From taxonomy to prototype: The categorization of personality acts.

Abstract

Twenty-two categories of behavior provided a framework for two studies exploring the cognitive organization of personality acts (Buss & Craik, 1983). Twenty categories of behavior were selected as markers for the five factor model of personality (Digman, 1990; McCrae & Costa, 1983; Norman, 1963). Two categories of behavior, ingenuous and calculating, were included as conceptual blends of surgency and agreeableness (Wiggins, 1972) to examine the comprehensiveness of the five factor model. In study one 36 subjects (18 males and 18 females) sorted each of the 330 acts for membership in ten categories, with multiple placement permitted. Two categories were selected, one representing each pole, for each of the five dimensions. Acts were then rated for prototypicality in the selected categories. In study two 215 subjects (109 males and 106 females) sorted 30 acts, randomly drawn from the pool of 330 acts in study one, for membership in the original 22 categories, with multiple placement permitted. Both studies yielded several interesting findings. First, acts were most often sorted into the categories from which they were originally drawn. Second many acts were dispositionally rich, with high prototypicality ratings for more than one category. Third, a cluster analysis found that acts were primarily categorized in two large clusters based on their positive, or negative connotations. And, fourth a confirmatory factor analysis of the structure of the cognitive organization of acts and the performance of personality acts (Botwin & Buss, 1989) indicated that the cognitive organization of acts greatly differs from their reported act frequencies. Discussion focuses on role of act categories as evaluative mechanisms in the interpersonal environment, the discrepancies between act categorization and act performance, and the uses of dispositionally rich acts in psychological assessment.