Beyond Consistency in the Definition of Personality

Abstract

Historically, personality has been predicated on behavioral consistency. Assuming that a unique repertoire of characteristics is the minimum requirement for the existence of a personality, three methods were employed to demonstrate uniqueness. Twenty-three women recorded self-descriptive words at the end of each twenty- three days (Adjective Generation Technique or AGT). The words generated in daily self-description were assigned favorability values from the AGT norm list. Subjects varied day-to-day in favorability of self-description more than they differed from one another in over-all favorability of self-description, thereby showing little consistency. First, uniqueness was demonstrated because variability of favorability within lists of most used words was significantly less than variability between lists. Second, a determination was made as to whether subjects' lists of most used words tended to be nonoverlapping, and were thereby unique. The observed overlap of at least one word among the subjects' actual lists of most used words was 93, not significantly different from 88, the estimated chance probability of overlap. Third, raters' Semantic Differential reactions to subjects' lists indicated that they clearly saw the corresponding subjects to be unique. Results present a dilemma in that subjects' uniqueness was reflected in their lists of most used words, but consistency was not great. Dramaturgical Quality and Value were offered as additional criteria for personality, beyond consistency.