Personality Psychology Podcast

In our daily lives, we may come across many situations in which we act in ways that are different from our typical personality. In this episode, Lisanne de Moor speaks with Evy Kuijpers about what counterdispositional behavior is and what the consequences of behaving in ways that are “out of character” are.

Loneliness has received a lot of attention—especially since the Covid-19 pandemic. In this episode, Rebekka Weidmann speaks with loneliness experts Marlies Maes, Julianne Holt-Lunstad, Marcus Mund, and Susanne Bücker about the definition of loneliness and related but distinct constructs, the rising interest in loneliness, measurement issues, interventions, and more.

In this episode, Rebekka Weidmann spoke with Theo Klimstra and Kate McLean, the two authors of a recently accepted Target Article in the European Journal of Personality titled "Reconsidering Normative Interpretations in Personality Research". The authors summarize their article and speak about how the field can move forward. 

René Mõttus talks to Bill Revelle and Bob Hogan who are well respected personality researchers in the field. They argue that the main use of personality research is to predict what real people do in the real world. Yet, much of academic psychology has not taken this seriously, focusing on abstract ideas and models with little real-world relevance. They discuss why useful personality assessment is not about complex statistics or even measuring traits, but simply adding up questions that best predict important outcomes. They also discuss why we should stop believing in Easter Bunnies, how to reassess your work after forty years, and how to build a successful global company. And many other things.

Creative products—paintings, poems, but also innovative ideas like the invention of the wheel—help societies move forward. As such, it is no surprise that formal interest in creativity from psychologists dates back at least 100 years, and the informal interest arguably much longer. In this episode, Rodica Damian and Andreea Sutu, two experts in the study of creativity, discuss with Lisanne de Moor what creativity is, what the personality traits of a creative person are, and if creativity is linked to psychopathology.

In this episode, Lisanne de Moor spoke with David Hughes and Paul Irwing, two of the authors of a recent publication in the European Journal of Personality titled "Toward a taxonomy of personality facets". The authors summarize their article and its studies and outline how they developed the facet map.

Many lay people and scientists think that life events can change personality traits. But proving or disproving this has been surprisingly challenging. Wiebke Bleidorn and Chris Hopwood are among the leading researchers on this topic, and they were involved in a recent large study that summarized the evidence so far. They will talk to René Mõttus about the latest research on life events and personality trait change, and discuss possible ways forward.

In this episode, Lucius Caviola discusses his psychological research on effective altruism and how people can be encouraged to give more effectively. You can try out effective giving yourself using his research-based donation platform https://givingmultiplier.org/personality. The episode also explores Lucius' research on how we perceive the value of animals and think about future risks. 

Have you ever pondered about your purpose? In this episode, we talked with Gabrielle Pfund about sense of purpose. What does it mean to have a sense of purpose, how can we measure it, and how is it related to important life outcomes? Gabrielle also describes the characteristics of people who are more likely to have a sense of purpose and in what direction her research is headed.

There is a lot of interest in the idea that people can voluntarily change their personality traits. René Mõttus talks to Mathias Allemand, Gabriel Olaru, and Christoph Flückiger about personality change interventions. Why people want to change their personality traits, how can they do it, and how long could the effects last? They also discuss ethical issues related to trait change, and whether most people have already been subjected to a personality change intervention – at school.