Are traits useful? Explaining trait manifestations as tools in the pursuit of goals.

Abstract

Traits and motivation mainly have been treated separately for almost a century. The purpose of these studies is to test the proposal that traits and motivation are intricately linked. Specifically, that one explanation for traits, at least in terms of their descriptiveness of what people actually do, is the goals people pursue. Study 1 used experience-sampling methodology to show that almost half the variance in extraversion and conscientiousness manifestation was explained by goal pursuit differences. Both why people enacted more of extraversion and/or conscientiousness than others, and why people enacted extraversion and/or conscientiousness at any given moment were explained by the goals people were pursuing at those moments. Study 2 used experimental methodology to show that extraversion and conscientiousness enactment was in fact caused by the goal pursuit. Study 3 employed observer ratings to show that the goal-dependent enactments of traits were observer-verified actual behaviors. In all three studies, different goals affected different traits discriminatively. Thus, these findings provided strong evidence for one explanation of traits, that they are useful for accomplishing goals. These findings provided one answer to long-standing questions about the conceptual relations between traits and motivation. And these findings clarified the meaning and nature of extraversion and conscientiousness by revealing part of what these traits are for.

Velocity explains the links between personality states and affect

“…These results speak to the capacity for structural dimensions of goals to energize and direct behavior (Austin & Vancouver, 1996), and they provide more support for the recent hypothesis that Big Five behaviors are enacted in the service of goal achievement (McCabe & Fleeson, 2012; 2016). The results also might raise the possibility that the within-person, state level covariation of approach/avoidance goals and extraverted/neurotic states is one explanation for the between-person associations between these constructs (Elliot & Thrash, 2002).…”

“…This characterization is in line with results from an experience sampling study that examined the links among these variables at the state level (Heller et al, 2007). Further, more recent research has suggested that personality states are enacted in the service of meeting one's goals (McCabe & Fleeson, 2012; 2016). Thus, we sought to extend our mediation model to include the approach/avoidance goal construct as an antecedent to personality states.…”

The Brief State Rumination Inventory (BSRI): Validation and Psychometric Evaluation

“…From a theoretical standpoint, personality theories argue that self-reported traits do not merely represent the aggregation of moments or states (e.g., Augustine & Larsen, 2012;McCabe & Fleeson, 2016), in that people rely on different types of information when reporting on states rather than traits (Robinson & Clore, 2002). In keeping with this, meaningful differences between trait and state rumination have been reported.…”

Individual differences in emotion regulation goals: Does personality predict the reasons why people regulate their emotions?

“…Given that individuals differ in what is important to them (Roccas, Sagiv, Schwartz, & Knafo, ), it is unlikely that people all value and pursue the same emotion regulation goals. Indeed, while goals can shift across situations (McCabe & Fleeson, ), there are still stable individual differences in goals (e.g., Reisz, Boudreaux, & Ozer, ; Roberts & Robins, ). Individual differences in emotion regulation goals are important to consider because goals impact how people typically behave (Austin & Vancouver, ) and have downstream consequences for well‐being if pursued chronically (e.g., Brunstein, Schultheiss, & Grassmann, ).…”