‘Grandpa, Do you like Roller Coasters?’: Identifying Age–Appropriate Personality Indicators

Abstract

Personality development research heavily relies on the comparison of scale means across age. This approach implicitly assumes that the scales are strictly measurement invariant across age. We questioned this assumption by examining whether appropriate personality indicators change over the lifespan. Moreover, we identified which types of items (e.g. dispositions, behaviours, and interests) are particularly prone to age effects. We reanalyzed the German Revised NEO Personality Inventory normative sample (N = 11,724) and applied a genetic algorithm to select short scales that yield acceptable model fit and reliability across locally weighted samples ranging from 16 to 66 years of age. We then examined how the item selection changes across age points and item types. Emotion-type items seemed to be interchangeable and generally applicable to people of all ages. Specific interests, attitudes, and social effect items-most prevalent within the domains of Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Openness-seemed to be more prone to measurement variations over age. A large proportion of items were systematically discarded by the item-selection procedure, indicating that, independent of age, many items are problematic measures of the underlying traits. The implications for personality assessment and personality development research are discussed. © 2019 European Association of Personality Psychology

Does Age Matter for Personality Psychology?

“…This means, the items did not seem to measure the same construct equally well for young, middle‐aged, or older adults. Olaru and colleagues () associate the differences between traits in age‐related measurement invariance to the item type; they demonstrate that items, which refer to emotions, abilities, behaviours, or evaluations, are rather age‐invariant (i.e. ‘age‐fair’), whereas items based on specific interests, attitudes, and social effects are more age‐specific—which partly ties in with the findings reported by Nikitin and Freund, Müller and colleagues, as well as Noftle and Gust in this issue.…”

“…First, it needs to be ensured that the indicators (questionnaire items, cognitive tasks, or behavioural indicators) are equally indicative of the trait—might it be a latent factor or a network of related states (Cramer et al, ) over the entire studied age range. Olaru and colleagues () discuss several routes to test ‘age‐fairness’ of existing measures as well as to plan and check age‐fairness during the test construction process. Second, during the analysis of personality effects on diverse outcomes, the dynamic (i.e.…”

Coffee or tea? Examining cross-cultural differences in personality nuances across former colonies of the British Empire

“…The traditional measurement invariance testing procedures showed a similar pattern as the item level classification procedures. None of the 60-item models achieved adequate model fit, which is a problem commonly encountered for broad personality measures (Marsh et al, 2010;Olaru et al, 2015Olaru et al, , 2019. CFI values of the configural models across all 45 pairs of countries ranged from .753 to .787 (Neuroticism), .673 to .739 (Extraversion), .628 to Figure 2.…”

Longitudinal Experience–Wide Association Studies—A Framework for Studying Personality Change

“…The more modest strategy would involve the improvement of existing self‐report instruments so they can better serve research on personality change across the lifespan and validly assess samples from different cultures. For example, items from existing personality instruments can be evaluated for their sensitivity to assess changes at different ages, or for their appropriateness as trait indicators across different ages, and refined as necessary (Olaru, Schroeders, Wilhelm, & Ostendorf, 2019).…”