Toward an Index of Adaptive Personality Regulation.

The idea that matching personality expression with situational demands is adaptive is implicit in many accounts of personality. Numerous constructs and measures have been posited to address this or similar phenomena. Few have proven adequate. In response, we proposed and tested a novel measurement approach (the APR index) assessing real-time behavior to rate participants' success in matching personality expression with situational demands, which we denote adaptive personality regulation. An experimental study (N = 88) and an observational study of comedians (N = 203) provided tests of whether the APR index constituted a useful metric of adaptive personality regulation. In both studies, the APR index showed robust psychometric properties; was statistically unique from mean-level personality, self-monitoring, and the general factor of personality expression; and provided incremental concurrent prediction of task/job performance. The results suggest that the APR index provides a useful metric for studying the phenomenon of successfully matching personality expression to situational demands.

Intelligence: is there a sex difference in IQ scores?

Arising from: S. Blinkhorn Nature 438, 31-32 (2005); Blinkhorn replies. Steve Blinkhorncriticizes our study of samples of university students, in which we found that the average IQ of men is 4.6 points higher than that of women, as measured by the Progressive (or Raven's) Matrices. He maintains that there is a negligible sex difference in adult intelligence. We believe that the principal error of Blinkhorn's criticism is that he does not consider our result in the context of several other studies showing that adult males have an IQ advantage of around 4-6 IQ points.

A General Factor of Personality (GFP) in the personality disorders: three studies of the Dimensional Assessment of Personality Pathology - Basic Questionnaire (DAPP-BQ).

We used structural equation modeling to test the hypothesis that a General Factor of Personality (GFP) occupies the apex of the hierarchy of personality disorders in three validation samples of the Dimensional Assessment of Personality Pathology - Basic Questionnaire (DAPP-BQ). In a general population sample (N = 942), we found a GFP explained 34% of the variance in four first-order factors and 33% of the variance in all 18 scales. In a twin sample (N = 1,346), a GFP explained 35% of the variance in four first-order factors and 34% of the variance in all 18 scales. In a clinical sample (N = 656), a GFP explained 34% of the variance in four first-order factors and 30% of the variance in all 18 scales.

Parental and school effects on children's political attitudes in Northern Ireland.

BACKGROUND: Recent research has suggested that intergroup contacts with out-group members can both reduce prejudice and is associated with attitude change. AIM: This study extends prior work in Northern Ireland to examine parental and schooling effects on children's attitudes in a post-conflict environment. SAMPLE: A large-scale cross-sectional survey of secondary schoolchildren (N=1,732) and their parents (N=800) in Northern Ireland assessed the effects of in-school and out-of-school intergroup contacts on intergroup attitudes. METHOD: Multivariate analysis of variance was employed to examine associations between children's political attitudes and parental, group membership, school, and contact variables. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that parental attitudes, group membership, and cross-group contacts explain the majority of variance (58%) in children's political attitudes. The findings provide a comprehensive account of the factors that influence children's political attitudes within a deeply divided society and offer teachers and educationalists a way to improve community relations in a segregated society.

Comedians' Trait Level and Stage Personalities: Evidence for Goal-Directed Personality Adaptation.

Recent findings have shown that both trait levels of personality and situational variability in its expression are of importance. So here, the Big Five personality traits of 77 professional and 125 amateur stand-up comedians were compared with two large matched samples (N > 100,000). The comedians were also observed while performing, which enabled a comparison of their stage personalities with situational requirements on 10 selected NEO-PIR facets. Both amateurs and professionals showed higher openness-to-experience, extraversion, and lower conscientiousness than their norm samples, while professionals also evidenced greater neuroticism. Irrespective of trait standing, with regard to most NEO-PIR facets, professionals expressed the appropriate on-stage persona and were better able to regulate their personality to conform to situational requirements than amateurs. This is consistent with research showing that individuals regulate their personality to conform to situational and goal requirements, and adds the finding that successful comedians demonstrate enhanced adaptability compared with amateurs.

A general factor of personality from multitrait-multimethod data and cross-national twins.

In three studies, a General Factor of Personality (GFP) was found to occupy the apex of the hierarchical structure. In Study 1, a GFP emerged independent of method variance and accounted for 54% of the reliable variance in a multitrait-multimethod assessment of 391 Italian high school students that used self-, teacher-, and parent-ratings on the Big Five Questionnaire - Children. In Study 2, a GFP was found in the seven dimensions of Cloninger's Temperament and Character Inventory as well as the Big Five of the NEO PI-R, with the GFPtci correlating r = .72 with the GFPneo. These results indicate that the GFP is practically the same in both test batteries, and its existence does not depend on being extracted using the Big Five model. The GFP accounted for 22% of the total variance in these trait measures, which were assessed in 651 pairs of 14- to 30-year-old Japanese twins. In Study 3, a GFP accounted for 32% of the total variance in nine scales derived from the NEO PI-R, the Humor Styles Questionnaire, and the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire assessed in 386 pairs of 18- to 74-year-old Canadian and U.S. twins. The GFP was found to be 50% heritable with high scores indicating openness, conscientiousness, sociability, agreeableness, emotional stability, good humor and emotional intelligence. The possible evolutionary origins of the GFP are discussed.

Leader dark traits, workplace bullying, and employee depression: Exploring mediation and the role of the dark core.

A growing body of empirical evidence now supports a negative association between dark traits in leaders and the psychological health of employees. To date, such investigations have mostly focused on psychopathy, nonspecific measures of psychological wellbeing, and have not considered the mechanisms through which these relationships might operate. In the current study (N = 508), we utilized other-ratings of personality (employees rated leaders' personality), psychometrically robust measures, and sophisticated modeling techniques, to examine whether the effects of leaders' levels of narcissism and psychopathy on employee depression are mediated by workplace bullying. Structural equation models provided clear evidence to suggest that employee perceptions of both leader narcissism and psychopathy are associated with increased workplace bullying (25.8% and 41.0% variance explained, respectively) and that workplace bullying fully mediates the effect of leader narcissism and psychopathy on employee depression (21.5% and 20.8% variance explained, respectively). However, when psychopathy and narcissism were modeled concurrently, narcissism did not explain any variance in bullying, suggesting that it is the overlap between psychopathy and narcissism, namely, the "dark core," which primarily accounts for the observed effects. We examined this assertion empirically and explored the unique effects of the subfactors of psychopathy. (PsycINFO Database Record

Sex differences in means and variability on the progressive matrices in university students: a meta-analysis.

A meta-analysis is presented of 22 studies of sex differences in university students of means and variances on the Progressive Matrices. The results disconfirm the frequent assertion that there is no sex difference in the mean but that males have greater variability. To the contrary, the results showed that males obtained a higher mean than females by between .22d and .33d, the equivalent of 3.3 and 5.0 IQ conventional points, respectively. In the 8 studies of the SPM for which standard deviations were available, females showed significantly greater variability (F(882,656) = 1.20, p < .02), whilst in the 10 studies of the APM there was no significant difference in variability (F(3344,5660) = 1.00, p > .05).

Sex differences in general knowledge, semantic memory and reasoning ability.

This paper has the three objectives of attempting to replicate a previous study in which it was found that males have substantially greater general knowledge in most fields or domains than females, and of determining how far sex differences in general knowledge are a function of differences in either Gf (fluid intelligence), or experience. The results confirmed the previous study to the effect that males have higher means in a general knowledge factor of approximately.50 d (half a standard deviation). It was found further that there was no significant sex difference in Gf measured by Baddeley's Grammatical Reasoning Test, and only a low correlation between general knowledge and Gf. Analysis of covariance showed that differential experience as indicated by 'A'-level points and socio-economic status had only a marginal impact on the observed sex difference. The results are interpreted as showing that sex differences in general knowledge cannot be explained as a function of differences in either Gf or experience. It is proposed further that general knowledge should be regarded as a new second-order factor and designated as semantic memory.

The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality.

BACKGROUND: Sex differences in personality are believed to be comparatively small. However, research in this area has suffered from significant methodological limitations. We advance a set of guidelines for overcoming those limitations: (a) measure personality with a higher resolution than that afforded by the Big Five; (b) estimate sex differences on latent factors; and (c) assess global sex differences with multivariate effect sizes. We then apply these guidelines to a large, representative adult sample, and obtain what is presently the best estimate of global sex differences in personality. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Personality measures were obtained from a large US sample (N = 10,261) with the 16PF Questionnaire. Multigroup latent variable modeling was used to estimate sex differences on individual personality dimensions, which were then aggregated to yield a multivariate effect size (Mahalanobis D). We found a global effect size D = 2.71, corresponding to an overlap of only 10% between the male and female distributions. Even excluding the factor showing the largest univariate ES, the global effect size was D = 1.71 (24% overlap). These are extremely large differences by psychological standards. SIGNIFICANCE: The idea that there are only minor differences between the personality profiles of males and females should be rejected as based on inadequate methodology.