Department of Psychology.
Department of Experimental and Applied Psychology.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2021 Nov;121(5):1112-1139. doi: 10.1037/pspp0000304. Epub 2021 Jan 21.
The study of volitional personality change has received increasing attention in recent years, suggesting that individuals want to change for the better particularly on those socially desirable characteristics that they lack. However, individuals do not want to change for the better on all (even socially desirable) traits alike. In a meta-analytic summary of evidence on the Big Five, we demonstrate that individuals' trait levels are only negatively related to their change goals for Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Conscientiousness, but not for Agreeableness and Openness to Experience. In three studies, two of them preregistered, we replicated these meta-analytic findings using the HEXACO model, showing negative relations between trait levels and change goals for all dimensions, except Honesty-Humility and Openness to Experience. Strikingly, however, these trait-specific differences in correlations of trait levels and change goals disappeared once providing individuals with personality feedback before assessing their change goals, suggesting that individuals may generally want to change for the better once having sufficient self-knowledge. Nonetheless, the mechanisms driving this desire differ between traits: Whereas the perceived social desirability of individuals' trait levels accounted for change goals on most HEXACO dimensions, it did not account for change goals on Honesty-Humility and Openness to Experience. By implication, a desire to have socially desirable characteristics that one lacks can explain change goals for some traits, but not for those traits underlying individual differences in values. As an aside, the studies offer vital information on personality development of the HEXACO dimensions over time, spanning 10 and 3.5 years, respectively. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).
近年来，意志人格改变的研究受到了越来越多的关注，这表明个体特别希望改善那些他们缺乏的社会期望特征。然而，个体并不希望在所有（甚至是社会期望的）特征上都变得更好。在对大五人格的证据进行元分析总结时，我们证明个体的特质水平仅与神经质、外向性和尽责性的改变目标呈负相关，而与宜人性和经验开放性无关。在三项研究中，其中两项是预先注册的，我们使用 HEXACO 模型复制了这些元分析发现，显示特质水平与改变目标之间存在负相关，除了诚实-谦逊和经验开放性维度。然而，令人惊讶的是，一旦在评估改变目标之前为个体提供人格反馈，这些特质水平和改变目标之间的相关差异就会消失，这表明个体一旦有了足够的自我认识，通常就会希望变得更好。尽管如此，驱动这种愿望的机制在不同特质之间存在差异：虽然个体特质水平的感知社会期望度可以解释大多数 HEXACO 维度上的改变目标，但它并不能解释诚实-谦逊和经验开放性维度上的改变目标。这意味着，拥有自己缺乏的社会期望特征的愿望可以解释某些特质的改变目标，但不能解释那些与价值观个体差异相关的特质的改变目标。此外，这些研究提供了关于 HEXACO 维度随时间推移的人格发展的重要信息，分别跨越了 10 年和 3.5 年。
