Romer D, Revelle W
J Pers Soc Psychol. 1984 Nov;47(5):1028-42. doi: 10.1037//0022-3514.47.5.1028.
According to Shweder and D'Andrade (1979, 1980), covariation in memory-based ratings of people's behavior is determined more by semantic relations between behavior categories than by actual co-occurrence. They claim therefore that the existence of personality traits is largely a fiction supported by our conceptions rather than by reality. Contrary to this hypothesis, we argue that semantics are logically implicated in both the observation and recall of behavior and that support for this assumption can be found if immediate encodings of behavior are as sensitively scaled as subsequent memory-based ratings. Results of a demonstration experiment supported this conclusion. When immediate encodings were scaled across all behavior categories, the relation between semantics and memory was completely explained by the role of semantics in the immediate encoding of behavior. However, when immediately encoded behavior was simply identified (rather than scaled), support for systematic distortion was obtained. Previous support for the systematic distortion hypothesis may therefore be attributed to the use of too simple a coding scheme for the measurement of immediate behavior. Implications for the existence of personality traits and for personality measurement are discussed.
根据施韦德和丹德拉德（1979年、1980年）的研究，基于记忆对人们行为的评分中的共变现象，更多地是由行为类别之间的语义关系决定的，而非实际的同时出现。因此他们声称，人格特质的存在很大程度上是由我们的观念而非现实所支撑的一种虚构。与这一假设相反，我们认为语义在行为的观察和回忆中都有逻辑上的牵连，并且如果行为的即时编码与随后基于记忆的评分一样经过敏感的量化，那么就能找到对这一假设的支持。一个示范实验的结果支持了这一结论。当对所有行为类别进行即时编码量化时，语义与记忆之间的关系完全可以通过语义在行为即时编码中的作用来解释。然而，当对即时编码的行为只是进行简单识别（而非量化）时，就得到了对系统偏差的支持。因此，先前对系统偏差假设的支持可能归因于在测量即时行为时使用了过于简单的编码方案。文中还讨论了得此结论对人格特质的存在以及人格测量的意义。
