Topic > Investigating the intersection of personality and intelligence

Traditionally, individual differences in intelligence and personality have been studied in separate paradigms. Intelligence is typically conceptualized and measured as “peak performance” while personality is conceptualized and measured as “typical performance” (Goff & Ackerman, 1992). Intelligence is assessed using tests designed to elicit a person's maximum mental capacity. Tests are usually administered according to strict administrative procedures in order to create an environment of high situational strength that will limit environmental or contextual factors. An individual taking an intelligence test is told that there is only one correct answer to each question and is emphasized the importance of giving one's best effort. In contrast, personality assessments are designed to measure behavioral tendencies in a wider variety of contexts. Personality traits are usually measured using self-report questionnaires in which the respondent is informed that there are no right or wrong answers and is asked to answer honestly. Items are not rated as “correct” or “incorrect,” but rather are rated on a two-way scale (e.g., Likert scale). This suggests that these constructs should be studied separately given their critical differences in theory and measurement, an approach to studying personality-intelligence associations that has been labeled the “independence approach” (Chamorro-Premuzic & Ackerman, 2011). to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay However, there have been substantial theoretical and empirical advances in studying the intersection of personality traits and intelligence (DeYoung, 2011). The expansion of the personality-intelligence association literature, which began both with broad investigations exploring trait correlates and progressed toward specific theories hypothesizing a small set of trait relationships (Ackerman & Heggestad, 1997), ultimately given rise to "intellectual investment traits". Investment traits are defined as “stable individual differences in the tendency to continually seek, engage in, enjoy, and pursue opportunities for demanding cognitive activity” (von Strumm, et al., 2011). Such traits are generally correlated more substantially with crystallized intelligence than with fluid intelligence (Goff & Ackerman, 1992; Funmham. Monsen, & Ahmetoglu, 2009; Judge et al., 2007; von Strumm & Ackerman, 2013) . This document provides a historical review of the development of these investment characteristics. I will begin by reviewing work that preceded the theoretical support of investment characteristics but which: a) provided commentary or theories that intelligence is not simply an inherited ability by acknowledging the role of non-ability factors, or b) has included extensive investigations into personality and ability associations. Next, I will review two foundational developmental theories that provide the theoretical backbone for investment traits and three of the most frequently used investment traits and their psychometric measurement scales. Finally, I conclude by discussing the burgeoning area of ​​intellectual investment and the broad impact that investment traits have had on the field of psychology, both historically and currently. Early work that led to the theoretical development of intellectual investment traits Early empirical studies suggesting personality-intelligence associations were very broad in scope and that the literature later converged on a smaller number of traits that playan important role in intellectual development (Ackerman & Heggestad, 1997). The early part of the 20th century was characterized by such extensive investigations, one of the first of which was Edward Webb's thesis study (Webb, 1915). As a student of Charles Spearman, Webb supported Spearman's (g) theory of general intelligence (Spearman, 1904). For his thesis study, Webb designed a study in which he assigned expert students to evaluate less advanced students in a program teaching a wide variety of skills and personality traits over the course of a semester and used factor analysis to isolate a general factor of intelligence. and a general “character” factor (i.e. non-ability factors). The results suggested two aspects of mental processes: intelligence and character. Although Webb considered these factors distinct and used an orthogonal rotation in his analysis, he observed that ratings of intelligence and character were correlated and attributed this to a bias on the part of raters against students they rated positively. The important aspect of this study for the purposes of this paper is its broad nature: Webb reported that these two general factors appeared to be related (albeit due to rating bias) but did not discuss a small number of specific traits which play an important role. This is a representative example of early studies of personality-intelligence associations that did not include the precision of studies later in history. The idea that personality traits are related to intellectual ability can also be traced back to the early history of differential psychology. Lewis Terman is known not only for the development of the Stanford-Binet intelligence test (Terman, 1916), but also for his longitudinal study of gifted children. Terman identified approximately 1,500 children of remarkable ability, whom he called “Termites,” and selected them based on an IQ threshold of 140 (Terman, 1922; Terman & Fenton, 1921). He launched a large-scale longitudinal study in which he followed them throughout their lives and collected a significant amount of psychological measurements. In tracking gifted children, Terman included an assessment of what he called “intellectual traits” (Terman & Oden, 1959, as cited in von Strumm & Ackerman, 2013). The assessment asked parents and teachers to rate the four students on four different personality aspects: desire to know, general intelligence, originality and common sense. Although this was an early mention of personality traits related to intelligence, it is worth pointing out that Terman did not use a personality trait that was “specific to the investment personality space” (von Strumm & Ackerman, 2013) . There were two other contributions that were important in laying the foundation for the theoretical developments that led to the development of the characteristics of intellectual investment. The first was presented in William McDougall's book in which he outlined his theory of dynamic psychology (McDougall, 1932). McDougall believed that natural instincts drive human behavior and that this premise was the central theme of his book. He identified 18 different intrinsic “propensities” that motivate human behavior: food seeking, disgust, sex, fear, curiosity, protective/parental, sociable, self-assertive, submissive, anger, attraction, constructive, acquisitive, laughter, comfort, rest. /sleep, migratory and bodily needs. McDougall argued that no behavior is purely intellectual, but rather all forms of behavior are based on one or more of these instinctive propensities. He offered the hypothetical example of a hungry mouse in a cage along with food tied to a rope connected to a piece of lead on the otherside of the cage, leaving the food suspended in mid-air. The rat gets food by pulling the string. McDougall argued that although many psychologists consider this behavior to be intellectual, it is not pure intelligence because the propensity to forage for food drives the behavior. In other words, animal and human behavior is “both instinctive and intelligent” (McDougall, 1932, p. 67). Although McDougall's argument did not specifically involve personality traits, his theory recognized the role of tendencies outside the domain of abilities that impact behavior, and this idea was expanded by later theories that had a significant impact on the literature on the traits of intellectual investment. The second contribution that led psychologists towards theories that suggested the influence of personality traits on intelligence came from Keith Hayes (1962). Similar to McDougall, Hayes argued that intelligence was linked not only to natural abilities, but also to natural propensities in behavior. However, Hayes went a step further by stating that intelligence is determined solely by genetic differences in “experience-producing drives” which in turn lead to differences in the knowledge that individuals accumulate. Similar to McDougall, Hayes offered a hypothetical example to illustrate his point. If two fraternal twins growing up in the same environment differ in interests such that one twin is oriented toward linguistic activities such as speaking and reading and the other is oriented toward physical activities such as sports, it is a strong possibility that the twin is oriented towards linguistic activity will score higher on the Stanford Binet as a teenager than his activity-oriented twin simply because he has developed a larger vocabulary by reading and speaking more frequently. Hayes bases his proposal that intelligence is the result of drive-producing experiences on four related arguments: 1) differences in motivation are genetically based, 2) differences in motivation lead to different experiences, 3) experiential differences lead to differences in abilities, and 4) differences in intelligence are nothing more than differences in acquired abilities. Hayes uses a variety of evidence to support these arguments, including research on learning and memory, evidence from adults who suffer brain damage, and the lack of statistical evidence of “superior mental function.” Ultimately, he concludes that “innate intellectual potential consists of the tendency to engage in activities conducive to learning, rather than inherited abilities.” (Hayes, 1962). Although Hayes does not mention specific personality traits, his theory suggests that intelligence is more than an inherited ability and that the drive to engage in different types of activities influences the knowledge that humans acquire over the course of their lives. Subsequent theoretical contributions built on the work of both Hayes and McDougall to develop comprehensive theories of intellectual investment that laid the foundation for the development of scales measuring personality traits that drive the acquisition of knowledge and skills. Theoretical Foundations of Trait Investment While the work discussed in the previous section emphasized the idea that non-skill factors play a role in the depth and breadth of knowledge or skills acquired over the life course and included extensive empirical investigations that suggested personality-intelligence associations, none discussed specific theories involving the role that personality traits play in the development of intelligence. In this section, I will examine two theories of development that are central to theconceptual understanding of the characteristics of investments. Raymond B. Cattell's “investing theory of intelligence” may have been the most critical theory for the development of investing characteristics. Cattell famously introduced a hierarchical theory of intelligence with two factors at the broadest level: fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence (Cattell, 1963). Fluid intelligence involves process-related abilities such as novel problem solving, abstract thinking, memory, and flexible thinking that peak in your twenties and then decline throughout the rest of your life. Crystallized intelligence involves content-related knowledge, including factual knowledge, vocabulary, and understanding that increases or is maintained across the lifespan (Horn & Cattell, 1966, 1967). Cattell's investment theory discusses the relationship between fluid and crystallized intelligence. The theory proposes that investment in a fluid intelligence eventually gives rise to a crystallized intelligence that uses more and more knowledge or skills. Cattell referred to a relationship between fluid ability and the accumulation of knowledge in a 1943 Psychological Bulletin article when he stated that “crystallized ability consists of discriminatory habits long established in a particular field, originally through the operation of fluid ability, but which no longer require penetrating skills. perceptual for their successful functioning” (Cattell, 1943). He later expanded this idea by proposing the formal theory in his book entitled Intelligence: Its Structure, Growth, and Action Cattell (1971/1987). In his book, Cattell offers an example that illustrates the relationship he proposed between fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence. A student learning to solve algebra problems initially uses his or her fluid intellectual abilities, but over time, as he or she becomes more familiar with the methods used to solve the problem, he or she becomes a crystallized intelligence as he or she uses already acquired procedural knowledge rather than putting in effort. into new problems. -solve. If this premise holds, a person's current crystallized ability is a function of the "operating levels" of their fluid intelligence in previous years. According to Cattell, individual differences outside the domain of ability affect what people invest their fluid intelligence in and the extent to which they do so. He argues that this is why Spearman observes a general intelligence factor. It's not because one's vocabulary affects one's ability to solve math problems, but because people who invest more of their fluid intelligence perform better on each other's tests. This is especially true in early education settings where a standardized curriculum exists. The correlations between different skills and knowledge decrease as one specializes in a particular subject or profession. In a later chapter of his book, Cattell proposes a set of personality traits from the 16PF personality structure (Cattell, Eber, & Tatsuoka, 1970) that can stimulate skill development. He suggests that higher levels of regression (i.e., neuroticism) and general inhibition are negatively related to ability, while higher levels of cortical alertness, temperamental independence, exuberance, and competitive ego strength are positively related to ability. investment theory to propose a more specific theory regarding the role of personality in the development of intelligence (Ackerman, 1996). The theory, titled the PPIK framework, identifies four components of adult intellect: intelligence as a process (P), personality (P), interests (I), and.