Dr. Jerome Kagan reviews a book by Samuel Barondes about decoding the mysteries of personality. I found it interesting for several reasons, including the difficulties professionals have in understanding why people are the way they are.
Lists of traits are part of Barondes book. While reading the lists, I made comparisons with how I viewed myself. As Dr. Kagan asserts, people often view themselves quite differently than others perceive them. I know that to be true for me.
From the review:
The narrative rests on two ideas. The first, which is in accord with evidence, but is given the least attention, is that each person’s genetic makeup makes an important contribution to his or her personality. Few scientists would quarrel with that declaration. Barondes acknowledges that the available evidence is too sparse to permit any firm conclusions regarding a relationship between any gene, or genes, and any known personality trait because a person’s experiences not only control the form that an inherited trait assumes but also influence the level of gene expression.
The heart of the text revolves around the second idea: three lists of words naming human characteristics. One list refers to 10 profiles that psychiatrists use to classify patients:
- excessive disregard for others
- unusual sensitivity to criticism
- constant seeking of attention
- paranoid distrust of others
The second list names a number of character traits, such as orderliness, humility, courage, and wisdom, which, Barondes notes, Benjamin Franklin would have endorsed. The third list refers to five continuous dimensions, called the Big Five, on which people are placed depending on their answers to a questionnaire. The five dimensions are extraversion to introversion, agreeable to disagreeable, conscientious to careless, open to new ideas to dogmatically closed, and tense to relaxed. http://www.dana.org/news/cerebrum/detail.aspx?id=34364
Among Dr. Kagan's criticisms of Dr. Barondes book is this one:
A third problem is that the Big Five represent relatively superficial human traits. This set of properties ignores the variation in sexual urges and sexual conflict; intensity of guilt or shame over failing to honor seminal moral standards of loyalty, honesty, and kindness; and the strength of identifications with one’s gender, class, and ethnic groups, all of which profoundly influence our moods and actions. The scale called “open to new ideas” is associated with whether a person grew up with a disadvantaged or privileged social class. More relevant is the fact that, rather than any known gene or a score on a questionnaire, a person’s social class remains the best predictor of the likelihood of a bout of anxiety or depression, a criminal career, or addiction to alcohol or other drugs. The reason for this robust fact is that a disadvantaged class position is associated with chronic worry over financial security, boring or physically strenuous work, poor health, few years of education, anger toward people who have more privilege, and feelings of self-doubt or shame about one’s relative status in the society that create anxiety about social interactions with more affluent, better-educated adults. For example, the memoir of the popular writer John Updike contains a confession of the deep shame he felt about his family’s compromised class position in a small Pennsylvania town.
We really are more complicated and mysterious than we actually believe. No wonder getting along while in proximity with others is such a challenge.