Integrating Personality Structure, Personality Process, and Personality Development

Abstract

In this target article, we argue that personality processes, personality structure, and personality development have to be understood and investigated in integrated ways in order to provide comprehensive responses to the key questions of personality psychology. The psychological processes and mechanisms that explain concrete behaviour in concrete situations should provide explanation for patterns of variation across situations and individuals, for development over time as well as for structures observed in intra-individual and inter-individual differences. Personality structures, defined as patterns of covariation in behaviour, including thoughts and feelings, are results of those processes in transaction with situational affordances and regularities. It cannot be presupposed that processes are organized in ways that directly correspond to the observed structure. Rather, it is an empirical question whether shared sets of processes are uniquely involved in shaping correlated behaviours, but not uncorrelated behaviours (what we term 'correspondence' throughout this paper), or whether more complex interactions of processes give rise to population-level patterns of covariation (termed 'emergence'). The paper is organized in three parts, with part I providing the main arguments, part II reviewing some of the past approaches at (partial) integration, and part III outlining conclusions of how future personality psychology should progress towards complete integration. Working definitions for the central terms are provided in the appendix.

Interpersonal Dynamics in Personality and Personality Disorders

“…While it is likely that the organization of traits can deviate from this nomothetic structure across people or in certain contexts and thus room remains for inductive research on this issue (e.g. Cramer et al, ; Schmittmann et al, ; Wood, Gardner, & Harms, ), general consensus about the nomothetic organization of traits is useful in moving the field on from questions about which traits exist to questions about how the traits develop and function (Baumert et al, ).…”

“…Baumert et al () discussed the importance of connecting process models like these to research on developmental processes and trait structure. What is the mechanism by which specific situations could give rise to relatively enduring patterns of personality?…”

Psychological Comparison Processes and Self–Concept in Relation to Five Distinct Frame–Of–Reference Effects: Pan–Human Cross–Cultural Generalizability over 68 Countries

“…For McAdams, personality traits such as the Big Five are part of the self‐concept to the extent that individuals consider these traits to be a part of who they are. Underscoring this difficulty for personality research to integrate social contexts, the Ozer and Benet‐Martínez's (; also Baumert et al, ) review argues that for many, self‐concept is an integral part of personality but that self‐concept can also be seen as an outcome that is influenced by personality traits as well as life experience and context.…”

Focusing Personality Assessment on the Person: Modeling General, Shared, and Person Specific Processes in Personality and Psychopathology

“…In contrast, contemporary personality theories elaborate within-person dynamic processes that putatively give rise to the major individual difference domains (e.g., Baumert et al, 2017;DeYoung, 2015;Fleeson & Jayawickreme, 2015;Pincus, Hopwood, & Wright, in press). Thus, what we recognize as an individual's personality is actually their particular patterning of behavior as it fluctuates across time and in response to situations (Wright, 2011).…”