Multitrait Multimethod validation of Implicit Association Test as a measure of individual differences in personality: Is there personality at all?

The objective of the study was to investigate the validity of IAT in the assessment of the Big five personality traits. We employed the Multi-Trait Multi-Method (MTMM) approach on a sample of 146 respondents. We collected measures on IATs assessing Big five personality traits, self-reports, and two ratings of close others of different gender on NEO PI-R. Additionally, we assessed behavior related to the Big five personality traits in a structured interview where three experts independently provided rating measures. MTMM analyses suggest that personality IAT measures have little in common with personality traits measured traditionally using explicit methods. The evidence does not support the claim that personality IAT can serve as a valid measure of individual differences in personality traits.     

TECHNOLOGY,THEOLOGY, AND SPIRITUALITY IN THE DIGITAL AGE

Digitalization and the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) will bring about substantial changes in all aspects of life. This happens in a world marked by the poisonous synergy of five Ps, polarization, populism, protectionism, post‐truth, patriarchy, as well as an ambiguous interplay of secularization and new visibility of religion. If development of AI is to be beneficial for people and planet a number of challenges must be met. In this regard, religion‐and‐science dialogue needs improvement in making things not only intellectually but also spiritually fit. Ethics should be involved from the beginning rather than being called upon first when problems arise. Faith communities have a prophetical, diaconal, ethical, and theological role. Based on the characterization of life as a fourfold web of relationality, personal, social, political, as well as global issues are identified and discussed. These include mental health disorders, addiction, manipulation, and self‐exploitation. Reflections on leadership suggest resilience, coexistence, and hope as theological key components for navigating the uncharted realms of the digital age.     

L’abord de la sexualité par les professionnel·le·s de santé en oncologie : une revue de la littérature

The improvement in medical techniques has drastically modified the practice of care in oncology. Supportive care, geared towards supporting patients with chronic illnesses, now occupies a greater place alongside treatments aimed at survival. These changes have conducted some health care professionals to be more interested in patients’ quality of life and, in particular, to the impact of cancer on sexuality. Repercussions on sexuality are actually one of the most problematic aspects of patients’ quality of life post cancer. The aim of this paper is to draw up a review of the English and French literature on this “new” concern which still seems to raise many challenges in practice. Our review emphasizes that despite the recognition of the importance of addressing sexuality issues post cancer in oncology, in their practices, physicians as the nurses alike find it difficult to address. In addition, it underlines that the dominant social representations of sexuality – in terms of gender, sexual orientation and age – have permeated health care professionals’ subjectivities and, at the same time, influence how sexuality is address and interfere with a systematic discussion of these issues throughout the care process. Our discussion tackles the lack of psychologists, both in research and clinic, regarding these issues. Finally, our conclusion highlights the contributions of psychology facing issue posed by sexuality in oncology.     

The effect of relational continuity of care in maternity and child health clinics on parenting self‐efficacy of mothers and fathers with loneliness and depressive symptoms

This study explored the parenting self‐efficacy of the parents of 18‐month‐old children in the context of Finnish maternity and child health clinics. This parenting self‐efficacy was observed in relation with the relational continuity of care and parents' experienced loneliness and depressive symptoms. The relational continuity of care was provided by a public health nurse in maternity and child health clinics. The participating parents were drawn from the STEPS study that is being carried out by the Institute for Child and Youth Research at the University of Turku. The results showed that relational continuity of care provided by the same public health nurse in the maternity and child health clinics was associated with mothers' higher emotional loneliness and with lower scores on three dimensions of parents' parenting self‐efficacy. Loneliness and depressive symptoms negatively influenced parents' parenting self‐efficacy – however, in the case where the family had experienced relational continuity of care, the parents' higher levels of depressive symptoms had not weakened their parenting self‐efficacy beliefs. These results are discussed in terms of organizing maternity and child health clinic services.     

The Impact of Wellness‐Focused Supervision on Mental Health Counseling Practicum Students

Professional counseling organizations tout the importance of wellness for counselors and counselors‐in‐training. The authors used a wellness‐focused supervision model with mental health practicum students to assess the model's degree of treatment effect at improving students' wellness over the course of the semester. Participants' demographics included three women, one man, three European Americans, and one Latino/a. Single‐case design results revealed that ongoing wellness‐focused interventions are helpful in improving participants' level of wellness; implications for practice are provided.     

Personality traits and body mass index: Modifiers and mechanisms

Objective: To identify how demographic factors (sex, age, ethnicity) modify the association between personality traits and body mass index (BMI) and to test the extent that diet and physical activity account for the personality-BMI relations.

Design: Cross-sectional study with a diverse sample (N = 5150, 50% female, 19% African American, 15% Hispanic). Participants completed a measure of the five major dimensions of personality and reported on their physical activity, diet and food intake behaviour, and height and weight.

Main Outcome Measures: BMI and obesity (BMI ≥ 30).

Results: High Neuroticism was associated with higher BMI and risk for obesity, whereas Conscientiousness and, to a lesser extent, Extraversion and Openness were protective. These associations were generally stronger among women and older participants; there was less evidence for ethnicity as a moderator. Personality had similar relations with the behavioural factors, and physical activity, diet and regular meal rhythms accounted for approximately 50% of the association between Neuroticism and Conscientiousness and BMI.

Conclusion: This study supports the links between personality traits and BMI and suggests that physical activity, more than diet, is a key factor in these associations.     

Does self-efficacy mediate the cross-sectional relationship between perceived quality of health care and self-management of diabetes? Results from Diabetes MILES – Australia

Objective: Quality of health care (QoC) and self-efficacy may affect self-management of diabetes, but such effects are not well understood. We examined the indirect role of diabetes-specific self-efficacy (DSE) and generalised self-efficacy (GSE) in mediating the cross-sectional relationship between self-reported QoC and diabetes self-management.

Design: Diabetes MILES–Australia was a national survey of 3,338 adults with diabetes. We analysed data from 1,624 respondents (age: M = 52.1, SD = 13.9) with type 1 (T1D; n = 680) or type 2 diabetes (T2D; n = 944), who responded to a version of the survey containing key measures.

Main Outcome Measures: self-reported healthy eating, physical activity, self-monitoring of blood glucose frequency, HbA_1c, medication/insulin adherence.

Results: We used Preacher and Hayes’ bootstrapping method, controlling for age, gender and diabetes duration, to test mediation of DSE and GSE on the relationship of QoC with each self-management variable. We found statistically significant but trivial mediation effects of DSE and of GSE on most, but not all, variables (all effect sizes < .06).

Conclusion: Support for mediation was weak, suggesting that relationships amongst these variables are small and that future research might explore other aspects of self-management in diabetes.     

Using Personality Item Characteristics to Predict Single‐Item Internal Reliability,Retest Reliability,and Self–Other Agreement

The use of reliability estimates is increasingly scrutinized as scholars become more aware that test–retest stability and self–other agreement provide a better approximation of the theoretical and practical usefulness of an instrument than its internal reliability. In this study, we investigate item characteristics that potentially impact single‐item internal reliability, retest reliability, and self–other agreement. Across two large samples (N = 6690 and N = 4396), two countries (Estonia and The Netherlands), and two personality inventories (the NEO PI‐3 and the HEXACO‐PI‐R), results show that (i) item variance is a strong predictor of self–other agreement and retest reliability but not of single‐item internal reliability; (ii) item variance mediates the relations between evaluativeness and self–other agreement; and (iii) self–other agreement is predicted by observability and item domain. On the whole, weak relations between item length, negations, and item position (indicating effects of questionnaire length) on the one hand, and single‐item internal reliability, retest reliability, and self–other agreement on the other, were observed. In order to increase the predictive validity of personality scales, our findings suggest that during the construction of questionnaire items, researchers are advised to pay close attention especially to item variance, but also to evaluativeness and observability. Copyright © 2016 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Towards More Rigorous Personality Trait–Outcome Research

Much of personality research attempts to identify causal links between personality traits and various types of outcomes. I argue that causal interpretations require traits to be seen as existentially and holistically real and the associations to be independent of specific ways of operationalizing the traits. Among other things, this means that, to the extents that causality is to be ascribed to such holistic traits, items and facets of those traits should be similarly associated with specific outcomes, except for variability in the degrees to which they reflect the traits (i.e. factor loadings). I argue that, before drawing causal inferences about personality trait–outcome associations, the presence of this condition should be routinely tested by, for example, systematically comparing the outcome associations of individual items or facets, or sampling different indicators for measuring the same purported traits. Existing evidence suggests that observed associations between personality traits and outcomes at least sometimes depend on which particular items or facets have been included in trait operationalizations, calling trait‐level causal interpretations into question. However, this has rarely been considered in the literature. I argue that when outcome associations are specific to facets, they should not be generalized to traits. Furthermore, when the associations are specific to particular items, they should not even be generalized to facets. Copyright © 2016 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Principle of Care and Giving to Help People in Need

Theories of moral development posit that an internalized moral value that one should help those in need—the principle of care—evokes helping behaviour in situations where empathic concern does not. Examples of such situations are helping behaviours that involve cognitive deliberation and planning, that benefit others who are known only in the abstract, and who are out‐group members. Charitable giving to help people in need is an important helping behaviour that has these characteristics. Therefore we hypothesized that the principle of care would be positively associated with charitable giving to help people in need, and that the principle of care would mediate the empathic concern–giving relationship. The two hypotheses were tested across four studies. The studies used four different samples, including three nationally representative samples from the American and Dutch populations, and included both self‐reports of giving (Studies 1–3), giving observed in a survey experiment (Study 3), and giving observed in a laboratory experiment (Study 4). The evidence from these studies indicated that a moral principle to care for others was associated with charitable giving to help people in need and mediated the empathic concern–giving relationship. © 2016 The Authors. European Journal of Personality published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of European Association of Personality Psychology