This Personality Trait Can Be Changed — Even With Zero Motivation (M)
Far from being impossible to change, people can increase this personality trait.
Category: Personality
The Personality Trait Linked To Loneliness
Feeling lonely is a part of some people’s genetic makeup.
Feeling lonely is a part of some people’s genetic makeup.
People who are neurotic have a genetic tendency towards loneliness.
Neuroticism is a personality trait that indicates a tendency to experience stress and insecurity.
However, loneliness is not just genetic, it is also a result of life circumstances.
In fact, the environment plays a bigger part than genetics — which is good news, because that means it can change.
Lonely people do not have to stay that way, whatever their genetic makeup.
Professor Julie Aitken Schermer, the study’s first author, said:
“If you have rich interactions with people, that’s an environmental component that would combat the genetic impact of loneliness.”
The conclusions come from research on 764 pairs of twins in Australia.
Twins enable researchers to separate out the influence of genetics and the environment on a person.
All were asked about their personality and any loneliness they experienced.
The results showed that people who were neurotic reported feeling more lonely.
In contrast, those who were high in extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness were less likely to experience loneliness.
The authors write:
“The results suggest common genetic and unique environmental factors play a role in personality and loneliness.”
Professor Schermer is worried about the spread of loneliness across society:
“It does concern be me because we’re getting lonelier as a society.
We’re not having the same richness of interaction.”
Professor Schermer sees it in her students:
“They’re all looking at their devices and not interacting with each other.
I always tell my students, ‘Put your stuff down and talk to each other.’
This is the key time to make friends – they already have things in common.”
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The study was published in the Journal of Research in Personality (Schermer & Martin, 2019).
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These 2 Personality Types Are The Most Romantically Compatible
People prefer a certain personality type in a romantic partner, study demonstrates.
People prefer a certain personality type in a romantic partner, study demonstrates.
People with similar personalities are the most compatible.
Extraverts get on with other extraverts, conscientious people are happy with other conscientious people, the agreeable love other agreeable people — and so on.
There was no evidence in this study that opposites attract.
Romantic partners also get on better — at least initially — when they have similar attitudes.
For a happy marriage, though, it is a similar personality that works best.
Similar attitudes, which are easier to gauge than personality, may help people with similar personalities find each other.
The study’s authors write:
“People may be attracted to those who have similar attitudes, values, and beliefs and even marry them – at least in part – on the basis of this similarity because attitudes are highly visible and salient characteristics and they are fundamental to the way people lead their lives.”
The conclusions come from a study of 291 newlyweds who were asked about their personality, attitudes and marital satisfaction.
The results showed that the couples who had similar personalities were happier together.
Attitudes — whether similar or not — made no different to marital satisfaction.
The authors write:
“…once people are in a committed relationship, it is primarily personality similarity that influences marital happiness because being in a committed relationship entails regular interaction and requires extensive coordination in dealing with tasks, issues and problems of daily living.
Whereas personality similarity is likely to facilitate this process, personality differences may result in more friction and conflict in daily life.
As far as attitudes are concerned, people who chose to marry each other should be well aware of how similar or different they are on these domains because attitudes are very visible and salient.
This suggests that attitudinal and value differences, when they exist, are part of a conscious decision to stay together on the basis of other important considerations.”
Related
The study was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Luo & Klohnen, 2005).
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2 Personality Traits That Predict Happiness
Two personality traits that lead to a happier and more satisfying life.
Two personality traits that lead to a happier and more satisfying life.
Young adults who are more outgoing go on to lead happier lives.
Being more emotional stable also predicts happiness in later life, psychologists discovered.
The study looked at data from 2,529 people born in 1946.
They first answered a series of questions about their personalities at 16 and 26-years-of age.
Forty years later, in their early sixties, they were asked about their well-being and satisfaction with life.
Dr Catharine Gale, the study’s first author, explained the results:
“We found that extroversion in youth had direct, positive effects on wellbeing and life satisfaction in later life.
Neuroticism, in contrast, had a negative impact, largely because it tends to make people more susceptible to feelings of anxiety and depression and to physical health problems.”
High extroversion is linked to being more sociable, having more energy and preferring to stay active.
High neuroticism is linked to being distractible, moody and having low emotional stability.
Increased extroversion was directly linked to more happiness.
Greater neuroticism, meanwhile, was linked to less happiness via a susceptibility to psychological distress.
Dr Gale said:
“Understanding what determines how happy people feel in later life is of particular interest because there is good evidence that happier people tend to live longer.
In this study we found that levels of neuroticism and extroversion measured over 40 years earlier were strongly predictive of well-being and life satisfaction in older men and women.
Personality in youth appears to have an enduring influence on happiness decades later.”
The study was published in the Journal of Research in Personality (Gale et al., 2013).
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