nonredundant characteristics or a data set contains only 2 empirically nonredundant variables? In Study 1, we performed extensive simulations to determine whether informative results can be obtained when only 2 variables are available for taxometric analysis. The mean above minus below a cut (MAMBAC) and maximum slope (MAXSLOPE) procedures, used with parallel analyses of comparison data, successfully differentiated categorical and dimensional structure. With just 2 variables, it seems especially important that indicators vary across as many distinct values as possible and that investigators obtain as large a sample as possible. Additional findings address questions about the most effective way to implement taxometric analyses. In Study 2, the potential utility of 2-variable taxometric analysis is illustrated using data on proactive and reactive childhood aggression, where the results provided strong support for dimensional structure. As long as high-quality data are available, it appears that one can have confidence in the results of taxometric analyses performed with only 2 variables.     

Personality and Daily Experience: The Promise and the Challenge

This special issue of the Journal of Personality is devoted to personality and daily experience. Through historical analysis of the daily event literature, empirical inquiry, and methodological and statistical commentary, the contributors to this issue convey both the possibilities and the problems of studying everyday life. These articles demonstrate how people's dispositions, goals, and commitments can influence daily emotional well-being and health, their inner experience, their reactions to events, and perhaps even which events they encounter. The introduction of personality to the study of daily experience holds the promise of enriching our studies of both.     

Resurrecting the Empathy–Bullying Relationship with a Pro-Bullying Attitudes Mediator: the Lazarus Effect in Mediation Research

The purpose of this study was to determine whether pro-bullying attitudes are capable of mediating the low empathy–bullying relationship in the absence of a significant unmediated correlation between low empathy and bullying behavior. Using three waves of self-report data from 1371 (677 boys, 694 girls) pre-adolescent/early adolescent members of the Illinois Study of Bullying and Sexual Violence (ISBSV), the mediating effect of pro-bullying attitudes on the low empathy–bullying connection was examined. A path analysis revealed that pro-bullying attitudes successfully mediated the pathway running from low empathy to bully perpetration even though the unmediated relationship between low empathy and bullying perpetration was non-significant. A control or comparison pathway running from bully perpetration to pro-bullying attitudes to low empathy was also tested and found to be non-significant. It would appear that low empathy contributes to bullying perpetration by stimulating pro-bullying attitudes which, in turn, promote bullying perpetration. The theoretical, research, and practical implications of these results are discussed.     

Factors in the assessment of suicidality in youth

Suicide remains a leading cause of death among youth, and suicide ideation and behavior are relatively common in both normal and clinical populations. Clinicians working with young people must assess for the presence of suicidal ideation, suicidal behavior, and other risk factors, in order to determine the level of risk. This paper provides the clinician with a summary of risk factors for youth suicide, as well as providing standardized terminology to enhance assessment of suicidal ideation and behavior.     

The Adult Attachment Interview and self-reports of attachment style: an empirical rapprochement

Although 10 studies have been published on the empirical overlap of the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) and measures of self-reported attachment style, results in this literature have been inconsistently interpreted in narrative reviews. This report was designed as a rapprochement of the AAI and attachment style literatures and includes 3 studies. Study 1 (combined N = 961) is a meta-analytic review showing that by J. Cohen's (1992) criteria (mean r = .09), the association between AAI security and attachment style dimensions is trivial to small. Study 2 (N = 160) confirms meta-analytic results with state-of-the-art assessments of attachment security and also examines attachment dimensions in relation to the Big 5 personality traits. Finally, Study 3 is an investigation of 50 engaged couples that shows that developmental and social psychological measures of attachment security predict somewhat distinct--though theoretically anticipated--aspects of functioning in adult relationships.     

Dimensional Personality Traits Broadly and Selectively Associated with Normative Externalizing Behavior

This study aimed to distinguish personality traits that are widely associated with several types of externalizing behaviors from personality traits that are more selectively associated with one or only a few specific types of externalizing behavior. A wide range of externalizing behaviors (e.g. alcohol and drug use, risky driving, aggressive acts, sexual promiscuity and relationship infidelity, academic misconduct) typical among an undergraduate population (N?=?257) were examined along with a range of personality traits measured using the Section III personality model for the DSM-5. We found that externalizing behavior was best associated with the domain level trait Antagonism and, to a lesser degree, Disinhibition. Antagonism’s association with problematic behavior was primarily accounted for by the facet trait Deceitfulness. Deceitfulness was found to be associated with a wide range of behaviors including relationship infidelity, theft, aggressive acts, and drug and alcohol use. Associations between Disinhibition and problem behavior, especially risky driving and poor work or school performance, were best accounted for by the Irresponsibility facet, as opposed to the Impulsivity or Distractibility facet traits. This comprehensive multivariate approach is important for a more complete understanding of the complex relationship that exists between personality traits and externalizing behavior. A better understanding of factors precipitating externalizing behavior could ultimately lead to an increased ability to target interventions to individuals most susceptible to engage in problematic behavior.     

Liking and identifying emotionally expressive music: age and gender differences

Adults and children 5, 8, and 11 years of age listened to short excerpts of unfamiliar music that sounded happy, scary, peaceful, or sad. Listeners initially rated how much they liked each excerpt. They subsequently made a forced-choice judgment about the emotion that each excerpt conveyed. Identification accuracy was higher for young girls than for young boys, but both genders reached adult-like levels by age 11. High-arousal emotions (happiness and fear) were better identified than low-arousal emotions (peacefulness and sadness), and this advantage was exaggerated among younger children. Whereas children of all ages preferred excerpts depicting high-arousal emotions, adults favored excerpts depicting positive emotions (happiness and peacefulness). A preference for positive emotions over negative emotions was also evident among females of all ages. As identification accuracy improved, liking for positively valenced music increased among 5- and 8-year-olds but decreased among 11-year-olds.     

Message from a “Not So Wise Old Man”

At the start of the academic year, the C. G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles has a Welcome Dinner during which the community gathers and is introduced to the new candidates training to become Jungian analysts and the new interns who work at the Kieffer E. Frantz Clinic, the first clinic to offer Jungian analysis on a sliding-fee scale. The staff is also invited to this event, held at a local restaurant with a large banquet room. It has become a tradition to invite a senior analyst to share their wisdom. Here is the talk given by Glenn Foy, the Institute's oldest member, at almost 97 years old.