Components and correlates of personality coherence in action, agency, and authorship

Personality coherence is an individual difference capturing the extent to which a person’s psychological characteristics are coordinated, unified, and integrated. The present research addressed the extent to which coherence indicators inter-correlate and predict relevant outcomes over and above the effects of the Big Five among midlife adults (N = 446). Coherence indicators loaded onto four components: actor coherence, which captured the extent to which people were consistent in their interpersonal values, traits, and behavior; agent coherence, which captured the extent to which people’s goals were coordinated and need-congruent; author coherence, which captured the extent to which people’s self-defining stories were well composed and theme laden; and controlled coherence, which captured the extent to which people experienced their goals as pressured or compelled and as leading them to need-detracting futures. Although actor coherence correlated with both agent and author coherence, agent and author coherence were not correlated. Nevertheless, the actor-, agent-, and author-coherence composites each predicted at least one of the outcome variables (i.e., well-being, autonomy, and ego development) over and above the Big Five. The present findings suggest that the coherence of personality constitutes an individual difference domain of consequence beyond the established content dimensions of personality

Broadening our Understanding of Adversarial Growth: The Contribution of Narrative Methods

After adversity, individuals sometimes report adversarial growth - positive changes in their identity, relationships, and worldviews. We examined how narrative methods enhanced understanding of adversarial growth compared to standard questionnaires. Participants (N = 411) from college and community samples reported on their well-being, wrote a narrative about a highly challenging experience, and answered questionnaires on adversarial growth. Results showed that adversarial growth coded in narratives was positively associated with widely used self-report questionnaires of adversarial growth. Unexpectedly, narrative growth did not predict incremental validity in well-being outcomes compared to standard questionnaires. We found unique expressions of adversarial growth in a qualitative analysis of the narratives. We discuss the added value of using narratives for the assessment of adversarial growth

“You gotta give them hope”: A structural psychobiography of Harvey Milk (1930-1978)

In this psychobiographical study, we examined the life and times of social change agent Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay public officials in the United States. Milk is remembered as a gay hero who fought for the rights of marginalized people, often by invoking the importance of hope. Milk was assassinated less than one year after his election. In this psychobiography, we adopted a structural approach foregrounding social, cultural, political, and historical forces that intersected with personal factors to explain Milk’s ascension to the status of social change agent. This psychobiography tells the story of a man not destined to become a social change agent but of a man who became one anyway because of shifting tides in the political climate of San Francisco in the 1970s, because of a series of catalytic events that started him down this path, because of a history of persecution as a gay Jew, and because of his enduring need for a stage upon which he could express his generative concern. Our analysis raises questions about the story that ‘belongs’ to the agent of social change, and the story that ‘belongs’ to the rest of us, as we remember him

The Rise and Fall of Gay: A CulturalHistorical Approach to Gay Identity Development.” Memory 18(2

Research on identity development has paid relatively little attention to the development of marginalised identities such as those of gays and lesbians, whose isolation from the canonical narrative of sexuality may limit the available resources required for establishing a coherent identity. We examined these contested identities in relation to cultural-historical factors that may have played a role in shaping these identities over the past 50 years, and looked at how such factors have impacted the voicing and silencing of gay experiences. Participants (N0251) reported (1) a memory of a cultural event relevant to their sexuality, and (2) a self-defining memory about their sexuality. Those in older cohorts reported cultural memories centred on politics and other external events (e.g., Stonewall riots), and younger cohorts reported more personal memories (e.g., coming out), suggesting that homosexual identities have become less culturally defined, and instead more personally defined. Further, participants of older cohorts reported self-defining events that were predominantly from one private domain (e.g., sex). In contrast, younger participants reported a variety of self-defining events. These results suggest that culturalhistorical factors play an important role in defining the developmental pathway of individuals, perhaps especially those who have marginalised identities. Keywords: Narrative; Master narrative; Homosexuality; Culture; Identity. By looking closely at the changes that have occurred in gay culture in the past few decades, I attempt to represent the process through which a culture with unique traditions and rituals is submerged into the melting pot, its distinguishing characteristics dissolving into this grey, flavorless gruel as its members are accepted by society at large. The authors wish to thank Andrea V. Breen, Lewis W. Jones, Phillip L. Hammack, and two anonymous reviewers for extraordinarily thoughtful and helpful comments on previous versions of this manuscript. We thank Alvi Dandal for help with coding. This study was supported by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada awarded to the second author. 1 In the current paper there are many instances where the term ''gay'' is used to capture the experiences of both males and females who identify as homosexual. The usage of this term is intended only for convenience sake, as in mainstream discourse we often find ''gay'' used as such a catchall phrase. We are not in any way trying to offer a male-centred view of sexuality. We will identify and attempt to explain those points at which our results diverge for males and females

Protest, Panic, Policy, and Parades: Memory for Cultural-Historical Events and Psychosocial Identity in the LGBTQ+ Community

Scholars have increasingly called for the centering of cultural-historical forces in research on psychosocial identity, particularly when that research seeks to understand development among marginalized groups. Accordingly, in this study, we investigated the content of cultural-historical events considered important to members of the LGBTQ+ community and examined the association between event internalization and psychosocial identity. Participants were a college and community sample of LGBTQ+ adults (N = 495) ranging in age from 17 to 80 years (M = 39.22; SD = 19.89) and representing three generational cohorts. In an online survey, participants reported up to six cultural-historical events considered important to their LGBTQ+ identities and rated those events for statements reflecting internalization. They also completed questionnaires assessing psychosocial identity. Results showed that 443 participants reported at least one cultural-historical event, with a total of 1,280 events reported. Cultural-historical events were coded into thematic categories. From most to least frequent, these categories were: (1) policy and legislation, (2) adversity and oppression, (3) protest, resistance, and activism, (4) community, celebration, and commemoration, (5) public figures and visibility, and (6) media, culture, and technology. We found no relation between the number of events reported and psychosocial identity, although there were moderate to strong positive associations between event internalization and psychosocial identity, and this association was strongest for the older cohort. Among the younger cohort, internalization of events occurring before the participant’s lifetime was the strongest predictor of psychosocial identity. These findings suggest that cultural-historical events represent a developmental resource for LGBTQ+ people

Letters from Queer Elders: Transmitting Intergenerational Wisdom in LGBTQ+ Communities

Intergenerational relationships have been established as a critical locus of psychosocial development, meeting needs of identity development for youth, generativity for elders, and connection and belonging for both. However, intergenerational relationships are both rare in the LGBTQ+ community and sorely needed as a buffer to the discrimination and harm that those within the community experience from systemic and structural oppression. Focusing on sexual identity, and employing a letter writing paradigm, we investigated the content of wisdom that LGB elders have to share with youth. In a descriptive, exploratory, mixed-methods, and pre-registered study, 94 adults ranging in age 50 to 79 years (M = 55.98; SD = 6.30) wrote letters to a fictional youth, Sam, as well as completed surveys of psychosocial development and well-being. Letters were content coded for themes, as well as for emotional tone and subjective perspective. The most common themes of wisdom shared included knowing and celebrating oneself, negotiating an oppressive society, and finding one’s community. Those who wrote more emotionally positive letters scored higher on measures of wisdom and generativity, and lower on embitterment. Results are discussed in terms of the importance of cultivating opportunities for wisdom-sharing within LGBTQ+ communities to promote flourishing across the lifespan

Scientific Meaning of Wisdom

Survey Responses (incl. Content analyses of Open-ended Responses) from the Project about the Meaning of Wisdom for Empirical Psychologists. Part of the Preparation for the Toronto Wisdom Task Force Meeting in July 2019

Toward a unified science of personality coherence

Gordon W. Allport (1937) considered the coherence of personality to be a matter of degree and, as such, an individual difference. Although considered by some to be the “central, unique charge” of personality psychology (Cervone & Shoda, 1999, p. 3), the study of personality coherence has been dispersed across different theoretical communities. We review how personality coherence has been defined and measured within the following five contemporary theoretical communities: the multivariate community (who focus upon the individual’s profile of global trait dispositions), the social-cognitive community (who focus upon the individual’s contextualized self-structures), the personological community (who focus upon the individual’s unique and ongoing life story), the cybernetic community (who focus upon the individual’s goal hierarchy), and the organismic community (who focus upon the individual’s sense of self). We conclude by reflecting upon the extent to which the five perspectives converge upon an underlying self-epistemic function

The signs and significance of personality coherence in personal stories and strivings

The concept of personality coherence refers to the extent of psychological unity and wholeness embodied within each individual. In the present research, we examined the extent to which the narrative, functional, and organismic conceptualizations of personality coherence interrelate, as well as their associations with psychological abilities and personal adjustment. College students (N = 391) narrated accounts of three personal memories; listed five personal strivings that they subsequently compared and evaluated; completed performance measures of their intelligence, wisdom, and creativity; and rated their hedonic and eudaimonic well-being. Individuals who coherently organized their autobiographical memories were protected against feeling pressured or compelled in their personal strivings and against being steered toward need-detracting futures. Narrative indicators of coherence were otherwise independent of the functional and organismic indicators, although all indicators of personality coherence correlated with personal adjustment. Wisdom and creativity predicted narrative coherence, which partially mediated the associations they demonstrated with eudaimonic well-being