The theory of evolution: The rise and impact of evolutionary ideas, by R. Scoon. Evolution in its relation to the philosophy of nature and the philosophy of culture, by F.S.C. Northrop. The genetic nature of differences among men, by T. Dobzhansky. Evolutionary thought in America: Evolution and American sociology by R.E.L. Faris. The impact of the idea of evolution on the American political and constitutional tradition, by E.S. Corwin. Evolutionism in American economics, 1800-1946, by J.J. Spengler. The influence of evolutionary (...) theory upon American psychological thought, by E.G. Boring. Naturalism in American literature, by M. Cowley. The idea of organic expression and American architecture, by D.D. Egbert. Evolution and moral theory in America, W.F. Quillian, Jr. Evolution and theology in America, by S. Persons. (shrink)

Although fairness is a key moral trait, limited research focuses on participants' observed fairness behavior because moral traits are generally measured through self-report. This experiment focused on day-to-day interpersonal fairness rather than impersonal justice, and fairness was assessed as observed behavior. The experiment investigated whether a self-reported fairness trait would moderate a situational influence on observed fairness behavior, such that individuals with a stronger fairness trait would be less affected by a situational influence than those with a weaker fairness trait. (...) We used an iterated resource game in which participants could withdraw resources as they chose, and we manipulated the number of resources bogus players withdrew. The number of resources participants withdrew was the behavioral measure of fairness. Results confirmed the expected moderation of the unfairness manipulation by a fairness trait on observed behavior. Those reporting a stronger fairness trait were unaffected by the manipulation, whereas those reporting a weaker fairness trait were more strongly influenced. (shrink)

The coherence objection to the doctrine of the Incarnation maintains that it is impossible for one individual to have both the attributes of God and the attributes of a human being. This article examines Thomas Aquinas’s answer to this objection. I challenge the dominant, mereological interpretation of Aquinas’s position and, in light of this challenge, develop and defend a new alternative interpretation of Aquinas’s response to this important objection to Christian doctrine.

Character-trait attribution is an important component of everyday social cognition that has until recently received insufficient attention in traditional accounts of folk psychology. In this paper, I consider how the case of character-trait attribution fits into the debate between mindreading-based and broadly ‘pluralistic’ approaches to folk psychology. Contrary to the arguments of some pluralists, I argue that the evidence on trait understanding does not show that it is a distinct, non-mentalistic mode of folk-psychological reasoning, but rather suggests that (...) traits are ordinarily understood as mentalistic dispositions. I also examine several ways in which trait attribution might also serve regulative, ‘mindshaping’ functions by promoting predictable norm-governed behavior, and argue that mindreading plays several important roles in these cases as well. I conclude that an appreciation of the relationship between trait attribution and mindreading is crucial to understanding the role it plays in our folk psychology. (shrink)

Personality Psychology: Current Status and Prospects For the Future I want to consider the current status and future of the field of personality psychology, often basing my observations on my own research and theoretical interests. Let me begin by summarizing what I have to say in terms of three points of emphasis: First, the field of personality can be viewed in terms of three disciplines—trait, social cognitive, and psychodynamic—each associated with its own empirical procedures and (...) observations. That is, each is associated with its own form of personality data but all represent relevant data. Second, there is a need in the field for a dynamic systems perspective, one that emphasizes the interplay among the parts of the personality system in the course of the person's ongoing transactions with the physical and interpersonal environment. Third, in the future personality psychologists increasingly will have to integrate findings from biopsychology and neuroscience into their theories and research questions. This raises the question of how they can create bridges across levels of analysis and avoid the problem of reductionism. In other words, there is the issue of how personality psychologists will address the mind-body problem. (shrink)

Research on personality psychology is making important contributions to psychological science and applied psychology. This second edition of The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Psychology offers a one-stop resource for scientific personality psychology. It summarizes cutting-edge personality research in all its forms, including genetics, psychometrics, social-cognitive psychology, and real-world expressions, with informative and lively chapters that also highlight some areas of controversy. The team of renowned international authors, led by two esteemed editors, (...) ensures a wide range of theoretical perspectives. Each research area is discussed in terms of scientific foundations, main theories and findings, and future directions for research. The handbook also features advances in technology, such as molecular genetics and functional neuroimaging, as well as contemporary statistical approaches. An invaluable aid to understanding the central role played by personality in psychology, it will appeal to students, researchers, and practitioners in psychology, behavioral neuroscience, and the social sciences. (shrink)

In this paper I examine and reply to a deflationary challenge brought against virtue ethics. The challenge comes from critics who are impressed by recent psychological evidence suggesting that much of what we take to be virtuous conduct is in fact elicited by narrowly specific social settings, as opposed to being the manifestation of robust individual character. In answer to the challenge, I suggest a conception of virtue that openly acknowledges the likelihood of its deep, ongoing dependence upon particular social (...) relationships and settings. I argue that holding this conception will indeed cause problems for some important strands of thought in virtue ethics, most notably in the tradition of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. But an approach to virtue ethics modeled on David Hume's treatment of virtue and character in A Treatise of Human Nature promises to escape these problems. (shrink)

Scientific psychology involves both identifying and classifying phenomena of interest (description) and revealing the causes and mechanisms that contribute towards these phenomena arising (explanation). Within personality psychology, some propose that aspects of behavior and cognition can be explained with reference to personality traits. However, certain conceptual and logical issues cast doubt upon the adequacy of traits as coherent explanatory constructs. This paper discusses ?explanation? in psychology and the problems of circularity and reification. An analysis of (...) relations and intrinsic properties is then developed to address the logical requirements necessary for circumventing these problems. An examination of McCrae and Costa's defense of traits as explanatory constructs, in terms of ?tendencies? and ?dispositions? highlights logical issues that prevent traits, so defined, from explaining trait-like behaviors and cognitions. The logical requirements for a coherent trait-explanatory account are outlined and possible explanatory directions in trait-approaches are discussed. The ongoing tendency towards fallacious reasoning in psychology and suggestions for preventing this are further examined. (shrink)

In this book Frank Dumont presents personality psychology with a fresh description of its current status as well as its prospects. Play, sex, cuisine, creativity, altruism, pets, grieving rituals, and other oft-neglected topics broaden the scope of this fascinating study. This tract is imbued with historical perspectives that reveal the continuity in the evolving science and research of this discipline over the past century. The author places classic schemas and constructs, as well as current principles, in the context (...) of their socio-political catalysts. He further relates this study of the person to life-span developmental issues and to cultural, gender-specific, trait-based, genetic/epigenetic, and evolutionary research findings. Personality psychology has recently reconciled itself to more modest paradigms for describing, explaining, and predicting human behaviour than it generated in the 19th and 20th centuries. This book documents that transformation, providing valuable information for health-service professionals as well as to teachers, researchers, and scientists. (shrink)

This paper aims to expand the range of empirical work relevant to the extended cognition debates. First, I trace the historical development of the person-situation debate in social and personality psychology and the extended cognition debate in the philosophy of mind. Next, I highlight some instructive similarities between the two and consider possible objections to my comparison. I then argue that the resolution of the person-situation debate in terms of interactionism lends support for an analogously interactionist conception of (...) extended cognition. I argue that this interactionism might necessitate a shift away from the dominant agent-artifact paradigm toward an agent–agent paradigm. If this is right, then social and personality psychology—the discipline(s) that developed from the person-situation debate—opens a whole new range of empirical considerations for extended cognition theorists which align with Clark & Chalmers original vision of agents themselves as spread into the world. (shrink)

Reviews the book, Behavior and personality: Psychological behaviorism by Arthur W. Staats . Staats' latest book provides a brief introduction to his philosophy of science known as unified positivism and a comprehensive review of his specific theory known as psychological behaviorism . Readers unfamiliar with Staats' work can, through this book, become acquainted with his earnest, if not somewhat totalitarian, strategy for uniting psychology under a single theoretical framework. Although Staats' earlier publications provide a more clear and accessible (...) exposition of his project than the current work, this book nonetheless constitutes an important contribution to the literature of fragmentation. 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

Owen Flanagan argues in this book for a more psychologically realistic ethical reflection and spells out the ways in which psychology can enrich moral philosophy. Beginning with a discussion of such "moral saints" as Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and Oskar Shindler, Flanagan charts a middle course between an ethics that is too realistic and socially parochial and one that is too idealistic, giving no weight to our natures.

This study proposed and examined a conceptual framework on the influence of real estate brokers’ personalities, psychological empowerment, social capital, and knowledge sharing on their innovation performance, and used moral hazard as a moderating variable. We used structural equation modeling for data analysis and estimation. The participants were real estate brokers in Kaohsiung City. A total of 1,000 questionnaires were administered to 100 branch offices of real estate companies, 571 of which were later recovered from 80 branch offices. After removing (...) 52 for being invalid, we were left with 519 valid questionnaires, indicating a 51.9% recovery rate. The empirical results suggest that the real estate brokers’ personalities and psychological empowerment positively and significantly influence social capital; personality and psychological empowerment also positively and significantly influence their innovation performance; and social capital significantly influences knowledge sharing, which in turn positively and significantly influences the brokers’ innovation performance. In environments with higher levels of moral hazard, the influence of social capital on the brokers’ knowledge sharing is significantly diminished. (shrink)

Identifying causal relations from correlational data is a fundamental challenge in personality psychology. In most cases, random assignment is not feasible, leaving observational studies as the primary methodological tool. Here, we document several techniques from behavior genetics that attempt to demonstrate causality. Although no one method is conclusive at ruling out all possible confounds, combining techniques can triangulate on causal relations. Behavior genetic tools leverage information gained by sampling pairs of individuals with assumed genetic and environmental relatedness or (...) by measuring genetic variants in unrelated individuals. These designs can find evidence consistent with causality, while simultaneously providing strong controls against common confounds. We conclude by discussing several potential problems that may limit the utility of these techniques when applied to personality. Ultimately, genetically informative designs can aid in drawing causal conclusions from correlational studies. (shrink)

A new venture barely makes a profit in its initial stage, and its success depends on innovation. Innovation is related to the work environment, and the innovation behavior of employees is of great significance to the performance improvement of new venture. Based on the previous research, in this study, hypotheses on the correlation between work environment, employee innovation behavior, and corporate performance are put forward first. Then, with team cooperation, organizational incentive, leadership support, sufficient resources, and work pressure as the (...) factors of the work environment, the bosses, middle and senior managers involved in entrepreneurship, and the main members of the entrepreneurial team of 202 newly established enterprises in developed regions are surveyed online or in scene. Multivariate hierarchical regression analysis is performed to analyze the data collected from the questionnaire. The results show that the effective recovery rate of the questionnaire is 86.4%; the number of traditional enterprises is 108, and that of R&D enterprises is 68 ; teamwork, leadership support, and work pressure are all correlated with employees’ innovative behavior ; employee innovation behavior is positively correlated with enterprise performance ; the working environment and employee innovation behavior promote enterprise performance ; and the working environment affects the relationship between employee innovation behavior and enterprise performance. The study theoretically enriches the research on the relationship between innovation behavior, work environment, and enterprise performance of new ventures. In practice, it is suggested that start-up enterprises provide good working environment for employees and attach importance to innovation activities at the individual level of employees, which provides useful guidance and reference for the development of Chinese start-up enterprises. (shrink)

개인동일성은 우리가 사람으로서 시간을 가로질러 지속하는 조건에 관한 형이상학의 오랜 논제이다. 개인동일성에 대한 지속 조건들의 문제는 ‘시간이 지남에 따른 개인동일성 문제’, 혹은 ‘지속성 질문(the Persistence question)’이라 불린다. 지속성 질문에 답하기 위한 몇 가지 시도들이 있다. 개인동일성과 관련한 지속성 질문에 대한 가장 인기 있는 답변은 심리적 연속성 견해(psychological-continuity views)이다. 이 견해는 심리주의로 알려져 있다. 이 견해에 따르면 개인의 지속은 어떤 심리적 속성들로 구성된다. 또 다른 영향력 있는 답변은 동물적-신체적 견해(brute-physical views)이다. 인간 존재를 생물학적 유기체로 보고 동물적-신체적 조건들이 인간의 지속 조건이라고 보는 (...) 이러한 입장은 우리에게 ‘애니멀리즘(animalism)’으로 알려져 있다. 본 논문은 심리적 연속성과 연결성이 우리의 지속 조건이라고 보는 심리주의와 동물적-신체적 연속성을 지속의 우선순위에 두는 애니멀리즘 혹은 생체주의의 논증들의 핵심 쟁점들을 검토하고, ‘무-사실 논제’를 통해 사실 지속성의 조건에 문제가 되는 사실이 없음을 보일 것이다. (shrink)

This article deals with two aspects of psychoanalytic history. The first is the history of ideas, specifically the notions of a one- and two-person psychology that are in such wide use today. Second, the authors attend, much more critically, to a disturbance of memory (repeated distortion, omission, selective representation, and misrepresentation) that has accompanied scholarly discussion of these ideas for the past 50 years. Finally, the authors attempt to restore the original meaning of the person-psychology concept and illustrate (...) its relevance for contemporary psychoanalytic debate. (shrink)

Purpose. The dynamics and pace of social and economic transformations that are characteristic of modern society, lead to an increase in tension and the destruction of habitual stereotypes – ideals, values, norms, patterns of behaviour that unite people. These moments encourage us to rethink the understanding of "security" essence, in particular, psychological, which emphasizes the urgency of its study in the philosophical and sociocultural coordinates. Theoretical basis of the research is based on the philosophical methodology of K. Jaspers, E. Fromm (...) and the A. Maslow’s psychological approach to understanding of a person. Originality. Psychological security is considered at different levels: first and foremost, society is a characteristic of social security, that is an analysis of how today’s social technologies, social changes affect the quality of life of the country’s population; secondly, the social environment – the family, the immediate environment, reference groups, training teams; thirdly, a person is an experience of his own security-insecurity, when it is possible to talk about the manifestations of psychological violence, when certain behavioral acts contribute to the violation of the security of the other or to self-destruction. It is found out that the knowledge of psychological security is closely connected with the socio-historical conditions of being, with the level of development of material and spiritual culture, with the interests and values prevailing in society, which determines its ontological, epistemological and axiological features. The presented issue is considered in the correlation of psychological security with types of scientific rationality – classical, nonclassical and post-nonclassical approaches, within the framework of which various perspectives, aspects, forms and types of psychological security are studied. Conclusions. The concept of security requires a systematic description of its manifestations, types, levels, concepts: security as the absence of dangers ; security as a certain activity to ensure or to prevent any threats or dangers ; security as a conscious necessity, the value of the individual. The study systematizes various ideas about psychological security in accordance with the logic of scientific knowledge: in the mainstream of classical, non-classical and post-nonclassical approaches. (shrink)

Culture is acknowledged to be a critical element in the construction of an individual's identity; however, in today's increasingly multicultural environments, the influence of culture is no longer straightforward. It is now important to explore cultural identity clarity—the extent to which beliefs about identity that arise from one's cultural group membership are clearly and confidently understood. We describe a novel theoretical model to explain why having a clear and confident understanding of one's cultural identity is important for psychological well-being, as (...) it clarifies one's understanding of personal identity. We propose that a clear cultural identity clarifies one's personal existence, by providing a clear normative template, reducing personal uncertainty, providing an individual with a sense of continuity, and buffering an individual against the fear of death. We discuss the implications of this model within our complex cultural worlds. (shrink)

본 논문은 현대 개인동일성 이론의 주류를 점하고 있는 심리주의와 생체주의의 개인동일성 규준을 명확히 하고, 이를 중심으로 개인동일성이 도덕적 책임 귀속의 필요조건인지 여부를 탐색한다. 심리주의는 우리가 특정한 종류의 심리적 특성을 유지함으로써 존속한다고 본다. 본 논문은 로크의 기억이론과 파핏-슈메이커류의 신(新)로크주의를 검토하면서 심리주의의 핵심주장을 분명히 한다. 특히 심리적 연결과 심리적 연속성의 개념을 명료히 함으로써 심리주의는 심리적 연속성을 개인동일성의 필요충분조건으로 간주한다는 점을 밝힌다. 한편 생체주의는 우리가 인간유기체의 종적 특성을 보존함으로써 존속한다고 본다. 본 논문은 생리적 연속성의 개념적 분석을 통해 생체주의는 생리적 연속성을 개인동일성의 필요충분조건으로 간주한다는 (...) 점을 밝히고, 생체주의가 심리주의에 대한 기존의 대안이론인 개인동일성에 대한 신체적 접근과 어떻게 다른지 논의한다. 이처럼 심리주의와 생체주의의 핵심주장을 정리한 다음 본 논문은 양자가 양립불가능하다는 점을 논증한다. 개인동일성과 도덕적 책임 귀속의 문제와 관련하여, 본 논문은 대뇌 이식과 분열의 사례를 검토함으로써 생체주의와 심리주의가 각각 개인동일성이 도덕적 책임 귀속의 필요조건이 아님을 함축한다는 것을 논증한다. 대뇌 이식의 경우 수혜자는 증여자의 성품과 성향, 반응태도 등 도덕적 책임의 귀속과 관련 있어 보이는 심리적 특성을 가질 수밖에 없다. 그러나 생체주의는 두 사람이 동일한 인물이 아님을 함축한다. 반면 심리주의는 심리적 연속성을 개인동일성의 필요충분조건으로 간주함으로써, 개인동일성이 도덕적 책임의 필요조건임을 함축하는 것처럼 보인다. 그런데 분열의 사례에서 분열하기 이전의 행위에 대한 책임은 분열 이후의 두 사람에게 귀속되는 것처럼 보인다. 그러나 분열 이전의 개인은 분열 이후의 두 사람 중 어느 누구와도 동일하지 않다. (shrink)

_The Budapest School of Psychoanalysis_ brings together a collection of expertly written pieces on the influence of the Budapest conception of analytic theory and practice on the evolution of psychoanalysis. It touches on major figures Sándor Ferenczi and Michael Balint whilst concurrently considering topics such as Ferenczi’s clinical diary, the study of trauma, the Confusion of Tongues paradigm, and Balint’s perspective on supervision. Further to this, the book highlights Jacques Lacan’s teaching of Ferenczi, which brings a fresh perspective to a (...) relatively unknown connection between them. The book highlights that the Hungarian analysts, influenced by Ferenczi, through their pioneering work developed a psychoanalytic paradigm which became an alternative to the Freudian tradition. That this paradigm has become recognised and admired in its own right underlines the need to clearly outline, as this book does, the historical context and the output of those who are writing and working in the tradition of the Budapest School. The contributions to this volume demonstrate the widespread and enduring influence of the Budapest School on contemporary psychoanalysis. The contributors are amongst the foremost in Budapest School scholarship and the insights they offer are at once profound as well as insightful. This book is an important read for those practitioners and students of psychoanalysis who wish for an insight into the early and developing years of the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis and its impact on contemporary clinical practice. (shrink)

This book offers an innovative introduction to the psychological basis of mathematics and the nature of mathematical thinking and learning, using an approach that empowers students by fostering their own construction of mathematical structures. Through accessible and engaging writing, award-winning mathematician and educator Anderson Norton reframes mathematics as something that exists first in the minds of students, rather than something that exists first in a textbook. By exploring the psychological basis for mathematics at every level - including geometry, algebra, calculus, (...) complex analysis and more - Norton unlocks students' personal power to construct mathematical objects based on their own mental activity, and illustrates the power of mathematics in organizing the world as we know it. Including reflections and activities designed to inspire awareness of the mental actions and processes coordinated in practicing mathematics, the book is geared towards current and future secondary and elementary mathematics teachers who will empower the next generation of mathematicians and STEM majors. Those interested in the history and philosophy that underpins mathematics will also benefit from this book, as well as those informed and curious minds attentive to the human experience more generally. Anderson Norton is Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Virginia Tech, USA, where he has been teaching mathematics courses for future teachers for 15 years. He is the editor of Constructing Number, and the co-author of Developing Fractions Knowledge and Numeracy for All Learners. (shrink)

In this accessible integration of psychology and theology, Marjorie Lindner Gunnoe offers a comprehensive understanding of personhood from both perspectives, examining the intersection of biblical perspectives with established theories of social development as proposed by Erik Erikson, B. F. Skinner, Evoluntionary Psychology, and more.

Epistemology and the Psychology of Personality I; [n his discussion of publication trends in contemporary personality psychology, Hogan () noted that; ...

Proponents of mindshaping argue that third-person folk psychology is not primarily about "reading" mental states for the purpose of behavior prediction and explanation. Instead, they claim that third-person folk psychology is first and foremost a regulative practice -- one that "shapes" mental states in accordance with the norms of a shared folk psychological framework. This paper investigates to what extent the core assumptions behind the mindshaping hypothesis are compatible with an account of first-person folk psychology that is (...) based on the notion of "self-regulative agency.". (shrink)

Most philosophers writing about personal identity in recent years claim that what it takes for us to persist through time is a matter of psychology. In this groundbreaking new book, Eric Olson argues that such approaches face daunting problems, and he defends in their place a radically non-psychological account of personal identity. He defines human beings as biological organisms, and claims that no psychological relation is either sufficient or necessary for an organism to persist. Olson rejects several famous thought-experiments (...) dealing with personal identity. He argues, instead, that one could survive the destruction of all of one's psychological contents and capabilities as long as the human organism remains alive--as long as its vital functions, such as breathing, circulation, and metabolism, continue. (shrink)

The paper has been written from a philosophical perspective and triggered by the recurrent discussions in psychology about the most suitable methods to study our multifaceted subjectivity. Its main point is that a phenomenological understanding of the human person provides a robust and also flexible philosophical framework for psychology. The first part discusses three classical distinctions –individual/general; explaining/understanding; induction/interpretation– which, in spite of possible deficiencies, are useful to illustrate the specificity of the human sciences relative to the natural (...) sciences. If not understood as an either-or dichotomy these distinctions represent the search of the right balance to reflect the complexity and richness of psychological science. The second part presents the phenomenological notions of ‘vital reduction’ and ‘personalist reduction’, where reductions does not take on an eliminativistic meaning, but of directing the mind’s gaze to attend to what is originally the case. The ‘vital reduction’ reveals a subject of experience at the center of the lifeworld, and the ‘personalist reduction’ sees in rationality –i.e., the power to grasp the meaning of things and to recognize other subjects of experience­– a deeper dimension of the subject, who we can thus call a person. Psychology and phenomenology converge in disclosing the person-centeredness of our lifeworld. (shrink)

Explanations in psychology are described as personal when they attribute psychological phenomena to the person, as when we attribute beliefs and thought processes to each other, for example. By contrast, explanations in psychology are described as subpersonal when they attribute psychological phenomena below the level of the person, as occurs when scientists describe parts of the brain as representing or evaluating, for example. The practice of subpersonal psychology raises a number of philosophical issues: whether it is acceptable (...) to attribute psychological phenomena to parts of persons, for example, and whether such attributions can yield any explanatory benefit. Even those who endorse subpersonal psychology do not necessarily agree on what this entails: there are several distinct ways of understanding the relationship between subpersonal psychology and personal psychology, which depend in part on how the ontological commitments of subpersonal explanations are understood. (shrink)

This is a critical, personalized approach to reframing the discipline of psychology through a singular narrative in the form of a memoir written by a successful research psychologist. In this book we follow Martin's unique career, which has allowed him to understand and adopt different perspectives and ways of approaching psychology, from working in applied areas like educational and counseling psychology to more specialized areas like theory and history of psychology. His journey through and within the (...) field describes his movement away from scientifically based psychology, which views teachings and interventions to be primarily underwritten by hard scientific evidence. Martin exposes the flaws in this approach and highlights the importance of focusing on the study of persons in their life contexts over the use of aggregated group results to ensure that the discipline survives and flourishes. This is an impactful and universally applicable book with valuable insights for students and scholars of psychology today, particularly those studying history of psychology, theoretical psychology, and philosophical psychology. (shrink)

Climate change is an anthropogenic existential threat that provokes extreme concern among climate scientists, but not, it seems, among all member of the public. Here, there is considerably more variability in level of concern and, it appears, in everyday sustainable behavior. But how does personality affect this variability in behavior? And how are underlying personality states like dispositional optimism linked to more sustainable everyday practices? Research in clinical psychology has suggested that dispositional optimism is a very positive (...) personality characteristic associated with higher levels of hope and resilience, but applied research from other domains has reported that optimists can, on occasion, bury their heads in the sand and avoid attending to external threats, like climate change, in order to maintain mood state. So are optimists more immune to climate change messaging than non-optimists? And do they make fewer sustainable choices? A series of experimental studies, manipulating signifiers of carbon footprint (Study 1) and eco labels on products (Study 2) found that optimists made more sustainable choices than non-optimists and that both groups were influenced equally by climate change film clips in terms of sustainable choices (Study 1). Optimists also displayed a false consensus effect, overestimating the proportion of people who would behave more sustainably like themselves (Study 3). Given that global problems like climate change need concerted, cooperative effort, these optimistic beliefs about how others behave could be adaptive in the long-run. Designing climate change messages to appeal to optimists might be a critical consideration for the future. (shrink)

Within contemporary personality psychology there is widespread consensus that, at long last, the basic elements of "the" human personality have been empirically discovered, and that the systematic search for the underlying causes and consequences of personality differences can be pursued on this basis. The putatively basic trait dimensions are neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness, and are referred to collectively as "the Big Five." In the present article, this perspective on the psychology of personality (...) is examined critically and found wanting. It is argued that neither the "Big Five" framework in particular nor trait "psychology" more generally is adequate as the basis for a scientific psychology of the human person. 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

Background:The understanding of factors that shape risk perception is crucial to modulate the perceived threat and, in turn, to promote optimal engagement in preventive actions.Methods:An on-line, cross-sectional, survey was conducted in Italy between May and July 2020 to investigate risk perception for COVID-19 and the adoption of preventive measures. A total of 964 volunteers participated in the study. Possible predictors of risk perception were identified through a hierarchical multiple linear regression analysis, including sociodemographic, epidemiological and, most of all, psychological factors. (...) A path analysis was adopted to probe the possible mediating role of risk perception on the relationship between the independent variables considered and the adoption of preventive measures.Results:Focusing on the psychological predictors of risk perception, high levels of anxiety, an anxious attachment, and an external locus of control predicted higher perceived risk. Conversely, high levels of openness personality and of avoidant attachment predicted a lower perception of risk. In turn, the higher was the perceived risk the higher was the adoption of precautionary measures. Furthermore, psychological factors influenced the adoption of preventive behaviors both directly and indirectly through their effect on risk perception.Conclusions:Our findings might be taken into high consideration by stakeholders, who are responsible for promoting a truthful perception of risk and proper compliance with precautionary measures. (shrink)

This paper argues that if persons last over time by “enduring”, then no analysis or reduction of personal identity over time in tenus of any sort of psychological continuity can be correct. In other words, any analysis of personal identity over time in tenus of psychological continuity entails that persons are four-dimensional and have temporal parts. The paper then shows that if we abandon psychological analyses of personal identity---as we must if persons endure---Parfit’s argument for the claim that identity does (...) not matter in survival is easily undenuined. The paper then suggests that this offers support for the claim that persons endure. Along the way the paper tries to clarify the contrast between the doctrine that persons endure and its rival, four-dimensionalism. (shrink)

Psychological and philosophical perspectives are employed in an exploration of the reasons particular individuals experience an activity as personally expressive while others may find the same activity neutral or even aversive. The relationships between personal expressiveness and intrinsic motivation, flow, and self-actualization are considered. The construct of personal expressiveness is shown to have its roots in eudaimonistic philosophy. Living in a manner consistent with one's daimon or "true self" gives rise to a cognitive-affective state labeled "eudaimonia" that is distinguishable from (...) hedonic enjoyment. A personally expressive personality pattern is described integrating concepts from diverse theories including a sense of personal identity, self-actualization, an internal locus of control, and principled moral reasoning. A series of empirical investigations is proposed to test the theoretical concepts of personal expressiveness advanced. (shrink)