Testing the lexical hypothesis: Are socially important traits more densely reflected in the English lexicon?

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Volumn 108, Issue 2, 2015, Pages 317-335

  Wood, Dustin ^a  

^a WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Big Five; Lexical hypothesis; Personality traits; Social desirability; Trait structure

Indexed keywords

ADULT; CHARACTER; CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY; FEMALE; HUMAN; HUMAN RELATION; LINGUISTICS; MALE; MIDDLE AGED; QUESTIONNAIRE; SEMANTICS; SOCIAL ADAPTATION;

ADULT; CHARACTER; CULTURE; FEMALE; HUMANS; INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS; MALE; MIDDLE AGED; QUESTIONNAIRES; SEMANTICS; SOCIAL SKILLS; VOCABULARY;

EID: 84925439967     PISSN: 00223514     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1037/a0038343     Document Type: Article

References (77)

1. Abele, A. E., & Wojciszke, B. (2007). Agency and communion from the perspective of self versus others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 751-763. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.93.5.751
2. Allport, G. W. (1937). Personality: A psychological interpretation. Oxford: Holt.
3. Almagor, M., Tellegen, A., & Waller, N. G. (1995). The Big Seven model: A cross-cultural replication and further exploration of the basic dimensions of natural language trait descriptors. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 300-307. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514 .69.2.300
4. Ashton, M. C., & Lee, K. (2007). Empirical, theoretical, and practical advantages of the HEXACO model of personality structure. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 11, 150-166. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1088868306294907
5. Ashton, M. C., Lee, K., & Goldberg, L. R. (2004). A hierarchical analysis of 1,710 English personality-descriptive adjectives. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87, 707-721. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.87.5.707
6. Ashton, M. C., Lee, K., Goldberg, L. R., & de Vries, R. E. (2009). Higher order factors of personality: Do they exist? Personality and Social Psychology Review, 13, 79 -91. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1088868309338467
7. Ashton, M. C., Lee, K., Perugini, M., Szarota, P., de Vries, R. E., Di Blas, L., De Raad, B. (2004). A six-factor structure of personalitydescriptive adjectives: Solutions from psycholexical studies in seven languages. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86, 356-366. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.86.2.356
8. Austin, J. L. (1956). A plea for excuses. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 57, 1-30.
9. Benet-Martínez, V., & Waller, N. G. (1997). Further evidence for the cross-cultural generality of the Big Seven Factor model: Indigenous and imported Spanish personality constructs. Journal of Personality, 65, 567-598. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.1997.tb00327.x
10. Block, J. (1995). A contrarian view of the five-factor approach to personality description. Psychological Bulletin, 117, 187-215. http://dx.doi .org/10.1037/0033-2909.117.2.187
11. Buss, D. M. (1989). Sex differences in human mate preferences: Evolutionary hypotheses tested in 37 cultures. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 12, 1-49. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X00023992
12. Buss, D. M. (1996). Social adaptation and five major factors of personality. In J. S. Wiggins (Ed.), The five-factor model of personality: Theoretical perspectives (pp. 180-207). New York: Guilford Press.
13. Buss, D. M. (2008). Human nature and individual differences: Evolution of human personality. In O. P. John, R. W. Robins, & L. A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (3rd ed., pp. 29-60). New York: Guilford Press.
14. Cattell, R. B. (1943). The description of personality: Basic traits resolved into clusters. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 38, 476-506.
15. Cattell, R. B. (1946). Description and measurement of personality. Oxford: World Book Company.
16. Cattell, R. B. (1950). Describing personality through traits. In Personality: A systematic theoretical and factual study (pp. 21-44). New York: McGraw-Hill.
17. Cottrell, C. A., Neuberg, S. L., & Li, N. P. (2007). What do people desire in others? A sociofunctional perspective on the importance of different valued characteristics. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92, 208-231. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.2.208
18. Davies, M. (2008). The Corpus of Contemporary American English: 450 million words, 1990-present. Retrieved from http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/
19. De Raad, B., Perugini, M., Hrebícková, M., & Szarota, P. (1998). Lingua franca of personality: Taxonomies and structures based on the psycholexical approach. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 29, 212- 232. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0022022198291011
20. DeYoung, C. G. (2006). Higher order factors of the Big Five in a multiinformant sample. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 91, 1138-1151. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.91.6.1138
21. Edwards, A. L. (1957). The social desirability variable in personality assessment and research. Ft Worth, TX: Dryden.
22. Fiske, D. W. (1994). Two cheers for the Big Five! Psychological Inquiry, 5, 123-124. http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15327965pli0502_5
23. Fiske, S. T. (1992). Thinking is for doing: Portraits of social cognition from Daguerreotype to laserphoto. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 877-889. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.63.6.877
24. Frank, R. H. (2011). The strategic role of the emotions. Emotion Review, 3, 252-254. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1754073911402375
25. Funder, D. C., & Colvin, C. R. (1997). Congruence of others' and selfjudgments of personality. In R. Hogan, J. A. Johnson, & S. R. Briggs (Eds.), Handbook of personality psychology (pp. 617-647). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-012134645-4/50025-1
26. Goldberg, L. R. (1981). Language and individual differences: The search for universals in personality lexicons. Review of Personality and Social Psychology, 2, 141-165.
27. Goldberg, L. R. (1982). From ace to zombie: Some explorations in the language of personality. In C. D. Spielberger & J. N. Butcher (Eds.), Advances in personality assessment (Vol. 1, pp. 203-234). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
28. Goldberg, L. R. (1990). An alternative "description of personality": The Big Five factor structure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 1216-1229. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.59.6.1216
29. Goldberg, L. R. (1992). The development of markers for the Big Five factor structure. Psychological Assessment, 4, 26-42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/1040-3590.4.1.26
30. Goldberg, L. R. (1993). The structure of phenotypic personality traits. American Psychologist, 48, 26-34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0003- 066X.48.1.26
31. Goldberg, L. R., & Saucier, G. (1995). So what do you propose we use instead? A reply to Block. Psychological Bulletin, 117, 221-225. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.117.2.221
32. Hahn, D.-W., Lee, K., & Ashton, M. C. (1999). A factor analysis of the most frequently used Korean personality trait adjectives. European Journal of Personality, 13, 261-282. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1099-0984(199907/08)13:4<261::AID-PER340>3.0.CO;2-B
33. Hofstee, W. K., de Raad, B., & Goldberg, L. R. (1992). Integration of the Big Five and circumplex approaches to trait structure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 146-163. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.63.1.146
34. Hogan, R. (1996). A socioanalytic perspective on the five-factor model. In J. S. Wiggins (Ed.), The five-factor model of personality: Theoretical perspectives (pp. 163-179). New York: Guilford Press.
35. Holmes, J. G. (2004). The benefits of abstract functional analysis in theory construction: The case of interdependence theory. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 8, 146-155. http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15327957pspr0802_8
36. Ireland, M. E., & Mehl, M. R. (2014). Natural language use as a marker of personality. In The Oxford handbook of language and social psychology (pp. 201-218). New York: Oxford University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199838639.013.034
37. John, O. P., Hampson, S. E., & Goldberg, L. R. (1991). The basic level in personality-trait hierarchies: Studies of trait use and accessibility in different contexts. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 348-361. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.60.3.348
38. John, O. P., & Robins, R. W. (1993). Determinants of interjudge agreement on personality traits: The Big Five domains, observability, evaluativeness, and the unique perspective of the self. Journal of Personality, 61, 521-551. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.1993.tb00781.x
39. Kelley, H. H. (1997). The "stimulus field" for interpersonal phenomena: The source of language and thought about interpersonal events. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 1, 140-169. http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15327957pspr0102_3
40. Leising, D., Ostrovski, O., Lohse, O., & Wood, D. (2014). Which are the terms that people prefer to use when describing someone's personality? Dresden, Germany: University of Dresden.
41. Li, N. P., Bailey, J. M., Kenrick, D. T., & Linsenmeier, J. A. W. (2002). The necessities and luxuries of mate preferences: Testing the tradeoffs. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 947-955. http://dx .doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.82.6.947
42. Lukaszewski, A. W. (2013). Testing an adaptationist theory of trait covariation: Relative bargaining power as a common calibrator of an interpersonal syndrome. European Journal of Personality, 27, 328-345. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/per.1908
43. Maynard Smith, J. (1982). Evolution and the theory of games. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511806292
44. McAdams, D. P., & Pals, J. L. (2006). A new Big Five: Fundamental principles for an integrative science of personality. American Psychologist, 61, 204-217. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.61.3.204
45. McArthur, L. Z., & Baron, R. M. (1983). Toward an ecological theory of social perception. Psychological Review, 90, 215-238. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.90.3.215
46. McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T. J. (1999). A five-factor theory of personality. In L. A. Pervin & O. P. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed., pp. 139-153). New York: Guilford Press.
47. McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T. J. (2008). The five-factor theory of personality. In O. P. John, R. W. Robins, & L. A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (3rd ed., pp. 159-181). New York: Guilford Press.
48. Michel, J.-B., Shen, Y. K., Aiden, A. P., Veres, A., Gray, M. K., Pickett, J. P., Aiden, E. L., & the Google Books Team. (2011). Quantitative analysis of culture using millions of digitized books. Science, 331, 176-182. http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1199644
49. Norman, W. T. (1967). 2800 personality trait descriptors - Normative operative characteristics for a university population. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI.
50. Osgood, C. E., May, W. H., & Miron, M. S. (1975). Cross-cultural universals of affective meaning. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press.
51. Ozer, D. J., & Benet-Martínez, V. (2006). Personality and the prediction of consequential outcomes. Annual Review of Psychology, 57, 401-421. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.57.102904.190127
52. Paunonen, S. V., & Jackson, D. N. (2000). What is beyond the Big Five? Plenty! Journal of Personality, 68, 821-835. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-6494.00117
53. Pettersson, E., Turkheimer, E., Horn, E. E., & Menatti, A. R. (2012). The general factor of personality and evaluation. European Journal of Personality, 26, 292-302. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/per.839
54. Roberts, B. W., Kuncel, N. R., Shiner, R., Caspi, A., & Goldberg, L. R. (2007). The power of personality: The comparative validity of personality traits, socioeconomic status, and cognitive ability for predicting important life outcomes. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2, 313-345. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6916.2007.00047.x
55. Rodale, J. I. (1978). The synonym finder. Emmaus, PA: Rodale Press.
56. Roivainen, E. (2013). Frequency of the use of English personality adjectives: Implications for personality theory. Journal of Research in Personality, 47, 417-420. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2013.04.004
57. Saucier, G. (1997). Effects of variable selection on the factor structure of person descriptors. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 1296-1312. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.73.6.1296
58. Saucier, G. (2009). Recurrent personality dimensions in inclusive lexical studies: Indications for a big six structure. Journal of Personality, 77, 1577-1614. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.2009.00593.x
59. Saucier, G., & Goldberg, L. R. (1996a). Evidence for the Big Five in analyses of familiar English personality adjectives. European Journal of Personality, 10, 61-77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1099- 0984(199603)10:1<61::AID-PER246>3.0.CO;2-D
60. Saucier, G., & Goldberg, L. R. (1996b). The language of personality: Lexical perspectives on the five-factor model. In J. S. Wiggins (Ed.), The five-factor model of personality: Theoretical perspectives (pp. 21-50). New York: Guilford Press.
61. Saucier, G., & Goldberg, L. R. (1998). What is beyond the Big Five? Journal of Personality, 66, 495-524. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467- 6494.00022
62. Saucier, G., & Goldberg, L. R. (2001). Lexical studies of indigenous personality factors: Premises, products, and prospects. Journal of Personality, 69, 847-879. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-6494.696167
63. Saucier, G., Hampson, S. E., & Goldberg, L. R. (2000). Cross-language studies of lexical personality factors. In S. E. Hampson (Ed.), Advances in personality psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 1-36). New York: Psychology Press.
64. Schwartz, S. H. (1992). Universals in the content and structure of values: Theoretical advances and empirical tests in 20 countries. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 25, 1-65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60281-6
65. Sherman, R. A., & Wood, D. (2014). Estimating the expected replicability of a pattern of correlations and other measures of association. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 49, 17-40. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00273171.2013.822785
66. Soto, C. J., John, O. P., Gosling, S. D., & Potter, J. (2008). The developmental psychometrics of Big Five self-reports: Acquiescence, factor structure, coherence, and differentiation from ages 10 to 20. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 94, 718-737. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.94.4.718
67. Srivastava, S. (2010). The five-factor model describes the structure of social perceptions. Psychological Inquiry, 21, 69-75. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10478401003648815
68. Toomela, A., & Valsiner, J. (2010). Methodological thinking in psychology: 60 years gone astray? Information Age Pub Incorporated.
69. Uher, J. (2013). Personality psychology: Lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts reveal only half of the story-Why it is time for a paradigm shift. Integrative Psychological & Behavioral Science, 47, 1-55. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12124-013-9230-6
70. Waller, N. G. (1999). Evaluating the structure of personality. Personality and Psychopathology, 155-197.
71. Wiggins, J. S. (2003). Paradigms of personality assessment. New York: Guilford Press.
72. Williams, J. E., Saiz, J. L., Formyduval, D. L., Munick, M. L., Fogle, E. E., Adom, A., Yu, J. (1995). Cross-cultural variation in the importance of psychological characteristics: A seven-country study. International Journal of Psychology, 30, 529-550. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00207599508246585
73. Williams, J. E., Satterwhite, R. C., & Saiz, J. L. (1998). The importance of psychological traits: A cross-cultural study. New York: Plenum Press.
74. Wood, D., Gardner, M. H., & Harms, P. D. (in press). How functionalist and process approaches to behavior can explain trait covariation. Psychological Review.
75. Wood, D., Gosling, S. D., & Potter, J. (2007). Normality evaluations and their relation to personality traits and well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 861-879. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022- 3514.93.5.861
76. Wood, D., Nye, C. D., & Saucier, G. (2010). Identification and measurement of a more comprehensive set of person-descriptive trait markers from the English lexicon. Journal of Research in Personality, 44, 258-272. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2010.02.003
77. Wortman, J., & Wood, D. (2011). The personality traits of liked people. Journal of Research in Personality, 45, 519-528. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2011.06.006