Contextualised behavioural measurements of personality differences obtained in behavioural tests and social observations in adult capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella)

Abstract

HighlightsPersonality differences studied with a new philosophy-of-science paradigm featuring a behavioural research framework. A non-lexical taxonomic approach applied for comprehensive emic/bottom-up construct generation. In 15 test and 2 group situations, 146 contextualised behaviours measured repeatedly. This is the first comprehensive study on personality differences in capuchin monkeys. Overall no age and sex differences found, but long-term effects of early life experiences. AbstractWe applied a new framework for behavioural research on personality differences in 26 adult tufted capuchin monkeys. Using the Behavioural Repertoire x Environmental Situations Approach, we generated systematically 20 non-lexical emic personality constructs that have high ecological validity for this species. For construct operationalisation, we obtained 146 contextualised behavioural measures repeatedly in 15 experimental situations and 2 group situations using computerised and video-assisted methods. A complete repetition after a 2-3-week break within a 60-day period yielded significant test-retest reliability from individualoriented and variable-oriented viewpoints at different levels of aggregation. In accordance with well-established findings on cross-situational consistency, internal consistency was only moderate. This new and important finding highlights fundamental differences between behavioural approaches and judgment-based approaches to personality differences.Key words: age differences; Behavioural Repertoire x Environmental Situations Approach; capuchin monkeys; cross-situational consistency; early life experiences; individual behaviour; methodology; personality differences; sex differences; situation-behaviour-profiles Uher, J., . Contextualised behavioural measurements of personality differences obtained in behavioural tests and social observations in adult capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). Journal of Research in Personality, 47, 427-444. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2013 www.primate-personality.net 2/36 Theoretical BackgroundPsychologists increasingly advocate for taking behavioural measurements of personality differences in greater consideration (Baumeister, Vohs, & Funder, 2007;Furr, 2009). Methods for studying the individuals' ongoing behaviour, physiology, and experience, as well as the environmental contexts in which they occur are currently being revived and further developed. Contextualised behavioural measurements are obtained, for example, in experimental "miniature situations" in objective personality tests sensu Cattell (Cattell & Warburton, 1967;Kubinger, 2009) or in daily life settings in the field of ambulatory monitoring (Gunthert et al. 2007;Mehl & Conner, 2012;Mehl & Pennebaker, 2003) to which Cattell (1957) referred to as Test-data and Life-data respectively.The behavioural study of individual differences involves more than just behavioural measurements, however. It requires meta-theoretical concepts and methodological approaches that differ in parts from those that have been established f...

Developing “Personality” Taxonomies: Metatheoretical and Methodological Rationales Underlying Selection Approaches, Methods of Data Generation and Reduction Principles

“…multi-contextuality, Uher 2014a and 2014c in this trilogy) and that these functionalities can also vary intra-and interindividually. For exploring behaviours, the TPS-Paradigm therefore provides contextualised methodologies that allow researchers to specify the particular behavioural situation in which defined behaviours occurred (see part I and II below; Uher 2013, Desideratum 2c; for empirical examples, see Uher et al 2013b;cf. similarly Uher 2011a;Wright & Zakriski 2003).…”

“…As the BR x BS-Approach was developed in cross-species comparative research, it has already been applied to comprehensively categorise individual-specific behaviours in capuchin monkeys (Uher et al 2013a) and great apes (Uher, Asendorpf & Call 2008) and to investigate the representations that human observers have developed of individual great apes (Uher 2011b;) and crab-eating macaques (Uher et al 2013b). This approach allowed for the identification of kinds of individual-specific behaviours that were already previously described in these species but also of additional ones that were not previously shown by other (mostly nomination or etic) approaches.…”

“…The rationale of lexical physical system approaches, for example, demarcates all persondescriptive words in the lexica as the universe of elements but does not suggest that any particular ones are to be selected. Their rationale does not rely on (implicit) assumptions about individual-specific patterns, their particular qualities and structures in a given population but on the assumption that individuals generally co-construct psychical representations about individual-specificity in their community and encode these ideas in their everyday language (Lahlou 1996b, Moscovici 1961Uher et al 2013b, cf. also John et al 1988;Saucier & Goldberg 2001).…”

“…That is, respondents must generate, based on memory and imagination, assessments of predetermined brief statements that are presented separately in a mostly randomised order. Co-variations in the thus-generated data can therefore reflect only similarities/dissimilarities-i.e., redundancies-in the meanings that respondents construct for the predetermined item statements; for example, based on semantic similarity (Block 2010;D'Andrade & Shweder 1980) or on the connotations that respondents attribute to particular meanings (e.g., valences; Uher et al 2013b).…”

“…In a second step, the thus-derived composite construct measures, rather than the raw behavioural data, are subjected to statistical analyses using redundancy-based or context-based reduction principles. For example, taxonomic structures of individual-specificity can be explored using correlational analyses of the composite construct measures (for an empirical demonstration, see Uher et al 2013b).…”