PERSONALITY - McCRAE and COSTA’s five-factor trait theory

                           McCrae and Costa’s five-factor trait theory

Overview of trait and factor theories:

  Most researches who study personality traits agree that five and only five, and no fewer than five dominant traits continue to emerge from factor analytic techniques-mathematical procedures capable of sifting personality traits from mountains of test data. Whereas many contemporary theorists believe that five is the magic number, earlier theorists found many more personality traits, and Eysenck  inisted that only three majör factors can be discerned by a factor analytic approach. In addition, we have seen that commonsense approach yielded 5 to 10 traits that are control to each person’s life. The five-factor theory includes neuroticism and extraversion; but it adds opnennes to experience, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. These term differ slightly from research team, but the underlying traits are quite similar.

Description of the five factors:

  McCrae  and Costa agreed with Eysenck that personality traits are bipolar and following a bell-shaped distribution. That is, most people score near the middle of each trait, with only a few people scoring at the extremes. Neuroticism ans extraversion are the two strongest and most ubiquitous personality traits, and Costa amd McCrae conceptualize in much the same way as Eysenck defined them. People who score high on neuroticism tend to be anxious, temperamental, self-pitying, self-conscious, emotional, and vulnerable to stress-related disorders. Those who score low on N are usually calm, even-tempered, self-satisfied, and unemotional. People who score high on extraversion tend to be affectionate, jovial, talkative, joiners, and fun-loving. In contrast, low E scorers are likely to be reserved, quiet, loners, passive, and lacking the ability to express strong emotion. Opennes to experience distinguishes people who prefer variety from those who have a need for closure and who gain comfort in their association with familiar people and thing. People who consistently seek out different and varied exoeriences would score high on opennes to experience. For example, they enjoy trying new menu items at a restaurant or they like searching for new and exciting restaurants. In contrast, people who are not open to experiences will stick with a familiar item, one they know they will enjoy. People high on opennes alsotend to question traditional values and to preserve a fixed style of living. In summary , people high on opennes are generally creative, imaginative, curious, and liberal and have a preference for variety. By contrast, those who score low on opennes to experience are typically conventional, down-to-earth, conservative, and lacking in curiosity.

Peripheral Components

Biological bases:

  The five-factor theory rests on a single casual influence on oersonality traits, namely biology. The principle biological mechanisms that influence basic tendencies are genes, hormones, and brain structures. McCrae and Costa have not yet provided specific details about which genes, hormones, and brain structures play what role in their influence on personality. Advences in behavioral genetics and barin imaging have begun and will continue to fill in the details. This positioning of biological bases eliminates any role that the environment may play in the formation of basic tendencies. This should not suggest that the environment has no part in personality formation-merely that it has no direct influence on basic tendecies.

Objective biography:

  Defined as ‘everything the person does, thinks, or feels across the whole life span’. Objective biography emphasizes what has happened in people’s lives rather than their view  or perceptions of their experiences. Every behavior or response becomes part of the cumulative record. Whereas theorists emphasize the subjective interpretations of one’s life-story

External influences:

  People constantly find themselves in a particular physical or social situation that has some influence on the personality system. The question of how we respond to the opportunities and demands of the context is what external influences is all about. McCrae and Costa assume that behavior is function of the interaction between characteristic adaptations and external influences. As an example, they cite the case of Joan, who is offered tickets to see the opera la traviata. But Joan has a long personal history of detesting opera and therefore refuses the offer. To elaborate, Joan may well have a basic tendency toward being closed to new experiences, and she was never around opera as a child or may have simply formed a negative opinion about it based on reputation. Whatever the case, she is more at home with familiar events and with down-to-earth experiences. This background predicts that Joan is likely to respond the way she did to an offer to attend an opera. These decision to stay away from such experiences reinforce themselves as her distaste for opera grows.

Critique of trait anf factor theories:

  Trait and factor methods-especially those of Eysenck and advocates of the Big five model-provide important taxonomies that organize personality into meaningful classification. However, taxonomies alone do not explain or predict behavior, two important functions of useful theories. The trait and factor theories of Costa and McCrae are examples of a strictly empirical approach to personality investigation. These theories were built by collecting as much data as possible on a large number of people, intercorrelating the scores, factor analyzing correlation matrices, and applying appropriate psychological significance to the resultant factors. A pscyhometric approach, rather than clinical judgement, is the cornerstone of trait and factor theories. Nevertheless, like other theories, trait and factor theories must be judged by six criteria of a useful theory.

  First, the five-factor model of Costa and other advocates of the big five personality structure have also generated large amounts of empirical research. That research has shown that the traits of extroversion, neuroticism, opnennes to experience, agreeableness, and conscientiousness are not limited to western nations, but are found in wide variety of cultures, using myriad translations of the revise. In addition, McCrae and Costa have found that basic personality traits are somewhat flexible up to about age 30, but, after that time, they remain quite stable over the lifespan.

  Second, trait and factor theories receive a moderate to high rating. The work of McCrae and Costa lends itself to falsification, even though some of the research coming from non western countries suggest that traits other than big five may be needed to explain personality in Asian countries.

  Third, trait and factor theories are rated high on their ability to organize knowledge. Anything that is truly known about personality should be reducible to some quantity. Anything that can be quantified can be measured, and anything that can be measured can be factor analyzed. The extracted factors then provide a convenient and accurate description of personality in terms of traits. These traits, in turn, can present a framework for organizing many disparate observations about human personality.

  Fourth, a useful theory has the power to guide the actions of practitioners, and on this criterion, trait and factor theories receive mixed reviews. Although these theories provide a compherensive and structured taxonomy, such a classification is less useful to parents, teachers, and counselors than it is to researchers.

  The final criterion of a useful theory is parsimony. Ideally, trait and factor theories should receive an excellent rating on this standard, because factor analysis is predicated on the idea of the fewest explanatory factors possible. In other words, the very purpose of factor analysis is to reduce a large number of variables to as few as possible. This approach is the essence of parsimony.