Measurement Issues in Tests of the Socioecological Complexity Hypothesis

Abstract

Recent research has advanced a socioecological theory to account for differences in the strengths of covariances among disparate personality measurements in different cultures. According to this socioecological complexity hypothesis, niche diversity is greater in more complex societies and this relaxes the covariances among personality traits (e.g., see Lukaszewski et al., 2017). While the socioecological complexity hypothesis is novel and interesting, we suggest that approaches used to test it thus far are conceptually and methodologically flawed. Accordingly, extant findings should be considered cautiously and not construed as evidence against alternative explanations for differences in personality or other behavioral trait covariances within or across countries. To advance the literature, here we review measurement issues that require attention in efforts to test the socioecological complexity hypothesis and then describe approaches that may aide researchers in overcoming them.

Niche diversity effects on personality measurement – evidence from large national samples during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Arguably, using the factor replicability is a more appropriate test of the niche construction hypothesis, because it provides an overall estimate on the organization of the personality space as inferred from the survey responses instead of assuming that the factors are present and then only examining the relative relation of factors to each other. We strongly encourage future studies to consider the cognitive implications at the psychometric level instead of just analyzing the factor interrelations because in the face of substantiative factor incomparability these intercorrelations might not be meaningful ( Fischer et al, 2022 ; Lasker et al, 2022 ).…”

“…Building on the earlier work investigating threat - resource models, we argue that a proper test of the niche diversity hypothesis needs to first focus on the replicability of the factor structure rather than assuming that the factors are replicated but vary in their intercorrelation. Lasker et al (2022) had pointed out that a failure to properly test measurement invariance in previous studies leads to alternative methodological interpretations. Our view is that testing the replication of the factor structure provides actually a conceptually more robust support for the argument that increased niche diversity provides differential cost-benefit ratios of behavior that in the aggregate of a community and over time translate into differential behavioral profiles that unfold into more or less differentiated personality structures.…”

The role of early intervention for adolescent mental health and polydrug use: Cascading mediation through childhood growth in the general psychopathology (p) factor.

“…This analysis is necessary because the measured variables need to carry the same meaning and represent the same construct in the same metric (Millsap, 2011) across subgroups and across assessment points. However, the procedures for examining measurement invariance of binary-response bifactor CFA on repeated measures have not been well developed (Lasker et al, 2022). As an alternative, we conducted multi-group measurement modeling of the bifactor structure by intervention conditions and by developmental stage (i.e., equivalence across ages 2-4; equivalence across ages 7.5-10.5) and gauged equivalence of the bifactor structure (i.e., factor loadings, thresholds) based on the adequate goodness-of-fit indices for the model that had all of the thresholds and loadings constrained to be equal across conditions or across assessments.…”

Measurement Bias, Sex Differences, and the Implications of Substantial Theories

“…120 of these items were included in the IPIP-NEO 120, a 120-item collection of questions distilled from the original 300-item IPIP-NEO and intended to measure thirty facets of the Big Five personality factors with a reasonably short questionnaire (Johnson, 2014). Based on the validity evidence provided in the IPIP-NEO 120's norming, we expect to observe six facets for each of five factors in Anglophone countries and, perhaps, evidence for additional crossloadings or fewer factors in less economically developed countries (Lukaszewski et al, 2017;Lasker et al, 2021).…”