Srivastava Sanjay, John Oliver P, Gosling Samuel D, Potter Jeff
Institute of Personality and Social Research, University of California, Berkeley, USA.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2003 May;84(5):1041-53. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.84.5.1041.
Different theories make different predictions about how mean levels of personality traits change in adulthood. The biological view of the Five-factor theory proposes the plaster hypothesis: All personality traits stop changing by age 30. In contrast, contextualist perspectives propose that changes should be more varied and should persist throughout adulthood. This study compared these perspectives in a large (N = 132,515) sample of adults aged 21-60 who completed a Big Five personality measure on the Internet. Conscientiousness and Agreeableness increased throughout early and middle adulthood at varying rates; Neuroticism declined among women but did not change among men. The variety in patterns of change suggests that the Big Five traits are complex phenomena subject to a variety of developmental influences.
不同的理论对于成年期人格特质平均水平如何变化有着不同的预测。五因素理论的生物学观点提出了“石膏假说”：所有人格特质在30岁时停止变化。相比之下，情境主义观点则认为变化应该更加多样，并且会贯穿成年期持续存在。本研究在一个由21至60岁成年人组成的大样本（N = 132,515）中比较了这些观点，这些成年人在互联网上完成了一项大五人格测量。尽责性和宜人性在成年早期和中期以不同的速率增加；神经质在女性中下降，但在男性中没有变化。变化模式的多样性表明，大五人格特质是复杂的现象，受到多种发展影响。
