Associations between personality traits and resilience
Mereish, S. 2018. Associations between personality traits and resilience. Association for Business Psychology Annual Conference. London, UK 11 - 12 Oct 2018
Mereish, S. 2018. Associations between personality traits and resilience. Association for Business Psychology Annual Conference. London, UK 11 - 12 Oct 2018
| Title | Associations between personality traits and resilience |
|---|---|
| Authors | Mereish, S. |
| Type | Conference paper |
| Abstract | Ensuring the presence of a healthy and stable environment at work is essential for both the organisation as well as the employees working in the organisation. Nevertheless, organisational challenges in the workplace are inevitable. Challenges such as the constant changes, the shift in economic growth (Barak, 2005), and the different personality traits that can lead to conflict between individuals (Benton, 2017). Resilience is one of the ways that can be taken into consideration to face and deal with such challenges. It has been identified as a bio-psycho-social process that grows naturally (Baruch and Stutman, 2006). All individuals and groups are likely to be resilient. However, this process which is the outcome of an intricate combination of interacting factors that take place when unfavorable events happen, is not automatic or stable (Buikstra et al., 2010). Several studies explored the presence and intensity of resilience within the different personality traits of the individuals (García and Mendieta, 2017). For instance, individuals that have a high sense of humor, are socially responsible, resilient, capable of adapting, problem solvers and have good self-esteem and self-control, can overcome adversity, and are more resilient than those that do not possess such traits (Rutter, 1985). Moreover, the big 5 model (Costa and McCrae, 1992) which is the most used model to assess personality, has been associated with overcoming adversity and resilience. It proposes five factors for personality which are: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism (OCEAN) (Goldberg, 1993). This model considers personality as a cluster of behavioral preferences that impact thought, emotions, and actions, thatare linked with the mechanisms that individuals use to overcome adversity. Based on that, neuroticism correlates positively with negative reactions to stressful situations. Moreover, extraversion correlates with inclinations towards dealing with stressful events through humor and positive thoughts. Also, openness correlates with minimizing stress through humor and fantasizing. Further, conscientiousness individuals are flexible, adjustable, and have a great capacity to learn (García and Mendieta, 2017). Finally, agreeable individuals can moderately deal with stressful events (Campbell-Sills et al., 2006). Accordingly, it has been postulated that resilience is negatively correlated with neuroticism and positively correlated with extraversion, conscientiousness, and openness. However, no significant correlation was found with agreeableness (García-Izquierdo et al., 2009). Interestingly, personality traits and the resilience levels of individuals are not static throughout the lifespan of the individual and can be changed gradually through learning (Gonzalez, 1987). For instance, individuals can learn to develop skills and attitudes that increase resilience in relation to how to face difficulties, how to expand their abilities to adapt, and how to have positive emotions (Menezes et al., 2006). Thus, as shown in previous studies, throughout the development and implementation of trainings and activities, and through professional practice neuroticism can decrease with time and extraversion, openness, and conscientiousness can increase over time. All of which can result in increasing the well-being of individuals and stabilizing the disrupted workplaces. |
| Year | 2018 |
| Conference | Association for Business Psychology Annual Conference |