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1 Department of Human Development and Family Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis.
2 Department of Human Development and Social Policy, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois.
Address correspondence to Karen Hooker, Department of Human Development and Family Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331. E-mail: hookerk{at}orst.edu
Abstract
We presented a newly emerging model, called the six-foci model of personality (
Hooker & McAdams, 2003
), to encourage researchers to look beyond the familiar five-factor model of personality encompassing the big five traits of openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (OCEAN). Reactions to our six-foci model provided additional issues to consider. We respond to the commentaries by
Mrozcek and Spiro (2003),
McCrae (2003), and
Wagerman, Wright, and Funder (2003), and we note areas of commonality as well as points where we hold differing views. In general, all commentaries agreed that going beyond the trait framework is necessary to move the field of personality and aging forward.
THE six-foci model of personality (Hooker & McAdams, 2003) was presented to generate research ideas for those interested in adult development and aging and to stimulate thinking beyond the trait framework. The commentaries provide further issues to consider, and although we agree with much that is presented therein, we have some differences of views as well.
Mroczek and Spiro (2003) provide further elaboration on within- and between-individual variability that we find useful. Their explication of how our model could be seen in concert with Cattell's data box is instructive as well. A minor quibble we have is in their historical claim of tracing process approaches to classic behaviorism. The study of processes can be traced further back to the inception of psychology in the 19th century with Stern and others in Germany (e.g., Kreppner, 1992) as well as James and the American functionalists (Heidbreder, 1933).
McCrae (2003) echoes our endorsement to broaden the scope of personality research by looking beyond traits for structural components of personality and by examining processes. We agree wholeheartedly that the six foci and their interactions should be traced over time. We hold divergent views on what should be included under the rubric of personality and the causal ordering of components in our models. The theory by McCrae and Costa (2003; see Figure 10, p. 192) depicts a personality system that we think is overly inclusive; for example, it includes all acquired psychological attributes and external influences such as life events. Although we think that personality affects and in some cases guides life events and the acquisition of skills and knowledge, these are not part of personality in the six-foci model. Their model also grants conceptual priority to traits, as seen by the unidirectional arrows going from basic tendencies (neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness) to other parts of the personality system, with only biological bases influencing basic tendencies. However, recent work in genetics (e.g., Gottleib, Wahlsten, & Lickliter, 1998) and social neuroscience (e.g., Cacioppo, Berntson, Sheridan, & McClintock, 2000) shows that biological processes both influence and are influenced by life events, stress appraisals, and personality. Thus, we argue for a more interactive personality system: one in which all levels portray emergent properties that cannot be reduced to other levels, and one in which interactions between and within levels exist.
In response to the contribution by Wagerman, Wright, and Funder (2003), we are more optimistic than they are regarding the prospects of conceptual integration in the study of adult personality. Despite the fact that such an integration across Levels 1 and 2 in our scheme may occasionally be "resisted by the parties involved," we see few theoretical impediments standing in the way. Dispositional traits are not and cannot be nuanced and contingent enough to carry all the freight in the study of persons; and no matter how well personal action constructs (a.k.a. characteristic adaptations) help us fill in the details of human individuality, they will never be able to account for broad stylistic trends across situations and over time.
When it comes to Level 3, Wagerman and colleagues seem to have misread the growing literature on life narratives and life course development. Our conception of the integrative life story is not synonymous with a person's entire life or objective biography. We are talking instead about a subjectively constructed, internalized, and evolving script—temporally construed and thematically organized—that serves the purpose (beginning in late adolescence and young adulthood) of providing a modern life with identity (that is, unity and purpose). Therefore, a life story does not "get longer" as a person gets older. Instead, it changes to reflect new reconstructions of the past and anticipations of the future. Furthermore, a life story can be analyzed from either an idiographic or nomothetic perspective. In the latter case, comparing and contrasting life stories in terms of, say, commonly described themes (e.g., redemption and contamination sequences, in McAdams, Reynolds, Lewis, Patten, & Bowman, 2001) does not reduce the analysis to Level 1 or 2. Redemption themes in life narratives are not a "trait." They are instead an aspect of a person's story. Self-narration processes create the life story, and these processes change with age, audience, and context. The story itself is the person's narrative identity. And a narrative identity is one of the foci of personality writ large, along with personal action constructs and traits.
Received for publication July 14, 2003. Accepted for publication July 17, 2003.
References
This article has been cited by other articles:
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  B. Chapman, P. Duberstein, and J. M. Lyness Personality Traits, Education, and Health-Related Quality of Life Among Older Adult Primary Care Patients J. Gerontol. B. Psychol. Sci. Soc. Sci., November 1, 2007; 62(6): P343 - P352. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
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