Clearer Thinking with Spencer Greenberg Are personality types a statistical mirage? (with Colin DeYoung)
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Jan 28, 2026 
Colin DeYoung, psychology professor who studies personality structure and biology, explains personality as stable patterns of behavior, emotion, thought, and motivation. He discusses traits versus life adaptations. Topics include trait stability across the lifespan, psychotherapy’s effects on traits, person versus situation influences, trade-offs of the Big Five, life events that nudge traits, and dimensional models of psychopathology.
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Personality Is Persistent Patterns
- Personality equals persistent patterns of behavior, emotion, cognition, and motivation that others can recognize over time.
- Colin DeYoung distinguishes broad traits from more changeable characteristic adaptations like habits and beliefs.
Two Kinds Of Trait Stability
- Rank-order stability (relative standing) increases with age while mean-levels (average) show normative shifts across life stages.
- Adolescence shows the largest normative shifts, especially in conscientiousness and agreeableness.
Therapy Can Shift Traits
- Psychotherapy can change personality, especially reducing neuroticism, not just improve functioning.
- Use evidence-based treatments to target trait-level change when mental health is persistent.