Continuity of the prototypes of social competence and shyness over the life span and across life transitions

Abstract

The continuity of the prototypes of two personality traits, social competence and shyness, over the life span and across life transitions was studied. Teachers who were either familiar with children in a particular life phase, or who were themselves in a certain transitional or stable life phase, were asked to give a description of a prototypical socially competent person and a prototypical shy person in that specific life phase. Results showed almost no change across the life phases in the extent to which specific behaviors or personality characteristics are regarded as typical for social competence or for shyness. Social competence and shyness therefore can be assessed by the same judgmental instruments at different ages and in different kinds of life phases.

Resilient, overcontrolled, and undercontroleed personality prototypes in childhood: Replicability, predictive power, and the trait-type issue.

“…That stability is lower than continuity is consistent with the findings for traits. Concerning continuity, Asendorpf (1992) found a continuity of .84 for behavioral correlates of judged shyness (a central aspect of overcontrol) between 4 and 23 years of age, and van Aken and Asendorpf (1996) reported continuities of .77 and .87 for teacher-rated prototypic Q-sort profiles for shyness and social competence (a central aspect of resiliency) between 3 and 15 years of age. In contrast, the stability of trait judgments across such large age intervals is moderate to low.…”