Conscientiousness is the personality trait of being responsible, careful, or diligent. Conscientiousness implies a desire to do a task well, and to take obligations to others seriously. Conscientious people tend to be efficient and organized as opposed to easy-going and disorderly. They tend to show self-discipline, act dutifully, and aim for achievement; they display planned rather than spontaneous behavior; and they are generally dependable. Conscientiousness manifests in characteristic behaviors such as being neat, systematic, careful, thorough, and deliberate (tending to think carefully before acting). [1]
Conscientiousness is one of the five traits of both the Five Factor Model and the HEXACO model of personality and is an aspect of what has traditionally been referred to as having character. Conscientious individuals are generally hard-working and reliable. When taken to an extreme, they may also be "workaholics", perfectionists, and compulsive in their behavior. [2] People who score low on conscientiousness tend to be laid back, less goal-oriented, and less driven by success, if they also score high on Big Five Agreeableness; otherwise, they are also more likely to engage in anti-social behavior and commit blue-collared crimes and crimes of passion. [3]
Conscientiousness is one of the five major dimensions in the Big Five model of personality (also called Five Factor Model or OCEAN), which consists of openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Two of many personality tests that assess these traits are Costa and McCrae's NEO PI-R [4] and Goldberg's NEO-IPIP. [5] According to these models, conscientiousness is a continuous dimension of personality, rather than a categorical "type" of person.
In the NEO framework, Conscientiousness has six facets: Competence, Order, Dutifulness, Achievement Striving, Self-Discipline, and Deliberation. Other models suggest a smaller set of two "aspects": orderliness and industriousness form an intermediate level of organization[ clarification needed ], with orderliness associated with the desire to keep things organized and tidy and industriousness being more associated with productivity and work ethic. [6]
Other Big Five personality traits such as low extraversion, high agreeableness, low openness, and low neuroticism are linked to high conscientiousness. [4]
Conscientiousness also appears in other models of personality, such as Cloninger's Temperament and Character Inventory, in which it is related to both self-directedness and persistence. [7] The traits of rule consciousness and perfectionism are included in Cattell's 16 PF model. It[ ambiguous ] is negatively associated with impulsive sensation-seeking in Zuckerman's alternative five model.
Traits associated with conscientiousness are frequently assessed by self-report integrity tests given by various corporations to prospective employees.
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Terms such as "hard-working", "reliable", and "persevering" describe desirable aspects of character. Because conscientiousness was once believed to be a moral evaluation, it was overlooked as a psychological attribute. The reality of individual differences in conscientiousness has now been clearly established by studies of cross-observer agreement. Peer and expert ratings confirm the self-reports that people make about their degrees of conscientiousness. Furthermore, both self-reports and observer ratings of conscientiousness predict real-life outcomes such as academic success. [8]
During most of the 20th century, psychologists believed that personality traits could be divided into two categories: temperament and character. Temperament traits were thought to be biologically based, whereas character traits were thought to be learned either during childhood or throughout life. With the advent of the FFM (Five-Factor Model), behavior geneticists began systematic studies of the full range of personality traits, and it soon became clear that all five factors are substantially heritable. Identical twins showed very similar personality traits even when they had been separated at birth and raised apart, and this was true for both character traits and temperament traits. Parents and communities influence the ways in which conscientiousness is expressed, but they apparently do not influence its level. [9]
A person's level of conscientiousness is generally assessed using self-report measures, although peer-reports and third-party observation can also be used. Self-report measures are either lexical [1] or based on statements. [10] Deciding which measure of either type to use in research is determined by an assessment of psychometric properties and the time and space constraints of the study being undertaken.
Lexical measures use adjectives that reflect conscientiousness traits, such as "efficient" and "systematic", and are very space- and time-efficient for research purposes. Goldberg [11] developed a 20-word measure as part of his 100-word Big Five markers. Saucier [12] developed a briefer 8-word measure as part of his 40-word mini-markers. Thompson [1] revised these measures to develop the International English Mini-Markers which has superior validity and reliability in populations both within and outside North America. Internal consistency reliability of the International English Mini-Markers for the Conscientiousness measure for native English-speakers is reported as .90, that for non-native English-speakers is .86. [1]
Statement measures tend to comprise more words than lexical measures, so consume more research instrument space and more respondent time to complete. Respondents are asked the extent to which they, for example, often forget to put things back in their proper place, or are careful to avoid making mistakes. [10] Some statement-based measures of conscientiousness have similarly acceptable psychometric properties in North American populations to lexical measures, but their generally emic development makes them less suited to use in other populations. [13] For instance, statements in colloquial North American English like Often forget to put things back in their proper place or Am careful to avoid making mistakes can be hard for non-native English-speakers to understand, suggesting internationally validated measures might be more appropriate for research conducted with non-North Americans.
Currently,[ when? ] little is known about conscientiousness in young children because the self-report inventories typically used to assess it are not appropriate for that age group. There are likely individual differences in this factor at an early age. It is known, for example, that some children have attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, which is characterized in part by problems with concentration, organization, and persistence. [14] Longitudinal and cross-sectional studies suggest that conscientiousness is relatively low among adolescents but increases between 18 and 30 years of age. Conscientiousness generally increases with age from 21 to 60, though the rate of increase is slow.
Individual differences are strongly preserved, meaning that a careful, neat, and scrupulous 30-year-old is likely to become a careful, neat, and scrupulous 80-year-old. [9]
People who score high on the trait of conscientiousness tend to be more organized and less cluttered in their homes and offices. For example, their books tend to be neatly shelved in alphabetical order, or categorized by topic, rather than scattered around the room. Their clothes tend to be folded and arranged in drawers or closets instead of lying on the floor. The presence of planners and to-do lists are also signs of conscientiousness. Their homes tend to have better lighting than the homes of people who score low on this trait. [15]
Conscientiousness correlates with successful academic performance in students and workplace performance among managers and workers. [16] Low levels of conscientiousness are strongly associated with procrastination. [17] Conscientiousness has a moderate to large positive correlation with performance in the workplace, [18] and in contrast, after general mental ability is taken into account, the other four Big Five personality traits do not aid in predicting career success. [19] : 169 [ verification needed ]
Conscientious employees are generally more reliable, more motivated, and harder working. They have lower rates of absenteeism and counterproductive work behaviors such as stealing and fighting with other employees. [20] Furthermore, conscientiousness is the personality trait that correlates the most with performance across all categories of jobs. [21] Agreeableness and emotional stability may also be important, particularly in jobs that involve a significant amount of social interaction. [22] Of all manager/leader types, top executives show the lowest level of rule-following, a conscientious trait. [23] Conscientiousness is not always positively related to job performance; sometimes the opposite is true. Being too conscientious could lead to taking too much time in making urgent decisions and to being too attached to the rules and lacking innovation. [24]
A 2008 meta-analysis found that conscientiousness has a positive relationship with subjective well-being, particularly satisfaction with life. Highly conscientious people tend to be happier with their lives than those who score low on this trait. [25] Although conscientiousness is generally seen as a positive trait to possess, research suggests that in some situations it may be harmful for well-being. In a prospective study of 9,570 people over four years, highly conscientious people suffered[ how? ] more than twice as much if they became unemployed. [26] The authors suggested this may be due to conscientious people making different attributions about why they became unemployed, or through experiencing stronger reactions following failure. This finding is consistent with perspectives which see no trait as inherently positive or negative, but rather the consequences of the trait being dependent on the situation and concomitant goals and motivations. [27]
Low conscientiousness is linked to anti-social behavior, blue-collared crimes, and crimes of passion, [3] as well as unemployment and homelessness. [20] Low conscientiousness and low agreeableness taken together are also associated with substance use disorders. [28] People low in conscientiousness have difficulty saving money and their risky borrowing practices make them fall prey to subprime and predatory lending more often than conscientious people. High conscientiousness is associated with more careful planning of shopping trips and less impulse buying of unneeded items. [20] While conscientiousness is generally linked to a lower level of anti-social behaviour, it is not always the case, and conscientiousness is not always negatively correlated with criminality. It has been shown that conscientiousness is positively correlated with business, white-collared, and premeditated criminal behavior. [29]
According to a multi-decade study begun in 1921 by psychologist Lewis Terman on over 1,500 gifted adolescent Californians, "The strongest predictor of long life was conscientiousness." [30] Specific behaviors associated with low conscientiousness may explain its influence on longevity. Nine different behaviors that are among the leading causes of mortality—alcohol use, disordered eating (including obesity), drug use, lack of exercise, risky sexual behavior, risky driving, tobacco use, violence, and suicide—are all predicted by low conscientiousness. Health behaviors are more strongly correlated with the "conventionality" rather than the "impulse-control" aspect of conscientiousness. Apparently, social norms influence many health-relevant behaviors, such as healthy diet, exercise, not smoking, and moderate drinking, and highly conscientious people adhere the most strongly to these norms. [20] Conscientiousness is positively related to health behaviors [31] such as regular visits to a doctor, checking smoke alarms, and adherence to medication regimens. Such behavior may better safeguard health and prevent disease. [20] [ better source needed ] The only known health benefits of low conscientiousness are relaxation and reduced anxiety.
Relationship quality is positively associated with partners' levels of conscientiousness. Highly conscientious people are less likely to get divorced due to their own fault. Conscientiousness is associated with lower rates of behavior associated with at-fault divorce, such as extramarital affairs, spousal abuse, and alcohol use disorder. Conscientious behaviors may have a direct influence on relationship quality, as people low in conscientiousness are less responsible, less responsive to their partners, more condescending, and less likely to hold back offensive comments. More conscientious people are better at managing conflict and tend to provoke fewer disagreements, perhaps because they elicit less criticism due to their well-controlled and responsible behavior. [20] [ better source needed ]
Conscientiousness has distinct sub-components, including two major branches (i.e., orderliness and industriousness). The largest set of meta-analyses found that these branches of conscientiousness have disparate connections with cognitive abilities. Orderliness has negative correlations with some cognitive abilities (e.g., fluid reasoning abilities, math knowledge, lexical knowledge, and science knowledge) whereas industriousness has strikingly positive correlations with multiple abilities (e.g., general mental ability, memory, processing speed, and knowledge). [32]
Some previous studies in selected samples (e.g., job candidates, [33] university students) have found negative correlations between conscientiousness and intelligence. One potential explanation is that these negative correlations may be artificially created by the selection of the sample. For example, with students who are low on one trait and high on the other (negative relationship) using the strong one to compensate and pass the selection, while students who are low on both (positive relationship) are removed by the selection. [34]
Conscientiousness correlates with conservative political attitudes. [35]
Because conscientiousness is positively related to job performance, [36] conservative service workers have been shown to earn higher ratings, evaluations, and tips than their liberal counterparts. [37]
Although right-wing authoritarianism is one of the most powerful predictors of prejudice, a large scale meta-analysis found that conscientiousness itself is uncorrelated with general prejudice. [38] Rebellion against control is significantly negatively correlated with conscientiousness. [39]
Hence, conscientiousness is associated only with rule compliance, obedience, and integrity, not necessarily with right-wing authoritarianism, which requires reduced Big Five Agreeableness as well. [40]
Conscientiousness plays an important role in mitigating the spread of misinformation. Across multiple studies, conscientious individuals were less likely to share fake news stories. [41] Furthermore, conscientiousness weakened the positive relationship between right-wing political ideology and sharing fake news. However, some research suggests that this evidence may be inconclusive. [42]
The orderliness/dependability subfactors (order, dutifulness, and deliberation) of conscientiousness correlate negatively with creativity while the industriousness/achievement subfactors (competence, achievement striving, and self-discipline) correlate positively. [43] People who score high on the order subfactor of conscientiousness show less innovative behavior, especially if coupled with a low score on the industrious subfactor. [44] Group conscientiousness[ definition needed ] has a negative effect on group performance during creative tasks. [45] Groups with only conscientious members have difficulty solving open-ended problems. [46]
A study from 2006 found that those scoring low on conscientiousness make better decisions after unanticipated changes in the context of a task. Specifically, the subfactors order, dutifulness, and deliberation negatively correlated with decision-making quality, but not[ ambiguous ] competence, achievement striving, and self-discipline. [47]
General religiosity was mainly correlated with high Agreeableness and Conscientiousness among the Big Five traits. [48]
Conscientiousness in psychology is defined, as noted above, by notions such as "orderliness and industriousness", not by reference to the ordinary language notion of conscience, or such as is referred to in the legal doctrine of equity, by concern with preventing unconscionable actions.
Average levels of conscientiousness vary by state in the United States. People living in the central part, including the states of Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Missouri, on average have higher scores than people living in other regions. People in the southwestern states of New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona also have relatively high average scores on conscientiousness. Among the eastern states, Florida is the only one that scores in the top ten for this personality trait. The four states with the lowest scores on conscientiousness on average were, in descending order, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Maine, and Alaska. [49]
A large scale survey of residents of Great Britain found that average levels of all the Big Five, including conscientiousness, vary across regional districts in England, Wales, and Scotland. High levels of conscientiousness were found throughout much of Southern England, scattered areas of the Midlands, and most of the Scottish Highlands. Low levels of conscientiousness were observed in London, Wales, and parts of the North of England. Higher mean levels of regional conscientiousness were positively correlated with voting for Toryism and the Conservative Party, and negatively correlated with voting for the Labour Party, in the 2005 and 2010 elections, and also correlated with a higher proportion of married residents, with higher life expectancy for men and women, fewer long-term health problems, and with lower rates of mortality from stroke, cancer, and heart disease. Higher regional conscientiousness was also correlated with lower median annual income in 2011. [50]
Emotional intelligence (EI), also known as emotional quotient (EQ), is the ability to perceive, use, understand, manage, and handle emotions. High emotional intelligence includes emotional recognition of emotions of the self and others, using emotional information to guide thinking and behavior, discerning between and labeling of different feelings, and adjusting emotions to adapt to environments.
In psychology, trait theory is an approach to the study of human personality. Trait theorists are primarily interested in the measurement of traits, which can be defined as habitual patterns of behavior, thought, and emotion. According to this perspective, traits are aspects of personality that are relatively stable over time, differ across individuals, are relatively consistent over situations, and influence behaviour. Traits are in contrast to states, which are more transitory dispositions.
In trait theory, the Big Five personality traits are a group of five characteristics used to study personality:
Neuroticism is a personality trait associated with negative emotions. It is one of the Big Five traits. Individuals with high scores on neuroticism are more likely than average to experience such feelings as anxiety, worry, fear, anger, frustration, envy, jealousy, pessimism, guilt, depressed mood, and loneliness. Such people are thought to respond worse to stressors and are more likely to interpret ordinary situations, such as minor frustrations, as appearing hopelessly difficult. Their behavioral responses may include procrastination, substance use, and other maladaptive behaviors, which may temporarily aid in relieving negative emotions and generating positive ones.
Agreeableness is a personality trait referring to individuals that are perceived as kind, sympathetic, cooperative, warm, honest, and considerate. In personality psychology, agreeableness is one of the five major dimensions of personality structure, reflecting individual differences in cooperation and social harmony.
Openness to experience is one of the domains which are used to describe human personality in the Five Factor Model. Openness involves six facets, or dimensions: active imagination (fantasy), aesthetic sensitivity, attentiveness to inner feelings, preference for variety (adventurousness), intellectual curiosity, and challenging authority. A great deal of psychometric research has demonstrated that these facets or qualities are significantly correlated. Thus, openness can be viewed as a global personality trait consisting of a set of specific traits, habits, and tendencies that cluster together.
Affective events theory (AET) is an industrial and organizational psychology model developed by organizational psychologists Howard M. Weiss and Russell Cropanzano to explain how emotions and moods influence job performance and job satisfaction. The model explains the linkages between employees' internal influences and their reactions to incidents that occur in their work environment that affect their performance, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction. The theory proposes that affective work behaviors are explained by employee mood and emotions, while cognitive-based behaviors are the best predictors of job satisfaction. The theory proposes that positive-inducing as well as negative-inducing emotional incidents at work are distinguishable and have a significant psychological impact upon workers' job satisfaction. This results in lasting internal and external affective reactions exhibited through job performance, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment.
The dark triad is a psychological theory of personality, first published by Delroy L. Paulhus and Kevin M. Williams in 2002, that describes three notably offensive, but non-pathological personality types: Machiavellianism, sub-clinical narcissism, and sub-clinical psychopathy. Each of these personality types is called dark because each is considered to contain malevolent qualities.
The HEXACO model of personality structure is a six-dimensional model of human personality that was created by Ashton and Lee and explained in their book, The H Factor of Personality, based on findings from a series of lexical studies involving several European and Asian languages. The six factors, or dimensions, include honesty-humility (H), emotionality (E), extraversion (X), agreeableness (A), conscientiousness (C), and openness to experience (O). Each factor is composed of traits with characteristics indicating high and low levels of the factor. The HEXACO model was developed through similar methods as other trait taxonomies and builds on the work of Costa and McCrae and Goldberg. The model, therefore, shares several common elements with other trait models. However, the HEXACO model is unique mainly due to the addition of the honesty-humility dimension.
The Revised NEO Personality Inventory is a personality inventory that assesses an individual on five dimensions of personality. These are the same dimensions found in the Big Five personality traits. These traits are openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion(-introversion), agreeableness, and neuroticism. In addition, the NEO PI-R also reports on six subcategories of each Big Five personality trait.
Within personality psychology, it has become common practice to use factor analysis to derive personality traits. The Big Five model proposes that there are five basic personality traits. These traits were derived in accordance with the lexical hypothesis. These five personality traits: Extraversion, Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience have garnered widespread support.
Personality change refers to the different forms of change in various aspects of personality. These changes include how we experience things, how our perception of experiences changes, and how we react in situations. An individual's personality may stay somewhat consistent throughout their life. Still, more often than not, everyone undergoes some form of change to their personality in their lifetime.
In psychology, a facet is a specific and unique aspect of a broader personality trait. Both the concept and the term "facet" were introduced by Paul Costa and Robert McCrae in the first edition of the NEO-Personality Inventory (NEO-PI) Manual. Facets were originally elaborated only for the neuroticism, openness to experience, and extraversion traits; Costa and McCrae introduced facet scales for the agreeableness and conscientiousness traits in the Revised NEO-PI. Each of the Big Five personality traits in the five factor model contains six facets, each of which is measured with a separate scale. The use of facets and facet scales has since expanded beyond the NEO PI-R, with alternative facet and domain structures derived from other models of personality. Examples include the HEXACO model of personality structure, psycholexical studies, circumplex models, the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (MPQ), and the California Psychological Inventory.
The honesty-humility factor is one of the six basic personality traits of the HEXACO model of personality. Honesty-humility is a basic personality trait representing the tendency to be fair and genuine when dealing with others, in the sense of cooperating with others, even when someone might utilize them without suffering retaliation. People with very high levels of the honesty-humility avoid manipulating for personal gain, feel little desire to break rules, are uninterested in wealth and luxuries, and feel no special right to elevated social status. Conversely, persons with very low levels on this scale will compliment others to get whatever they want, are inclined to break the rules for personal gains, are motivated by material gain, and feel a strong sense of self-importance.
Most scientists agree that religiosity is not an independent personality trait, despite there being some commonality between their characteristics. Religiosity and personality traits both relate to one's feelings, thoughts, and behaviors. However, unlike for personality, one's level of religiosity is often measured by the presence or lack of belief in and relationship with a higher power, certain lifestyles or behaviors adopted for a higher power, and a sense of belonging with other followers of one's religion. Additionally, personality traits tend to follow a normal distribution, such that the majority of individuals' scores for a personality trait will be concentrated towards the middle, rather than being extremely high or low. Distributions for religiosity, however, follow a non-normal distribution, such that there are more individuals who score particularly high or low on religiosity scales.
The psychology of music preference is the study of the psychological factors behind peoples' different music preferences. One study found that after researching through studies from the past 50 years, there are more than 500 functions for music. Music is heard by people daily in many parts of the world, and affects people in various ways from emotional regulation to cognitive development, along with providing a means for self-expression. Music training has been shown to help improve intellectual development and ability, though minimal connection has been found as to how it affects emotion regulation. Numerous studies have been conducted to show that individual personality can have an effect on music preference, though a recent meta-analysis has shown that personality in itself explains little variance in music preferences. These studies are not limited to American culture, as they have been conducted with significant results in countries all over the world, including Japan, Germany, Spain, and Brazil.
The biological basis of personality is a collection of brain systems and mechanisms that underlie human personality. Human neurobiology, especially as it relates to complex traits and behaviors, is not well understood, but research into the neuroanatomical and functional underpinnings of personality are an active field of research. Animal models of behavior, molecular biology, and brain imaging techniques have provided some insight into human personality, especially trait theories.
Intelligence and personality have traditionally been studied as separate entities in psychology, but more recent work has increasingly challenged this view. An increasing number of studies have recently explored the relationship between intelligence and personality, in particular the Big Five personality traits.
Trait activation theory is based on a specific model of job performance, and can be considered an elaborated or extended view of personality-job fit. Specifically, it is how an individual expresses their traits when exposed to situational cues related to those traits. These situational cues may stem from organization, social, and/or task cues. These cues can activate personality traits that are related to job tasks and organizational expectations that the organization values. These cues may also elicit trait-related behaviors that are not directly related to job performance.
A zero-acquaintance situation requires a perceiver to make a judgment about a target with whom the perceiver has had no prior social interaction. These judgments can be made using a variety of cues, including brief interactions with the target, video recordings of the target, photographs of the target, and observations of the target's personal environments, among others. In zero-acquaintance studies, the target's actual personality is determined through the target's self-rating and/or ratings from close acquaintance(s) of that target. Consensus in ratings is determined by how consistently perceivers rate the target's personality when compared to other raters. Accuracy in ratings is determined by how well perceivers' ratings of a target compare to that target's self-ratings on the same scale, or to that target's close acquaintances' ratings of the target. Zero-acquaintance judgments are regularly made in day-to-day life. Given that these judgments tend to remain stable, even as the length of interaction increases, they can influence important interpersonal outcomes.
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