In: Psychology
1. What was Walter Mischel's critique of personality?
2. Provide at least two arguments from his critique.
3. Explain one example of modern research that supports his critique.
Walter Mischel extensively by discussed how personality research, despite having made a lot of progress had nonetheless failed to support the assumption of personality being a constant construct across settings. Firstly, he argued that individual personality traits varied as per the environment and thus could not be reliability assessed as it expressed itself differently across situations. Next, he argued that because these personality traits were highly variable, no consistent set of personality traits could be attributed to a particular individual.
The research conducted by Judge and Zapata (2015) showed how the Big 5 personality traits showed situational variability in a workplace context, thereby offering support to the critique of personality testing put forward by Mischel.
References:
The person–situation debate revisited: Effect of situation strength and trait activation on the validity of the Big Five personality traits in predicting job performance; TA Judge, CP Zapata - ACAD MANAGE J August 1, 2015 vol. 58 no. 4 1149-1179