The study of behaviour in personality psychology: Meaning,importance and measurement

Abstract

The target paper was intended to initiate dialogue about challenges to personality psychology's progress as a truly behavioural science, and the commentaries' diverse reactions underscore the fact that these issues do indeed merit serious discussion. This response addresses several broad questions raised in the commentaries—what is behaviour, is behaviour of primary importance yet understudied, and what are the strengths and weaknesses of core types of behavioural data? In addition, it addresses an issue raised in several commentaries, but only briefly mentioned in the target paper—the fact that behaviour can be conceptualized and measured at multiple levels of abstraction. These issues have implications for the nature of personality psychology and for the research conducted by personality psychologists. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

References

Asendorpf

J. B.

Banse

Mücke

(2002).Double dissociation between implicit and explicit personality self‐concept: The case of shy behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83,380–393.

Back

M. D.

Schmukle

S. C.

Egloff

(2006).Who is late and who is early? Big Five personality factors and punctuality in attending psychological experiments. Journal of Research in Personality, 40,841–848.

Back

M. D.

Schmukle

S. C.

Egloff

(2008a).A closer look at first sight: Social relations lens model analyses of personality and interpersonal attraction at zero acquaintance. Manuscript submitted for publication.

Back

M. D.

Schmukle

S. C.

Egloff

(2008b).How extraverted is honey.bunny77@hotmail.de? Inferring personality from e‐mail addresses. Journal of Research in Personality, 42,1116–1122.

Back

M. D.

Schmukle

S. C.

Egloff

(in press).Predicting actual behavior from the explicit and implicit self‐concept of personality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Back

M. D.

Stopfer

J. M.

Vazire

(2008).Facebook profiles reflect actual personality not self‐idealization. Manuscript submitted for publication.

Bakeman

Gottman

J. M.

(1997). Observing interaction: An introduction to sequential analysis(2nd ed.). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Barker

R. G.

Wright

H. F.

(1951). One boy's day. A specimen record of behavior. New York, NY: Harper & Brothers.

Batey

Furnham

(2006).Creativity, intelligence, and personality: A critical review of the scattered literature. Genetic, Social, and General Psychology Monographs, 132,355–429.

10.

Baumeister

R. F.

Vohs

K. D.

Funder

D. C.

(2007).Psychology as the science of self‐reports and finger movements: Whatever happened to behavior? Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2,396–403.

11.

Baumert

Schmitt

(in press).Justice sensitive interpretations of ambiguous situations. Australian Journal of Psychology.

12.

Borkenau

(1986).Toward an understanding of trait interrelations: Acts as instances for several traits. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51,371–381.

13.

Borkenau

Müller

(1992).Inferring act frequencies and traits from behavior observations. Journal of Personality, 60,553–573.

14.

Borkenau

Ostendorf

(1987).Retrospective estimates of act frequencies: How accurately do they reflect reality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52,626–638.

15.

Brown

Moskowitz

D. S.

(1998).Dynamic stability of behavior: The rhythms of our interpersonal lives. Journal of Personality, 66,105–134.

16.

Brunswik

(1956). Perception and the representative design of experiments. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

17.

Cairns

R. B.

Green

J. A.

(1979). How to assess personality and social patterns: Observations or ratings?In R. B. Cairns (Ed.), The analysis of social interactions: Methods, issues and illustrations(pp.209–226). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

18.

Campbell

N. A.

(2008). Biology(8th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson.

19.

Cervone

Shoda

(1999). The coherence of personality. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

20.

Côté

Moskowitz

D. S.

Zuroff

D. C.

(2009).Interpersonal spin at work. Unpublished study, Montreal, Quebec, McGill University.

21.

Craik

K. H.

(2000). The lived day of an individual: A person‐environment perspective. In W. B. Walsh , K. H. Craik , & R. H. Price (Eds.), Person‐environment psychology: New directions and perspectives(pp.233–266). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

22.

Cronbach

L. E.

Meehl

P. E.

(1955).Construct validity in psychological tests. Psychological Bulletin, 52,281–302.

23.

Dixon

N. F.

(1981). Preconscious processing. New York, NY: John Wiley.

24.

Eibl‐Eibesfelt

(1989). Human ethology. New York, NY: de Gruyter.

25.

Eysenck

M. W.

(1997). Anxiety and cognition: A unified theory. Hove, UK: Psychology Press.

26.

Fast

L. A.

Funder

D. C.

(2008).Personality as manifest in word use: Correlations with self‐report, acquaintance‐report, and behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 94,334–346.

27.

Fetchenhauer

Huang

(2004).Justice sensitivity and distributive decisions in experimental games. Personality and Individual Differences, 36,1015–1029.

28.

Fleeson

(2001).Toward a structure‐ and process‐integrated view of personality: Traits as density distributions of states. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80,1011–1027.

29.

Fleeson

Noftle

(2008).The end of the person‐situation debate: An emerging synthesis in the answer to the consistency question. Social‐Personality Psychology Compass, 2,1667–1684.

30.

Fournier

M. A.

Moskowitz

D. S.

Zuroff

D. C.

(2008).Integrating dispositions, signatures, and the interpersonal domain. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 94,531–545.

31.

Friese

Hofmann

Schmitt

(2009).When and why do implicit measures predict behavior? Empirical evidence for the moderating role of opportunity, motivation, and process reliance. European Review of Social Psychology, 19,285–338.

32.

Funder

D. C.

(1991).Global traits: A neo‐Allportian approach to personality. Psychological Science, 2,31–38.

33.

Funder

D. C.

(1999). Personality judgment: A realistic approach to person perception. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

34.

Funder

D. C.

(2001).Personality. Annual Review of Psychology, 52,197–221.

35.

Funder

D. C.

(2006).Towards a resolution of the personality triad: Persons, situations, and behaviors. Journal of Research in Personality, 40,21–34.

36.

Funder

D. C.

Furr

R. M.

Colvin

C. R.

(2000).The riverside behavioral Q‐sort: A tool for the description of social behavior. Journal of Personality, 68,553–573.

37.

Furr

R. M.

Funder

D. C.

(1998).A multi‐modal analysis of personal negativity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74,1580–1591.

38.

Furr

R. M.

Funder

D. C.

(2004).Situational similarity and behavioral consistency: Subjective, objective, variable‐centered, and person‐centered approaches. Journal of Research in Personality, 38,421–447.

39.

Furr

R. M.

Funder

D. C.

(2007). Behavioral observation. In R. Robins , C. Fraley , & R. Krueger (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in personality psychology(pp.273–291). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

40.

Furr

R. M.

Wagerman

S. A.

Funder

D. C.

(in press). Personality as manifest in behavior: Direct behavioral observation using the revised Riverside Behavioral Q‐sort (RBQ‐3). In C. R. Agnew , D. E. Carlston , W. G. Graziano , & J. R. Kelly (Eds.), Then a miracle occurs: Focusing on behavior in social psychological theory and research. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

41.

Gollwitzer

Rothmund

(in press). When the need to trust results in unethical behavior: The sensitivity to mean intentions (SeMI) model. In D. De Cremer (Ed.), Psychological perspectives on unethical behavior and decision making. Charlotte, NC: Information Age.

42.

Gollwitzer

Schmitt

Schalke

Maes

Baer

(2005).Asymmetrical effects of justice sensitivity perspectives on prosocial and antisocial behavior. Social Justice Research, 18,183–201.

43.

Gosling

S. D.

John

O. P.

Craik

K. H.

Robins

R. W.

(1998).Do people know how they behave? Self‐reported act frequencies compared with on‐line codings by observers. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74,1337–1349.

44.

Gosling

S. D.

S. J.

Mannarelli

Morris

M. E.

(2002).A room with a cue: Personality judgments based on offices and bedrooms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82,379–398.

45.

Green

A. S.

Rafaeli

Bolger

Shrout

P. E.

Reis

H. T.

(2006).Paper or plastic? Data equivalence in paper and electronic diaries. Psychological Methods, 11,87–105.

46.

Heine

S. J.

Buchtel

E. E.

Norenzayan

(2008).What do cross‐national comparisons of personality traits tell us? The case of conscientiousness. Psychological Science, 19,309–313.

47.

Jackson

D. N.

(1971).The dynamics of structured personality tests: 1971. Psychological Review, 78,229–248.

48.

John

O. P.

Srivastava

(1999). The Big Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and theoretical perspectives. In L. A. Pervin , & O. P. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research(2nd ed., pp.102–138). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

49.

Kenny

D. A.

(1994). Interpersonal perception: A social relations analysis. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

50.

Kenny

D. A.

(2006).PERSON: A general model of interpersonal perception. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 8,265–280.

51.

Klein

S. B.

Cosmides

Tooby

Chance

(2001).Priming exceptions: A test of the scope hypothesis in naturalistic trait judgments. Social Cognition, 19,443–468.

52.

Krebs

J. R.

Davies

N. B.

(1997). Behavioural ecology(4th ed.). Oxford, UK: Blackwell Science.

53.

Leary

M. R.

Britt

T. W.

Cutlip

W. D.

Templeton

J. L.

(1992).Social blushing. Psychological Bulletin, 112,446–460.

54.

Leary

M. R.

Meadows

(1991).Predictors, elicitors, and concomitants of social blushing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60,254–262.

55.

Loevinger

(1957).Objective tests as instruments of psychological theory [Monograph]. Psychological Reports, 3,635–694.

56.

Martin

Bateson

(1993). Measuring behavior: An introductory guide. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

57.

Mayer

J. D.

(2005).A tale of two visions: Can a new view of personality help integrate psychology? American Psychologist, 60,294–307.

58.

McClelland

D. C.

(1951). Personality. New York, NY: William Sloane Association.

59.

Meehl

P. E.

(1945).The dynamics of “structured” personality tests. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 1,296–303.

60.

Mehl

M. R.

(2006).The lay assessment of subclinical depression in daily life. Psychological Assessment, 18,340–345.

61.

Mehl

M. R.

Gosling

S. D.

Pennebaker

J. W.

(2006).Personality in its natural habitat: Manifestations and implicit folk theories of personality in daily life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90,862–877.

62.

Mehl

M. R.

Holleran

S. E.

(2007).An empirical analysis of the obtrusiveness of and participants' compliance with the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR). European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 23,248–257.

63.

Mehl

M. R.

Pennebaker

J. W.

(2003).The sounds of social life: A psychometric analysis of student's daily social environments and natural conversations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84,857–870.

64.

Mehl

M. R.

Pennebaker

J. W.

Crow

Dabbs

Price

(2001).The electronically activated recorder (EAR): A device for sampling naturalistic daily activities and conversations. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers, 33,517–523.

65.

Mehl

M. R.

Vazire

Ramirez‐Esparza

Slatcher

R. B.

Pennebaker

J. W.

(2007).Are women really more talkative than men?. Science, 317,82.

66.

Mischel

(1968). Personality and assessment. New York, NY: Wiley.

67.

Mohiyeddini

Schmitt

(1997).Sensitivity to befallen injustice and reactions to unfair treatment in a laboratory situation. Social Justice Research, 10,333–353.

68.

Moskowitz

D. S.

(1994).Cross‐situational generality and the interpersonal circumplex. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66,921–933.

69.

Moskowitz

D. S.

(2009).Coming full circle: Conceptualizing the study of interpersonal behavior. Canadian Psychology, 50,33–41.

70.

Moskowitz

D. S.

Russell

J. J.

Sadikaj

Sutton

(in press).Measuring people intensively. Canadian Psychology.

71.

Moskowitz

D. S.

Zuroff

D. C.

(2004).Flux, pulse, and spin: Dynamic additions to the personality lexicon. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86,880–893.

72.

Nave

C. S.

Sherman

R. A.

Funder

D. C.

(2008).Beyond self‐report in the study of hedonic and eudaimonic well‐being: Correlations with acquaintance reports, clinician judgments and directly observed social behavior. Journal of Research in Personality, 42,643–659.

73.

Ode

Robinson

M. D.

Hanson

D. M.

(2009).The functional consequences of a noisy mind: Predictions from individual differences in reaction time variability. Manuscript submitted for publication.

74.

Ozer

Benet‐Martínez

(2006).Personality and the prediction of consequential outcomes. Annual Review of Psychology, 57,401–421.

75.

Paulhus

D. L.

Vazire

(2007). The self‐report method. In R. W. Robins , R. C. Fraley , & R. F. Krueger (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in personality psychology(pp.224–239). New York, NY: Guilford.

76.

Penke

(2009).Adaptive developmental plasticity might not contribute much to the adaptiveness of reproductive strategies. A commentary on M. Del Giudice. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 32.

77.

Penke

(in press). Bridging the gap between modern evolutionary psychology and the study of individual differences. In D. M. Buss , & P. Hawley (eds.), The Evolution of personality and individual differences. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

78.

Penke

Asendorpf

J. B.

(2008).Beyond global sociosexual orientations: A more differentiated look at sociosexuality and its effects on courtship and romantic relationships. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95,1113–1135.

79.

Penke

Denissen

J. J. A.

Miller

G. F.

(2007).The evolutionary genetics of personality (target article). European Journal of Personality, 21,549–587.

80.

Phelps

F.G.

Doherty‐Sneddon

Warnock

(2006).Helping children think: Gaze aversion and teaching. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 24,577–588.

81.

Ramírez‐Esparza

Mehl

M. R.

Álvarez Bermúdez

Pennebaker

J. W.

(2009).Are Mexicans more or less sociable than Americans? Insights from a naturalistic observation study. Journal of Research in Personality, 43,1–7.

82.

Richard

F. D.

Bond

C. F.

Stokes‐Zoota

J. J.

(2003).One hundred years of social psychology quantitatively described. Review of General Psychology, 7,331–363.

83.

Roberts

B. W.

Kuncel

Shiner

R. N.

Caspi

Goldberg

L. R.

(2007).The power of personality: The comparative validity of personality traits, socio‐economic status, and cognitive ability for predicting important life outcomes. Perspectives in Psychological Science, 2,313–345.

84.

Robinson

M. D.

Sedikides

(in press). Traits and the self: Toward an integration. In: P. J. Corr , & G. Matthews (Eds.), Handbook of personality. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

85.

Rogers

R. D.

Monsell

(1995).Costs of a predictable switch between simple cognitive tasks. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 124,207–231.

86.

Ross

Nisbett

R. E.

(1991). The person and the situation: Perspectives of social psychology. McGraw‐Hill series in social psychology. New York, NY: McGraw‐Hill.

87.

Russell

J. J.

Moskowitz

D. S.

Paris

Sookman

Zuroff

D. C.

(2007).Stability and variability of affective experience and interpersonal behavior in Borderline Personality Disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 116,578–588.

88.

Schmitt

(1996).Individual differences in sensitivity to befallen injustice. Personality and Individual Differences, 21,3–20.

89.

Schmitt

(in press).Person×situation—interactions as moderators. Journal of Research in Personality.

90.

Sechrest

McKnight

P. E.

McKnight

K. M.

(1996).Calibration of measures for psychotherapy outcome studies. American Psychologist, 51,1065–1071.

91.

Shoda

Mischel

Wright

J. C.

(1993).The role of situational demands and cognitive competencies in behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65,1023–1035.

92.

Spain

J. S.

Eaton

L. G.

Funder

D. C.

(2000).Perspectives on personality: The relative accuracy of self vs. others for the prediction of behavior and emotion. Journal of Personality, 68,837–867.

93.

Steyer

Schmitt

Eid

(1999).Latent state‐trait theory and research in personality and individual differences. European Journal of Personality, 13,389–408.

94.

Takarangi

M. K. T.

Garry

Loftus

E. F.

(2006).Dear diary, is plastic better than paper? I can't remember. Psychological Methods, 11,119–122.

95.

Terracciano

Abdel‐Khalek

A. M.

Ádám

(2005).National character does not reflect mean personality trait levels in 49 cultures. Science, 310,96–100.

96.

Tinbergen

(1963).On aims and methods of Ethology. Zeitschrift für Tierpsychology, 20,410–433.

97.

Todd

P. M.

Penke

Fasolo

Lenton

A. P.

(2007).Different cognitive processes underlie human mate choices and mate preferences. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of USA, 104,15011–15016.

98.

Vazire

Funder

D. C.

(2006).Impulsivity and the self‐defeating behavior of narcissists. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10,154–165.

99.

Vazire

Gosling

S. D.

(2004).e‐perceptions: Personality impressions based on personal websites. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87,123–132.

100.

Vazire

Gosling

S. D.

Dickey

A. S.

Schapiro

S. J.

(2007). Measuring personality in nonhuman animals. In R. W. Robins , R. C. Fraley , & R. F. Kreuger (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in personality psychology(pp.190–206). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

101.

Vazire

Mehl

M. R.

(2008).Knowing me, knowing you: The relative accuracy and unique predictive validity of self‐ and other ratings of daily behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95,1202–1216.

102.

Watson

J. B.

(1925). Behaviorism. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.

103.

Watzlawick

Beavin

J. H.

Jackson

D. D.

(1967). Pragmatics of human communication: A study of interactional patterns, pathologies, and paradoxes. New York, NY: Norton.

104.

Williams

J. M. G.

Watts

F. N.

MacLeod

Mathews

(1997). Cognitive psychology and emotional disorders. Chichester, UK: Wiley.

105.

Wilson

E. O.

(1975). Sociobiology: A new synthesis. Harvard, MA: Harvard University Press.

106.

Wirtz

Druger

Scollon

C. N.

Diener

(2003).What to do on spring break? The role of predicted, on‐line, and remembered experience in future choice. Psychological Science, 14,520–524.