What personality means to psychologists
In psychology, personality refers to the relatively stable patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving that distinguish one person from another. A person who tends to be sociable at parties, at work and with new acquaintances is described as having a sociable trait. Traits are descriptions of tendencies, not explanations or labels that fully predict behavior.
One long-standing approach tries to describe people using a limited number of broad dimensions. These trait models are the most common framework in personality research today.
Where traits come from
Trait researchers often start from language. The lexical hypothesis suggests that the differences most important to people become encoded in everyday words. Researchers collected large numbers of personality-describing words from dictionaries, asked people to rate themselves or others, and used a statistical method called factor analysis to find which ratings tend to go together. Repeated analyses of this kind led many researchers toward a five-factor solution.
The Big Five
The model most widely used is the Five-Factor Model, also called the Big Five. It describes each person with a position along five dimensions, a continuum rather than a type:
- Openness to experience. Curiosity, imagination and interest in new ideas versus preference for the familiar and practical.
- Conscientiousness. Organization, self-discipline and dependability versus spontaneity and flexibility.
- Extraversion. Sociability, energy and assertiveness versus reserve and quietness.
- Agreeableness. Cooperation, trust and compassion versus a more competitive or skeptical stance.
- Neuroticism. Tendency toward negative emotions such as worry or low mood versus emotional steadiness. Some researchers use the label emotional stability for the opposite end.
A common memory aid is the acronym OCEAN. Most people fall in the middle on most dimensions, with fewer at the extremes. None of the poles is inherently good or bad; high conscientiousness may help with planning, for example, but may make some people less comfortable with unpredictability.
Measuring traits
Personality is usually measured with questionnaires asking people how well statements describe them. Others who know the person can also provide ratings. Scores are compared with those of a large reference group. Because these are self-descriptions, answers can be affected by mood, self-image and the wish to look good. Results are best seen as a rough profile.
What the research suggests
Findings that are generally reported, with some caution about size and certainty:
- Reasonable stability. Trait scores tend to be fairly stable over years, though they can shift gradually, and many studies find modest changes across adulthood.
- Heritability. Twin and family studies suggest that genetic differences account for a meaningful share of the variation in traits, with the rest linked to environment and experience. This does not mean personality is fixed at birth, and it connects to the wider topic of inherited traits.
- Links to life outcomes. Traits are statistically associated with outcomes such as job performance, relationship patterns and health behaviors. Associations are usually modest and describe groups, not individuals.
- Cross-cultural use. The five factors have been found in many societies, although researchers disagree about how well they fit everywhere and how much language and culture shape the results.
Criticisms and limits
Trait models have many supporters, and also several well-known critics.
- Description, not explanation. Saying someone is “extraverted” summarizes behavior but does not say why it occurs. Critics argue that traits can become circular if used to explain the behavior they were built from.
- Situations matter. Walter Mischel’s influential critique in the late 1960s noted that behavior often varies across situations more than trait theory seemed to assume. Today most psychologists accept that both traits and context matter, and that a person may be talkative with friends and quiet in a meeting.
- Self-report problems. Questionnaires rely on honesty and self-insight.
- Too few or too many dimensions? Some researchers propose six factors, adding a trait related to honesty and humility, while others suggest fewer or more finely divided facets. The five-factor structure is a convenient summary and not a law of nature.
- Cultural bias. Models built mostly on Western, English-language samples may miss dimensions important elsewhere.
- Narrow focus. Traits leave out life stories, goals and values, which other approaches treat as equally central to who someone is.
Other ways of describing people
Not every popular test uses this approach. Some widely used workplace and online tests sort people into a small number of categories or “types.” Many research psychologists regard type systems as less well supported than trait dimensions, partly because scores on most traits form a continuous spread instead of splitting into clear groups, and partly because retest results can change. Such tests can still be fun conversation starters, but they should not be used as the sole basis for decisions about hiring or relationships.
Earlier history includes the ancient idea of four temperaments and the psychodynamic theories of Freud, which shaped the early basics of psychology but are less used as measurement tools today.
Using the concept sensibly
Personality descriptions can help people reflect on their preferences and notice how they differ from others. They are not diagnoses, and a trait score does not say whether someone is healthy or unwell. Anyone concerned about emotional difficulties should talk to a qualified professional. Personality also interacts with how we experience feelings, as explained in human emotions, and with how we respond to pressure, as seen in the stress response.