Personality Psychology: Havings, Doings, and Beings in Context

Brian R. Little
Carleton University and
Murray Research Center
Radclie Institute for Advanced Study
Harvard University
Introduction: Voices in the Cafeteria
Imagine that we are listening in on a conversation between three
students in the college cafeteria. Their discussion weaves around many
topics but the dominant theme is their common project of applying to
graduate school in psychology. Speaking animatedly and downing her
third cup of coee, Eve declares that she is only applying to her top
three choices and she s looking forward to dragging her boyfriend to
Ann Arbor. She suddenly bolts from the group realizing she s late for
her stats class. Adam says little, nods often, and is wondering whether
he really is grad school material. Besides, his parents want him to go
back home after graduation to work in the family business. Nikki isn t
really listening at all; she s hung over again, hadn t realized grad
application deadlines were coming up, and frankly is fed up with Adam
and Eve and the whole human condition. She mumbles something they
can t quite hear and heads for the restroom.
If you are sitting in the adjacent booth in the cafeteria, would you linger
a bit, intrigued by the diering styles, contrasting concerns, and singular
stories you hear emerging in the snatches of conversation? If so, then
you probably have a natural anity for personality psychology. This
chapter surveys the past and present state of personality psychology as
a core specialty within psychology and examines how it goes about
understanding the lives of the Eves, Adams, and Nikkis of this world.
The eld of personality psychology is ourishing. In many respects the
current buoyancy of the eld reects important shifts, both
methodological and conceptual, that have occurred over the past two

1
decades. Some of these changes arose in response to conceptual crises
within the eld, particularly the Great Trait Debate that occupied much
of the eld in the seventies. (Mischel s (1968) critique, which launched
the debate, and reactions to it are discussed in a later section).
Other shifts reect the gradual maturing of intellectual agendas that
were present at the modern inception of academic personality
psychology in the nineteen thirties (Craik, 1986). After sketching very
briey the nature and challenges of the eld of personality psychology, I
will present a perspective (admittedly an idiosyncratic one) on some of
the currently active research programs in the new look in personality
psychology.
The Core Project of Personality Psychology: The Integrative
Challenge
Within the social and behavioral sciences, personality psychologists
have chosen to specialize in comprehensiveness (Little, 1972). As an
intellectual eld its scope of inquiry is inordinately extensive.
Personality psychology seeks to integrate diverse inuences on human
conduct ranging from the genetic and neurophysiological underpinnings
of traits to the historical contexts within which individual life stories can
be rendered coherent. Pervin (1996) has provided a thoughtful
denition of personality which, in part, characterizes it as the complex
organization of cognitions, aects, and behaviors that gives direction
and pattern (coherence) to the person s life (p.414). The study of
personality seeks to understand how individuals are like all other
people, some other people, and no other person (to revise slightly the
classic phrase of Kluckhohn & Murray, 1953, p.53). It formulates
theories about the nature of human nature, the role of individual
dierences, and the study of single cases. Personality psychology
provides one of the core basic sciences underlying many of the elds of
applied psychology, including clinical, counseling, health, and
organizational psychology.
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Classical Voices and the Conceptual Foundations of Personology
Even a cursory history of the classical theoretical and methodological
perspectives in personality psychology exceeds the limits of this chapter,
but fortunately two recent reviews provide authoritative and concise
accounts of the history of personality psychology (McAdams, 1997;
Winter & Barenbaum, 1999). But it will advance the purpose of this
chapter if we have some major historical gures in the eld,
metaphorically descend (or ascend) from their places in posterity to
oer their perspective on the cafeteria conversation with which we
began this survey. Their role will be like that of the Greek Chorus in
classical drama that oered commentary about the ongoing action.
(Except that none will speak in Greek and some won t speak, but sing.
Or hum.) They will introduce some of the concerns and admonishments
of classical personology and provide a bridge to contemporary discourse
about the eld.
Let us start with a Freudian chorus (perhaps the Vienna Old Boys
Choir?). There is little doubt that psychoanalysis has had a profound
impact on the intellectual climate of the twentieth century. Many in fact
would claim that its impact has been greater in the arts and humanities
than in the social and behavioral sciences. In essence the Freudian
psychodynamic perspective held that unconscious wishes and the
vicissitudes of their expression comprised the core integrative concepts
necessary to understand the complexities of both normal and abnormal
personality. Thus the reach of psychoanalytic theorizing extended from
the clinical couch to the psychopathology of daily life, from the deepest
neuroses to the seeming innocence of typing misrakes. Through the
theoretical lenses provided by Freudian theory, Eve s tardiness, Adam s
ambivalence, and Nikki s petulance might reect the subtle operation of
unconscious wishes and defenses against them. Such inuences would
likely be sexual or aggressive at root. A Freudian chorus might choose
Nikki as the most obvious case for explication of the possible inuences
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of unconscious and destructive forces in human personality because of
the welling up of impulses that compromise her ability to muddle
through this particular Monday. But they would also have comments to
make about why Eve is late only for her stats class and why Adam has
never fully been able to break away from the Edenic security of his
home.
The Personological Chorus would feature Henry Murray with
counterpoint commentary by Gordon Allport, both of whom would be
draped in Harvard Crimson. Like Freud, Murray would insist that the
motivation of the students would run deep. Rather than focusing
exclusively upon sex and aggression, he would insist that there are
diverse needs that underlie human motivation, such as the need for
aliation or need for achievement. He would voice concern that the
environments within which human motives play out should also receive
our attention, and that for each need operating in personality there is a
corresponding press in the environment that can facilitate or frustrate
its achievement. Finally, Murray would be concerned that we expand
the time line to look at serials the sequences of action that extend
over longer periods of time and without which the signicant
motivational agendas of people s lives may be given shorter shrift than
they deserve.
Allport would generally concur, but would suggest that traits are the
substantively real and dynamic sources of human personality and that
both the nature and organization of such dispositions are patterned
idiosyncratically. He would also argue that although pursuits may
originally be undertaken for one set of motives, they may eventually
become independent or functionally autonomous of the originating
motivation.
For these personologists, the ways in which the three students are
approaching their last weeks as undergraduates may reect dierent
patterns of needs and the ways in which the environments are fullling
4
or frustrating the achievement of the needs. Eve may be primarily
concerned with a need for power, and her seeking admission only to the
elite schools may help her to develop inuential connections. This
would contrast with her classmates, high in achievement motivation,
who may apply to a greater range of schools to optimize likely success.
(See Winter (1996) for an excellent description of need research in the
tradition of Murray and his followers such as McClelland). Adam may
have a strong need for self-abasementa need his parents are only too
happy to satisfy when he broaches the topic of heading o for grad
school. Nikki might be particularly intriguing to the personologists. Not
satised to dismiss her behavior simply as aggressive or neurotic, they
may see her as a complex personperhaps a highly creative personality
whose needs are being systematically frustrated by environmental press
that keeps her from exploring ideas that she and others nd strange and
disturbing.
We might hear next from the Behaviorist Chorus comprising the early
learning theorists and joined by those such as Dollard and Miller who
attempted to translate psychodynamic theory into behaviorist principles
and of course Skinner whose clear voice of condence about the power
of operant conditioning would likely drown out the rest of the Chorus.
The behavioral analytic units would be stimulus-response bonds that
would allow an integration not only of human personality but the
behavior of all organisms. This perspective placed considerable
emphasis upon the shaping of personality by environmental
contingencies, particularly by the rewards and punishments that
reinforced behavior. For the behaviorists, the dierences between our
three students, Eve s ascendancy, Adam s didence, and Nikki s
emotionality (and drinking problems), arise from dierences in their
reinforcement histories and the commonalities arise from their desire to
avoid painful stimulation and seek out rewards.

5
A third distinctive voice can be heard in the cafeteria: that of George
Kelly. At the same time as behavioral theories were in ascendancy in
psychology, Kelly proposed an original and audacious theory. His
integrative mission was to weave theoretical, assessment, and clinical
concerns into a seamless model of human personality. Kelly postulated
that to understand individuals was to understand the personal
constructs through which they viewed their worlds. Kelly saw each of us
as a lay scientisttesting out hypotheses about ourselves and our
worlds and revising those hypotheses (constructs) in the light of
experience. These personal constructs are organized into systems such
that some of them become core role constructs, centrally important to
the lives of individuals. Their preservation and continued validation
have a profound eect on emotional experience. For example,
according to Kellian theory, threat is awareness of an imminent and
comprehensive change in one s construct system. Guilt is awareness of
being dislodged from one s core constructs, aggression is the expansion
of core constructs to subsume new domains, and hostility is the attempt
to extort validation for a construct one already feels has been
invalidated (Kelly, 1955). So how would the Kellian Chorus in the
cafeteria (more likely an Irish tenor solo) attempt to understand our
three students? Kelly would likely see all three students as feeling threat
at the prospect of being in transition between undergraduate life and
their futures. Adam may feel guilt in that he is being dislodged from a
core construct of being loyal to his family. Eve may be aggressively
pursuing conrmation of her construct of herself as successful. Nikki,
we can now disclose, has experienced a series of abusive relationships.
She may have experienced what Kellians refer to as serial invalidation
of her core constructs, in which each attempt to anticipate her world is
painfully disconrmed. Her only strategy left is to attempt to extort
validation of her worth by acting abrasively toward those who have

6
failed to notice her pain. For Nikki, only a worthy person has the
temerity to tell her friends to piss o . Or so she tells herself.
These classic voices from personality psychology each approach the
integrative task by developing overarching theories of considerable
scope, though each selectively highlights a particular aspect of human
conduct as its integrative center. Thus classical psychodynamic theory is
primarily concerned with emotional experience, learning theory with
overt behavioral processes, and Kellian theory with the cognitive
systems through which personality unfolds. Yet each extends the range
of its theoretical constructs to include phenomena that are of more focal
concern for alternative perspectives. Indeed, within psychodynamic
theory, a major historical progression involved a shift from emphasis
upon unconscious motivation, to a conict free domain in which
conscious goal pursuit could be carried out without being subordinated
to the pressures of irrational impulses and wishes. Thus, psychodynamic
theory was able to push its conceptual agenda into an area that would
be regarded as more the domain of cognitive psychology. Similarly,
learning theorists over the century have moved from drive-reduction
and peripheralist theories to cognitive social learning theories (e.g.,
Bandura, Mischel), in which the inuence on human action has shifted
from classical and operant conditioning, or rewards and punishments to
more cognitive concerns, such as schemata, encoding skills etc. (e.g.,
Mischel, 1990).
Critical Voices: Challenge and Restoration in Personology
The eld of personality psychology was thrown into considerable
conceptual turmoil with the publication of Walter Mischel s (1968)
Personality and Assessment. Mischel mounted a detailed critique of
broad dispositional traits as units of analysis in personality psychology.
Specically, he argued that there was little evidence for broad-based
generalities of trait dispositions (e.g., an Adam may be submissive
around his fellow students and his parents but assertive and condent
7
when playing in his jazz band). He also provided evidence that specic
tests of personality traits had little predictive validity in accounting for
actual behavior and seldom exceed a personality coecient limit of .
30. Thus, Mischel s attack was antagonistic to the classical
personological perspectives and particularly to those who oered xed
traits as analytic units for the eld. His allies, interestingly, were rather
strange bedfolk: behaviorists (who by then were transforming into
cognitive social learning theorists) and personal construct theoristsa
direct reection of Mischel having been a student of George Kelly s.
Mischel s central contentions were that human action was nely attuned
to situational inuences, and that such action was less the product of
xed traits than of the personal constructs or conceptual lenses through
which individuals viewed the world.
The impact of Mischel s critique was pivotal for the eld of personality
in three ways. First, it had a major eect upon personality testing by
calling into question the validity of such tests. Second, it encouraged
greater collaborative linkages with social psychologists, who had
traditionally regarded the major sources of human action to lie in the
situations and environmental contexts with which individuals were
confronted (Endler & Magnusson, 1976). Finally, and most signicantly,
it stimulated an immediate, protracted, and eventually successful
defense of the orthodox trait model by personality psychologists. While
feeling that the strengths of the personological tradition had been
underestimated by Mischel, they also conceded that greater conceptual
grappling with some of the foundational issues in personality
measurement were now urgently needed (Wiggins, 1997). The result of
the clash between these critical voices was an enrichment and
broadening of the conceptual base of personality psychology. The social
cognitive learning alternative, espoused by Mischel, continues to
generate considerable research (e.g., Cervone & Shoda, 1999; Mischel
& Shoda, 1995). But a full scale restoration of trait psychology also
8
came about as a result of the Great Trait Debate and, as we shall see, it
now constitutes one of three major contemporary perspectives in the
eld. It is to these contemporary voices that we can now turn.
Contemporary Voices: Three Tiers for Personality Psychology
Contemporary personality psychology is multifaceted, complex, and
dynamic. One particularly helpful way of organizing this complexity for
expository purposes has been proposed by McAdams (1995). I will
adopt this as a starting point to review three dierent levels at which
personality psychologists are exploring the nature of human nature and
explaining the ways in which individuals live out their lives.
Havings, Doings, and Beings in Personality Research
The rst level of inquiry in contemporary personality research is that of
relatively xed features of individual dierences emphasizing
personality traits. The second level explores more contextually sensitive
and dynamic units of analysis that McAdams labels personal concerns.
(McAdams includes many more constructs at this level than I will treat
in this chapter. I have tried to make the case that the central integrative
units at this level are Personal Action Constructs (PAC units) (Little,
1989, 1996)). The third level addresses individuals life stories and the
narrative identities that people construct to make sense of their lives.
Invoking terms introduced by Allport and re-introduced by Cantor
(1990), we can refer to Levels 1 and Levels 2 as reecting the having
and doing aspects of human personality respectively. Having refers
to that which we are endowed with and carry with us and doing refers
to that which we intentionally perform. Because Level 3 is concerned
with identity and the sense of self that individuals construct, and to
preserve the gerundial form of depicting the eld, we can refer to this as
the being aspects of personality. Collectively this structure of the
contemporary eld of personality research can be thought of as
exploring the havings, doings, and beings of individuals.

9
For initial expository purposes, we can conceive of these three levels as
dierent tiers or oors of a house. Thus, personality psychology can be
thought of as having trait psychologists on the ground oor exploring
the nature of stable dispositions. On the second oor are a group of
psychologists who are interested in people s personal concerns, and
carry out research with PAC units, such as current concerns, personal
strivings, personal projects, and life tasks (Little, 1996, 1999a). On the
third oor are the narrative theorists and psychobiographers who are
examining identity and life stories. As I have suggested elsewhere
however, (Little, 1996), the house of personality would be incomplete
unless we added a basement in which would be housed two other active
groups of contemporary personality psychologists, psychodynamic
theorists and evolutionary psychologists. I wish to turn now to a
description of some of the important questions, methodological tools,
and research ndings on the three main levels of personality
psychology. We shall deal with the cellar in due course.
LEVEL I ( HAVINGS ): TRAITS AS ENDURING DISPOSITIONS
Stable traits of personality were not only a foundational unit of analysis
in academic psychology, they have been invoked ever since humans
have communicated about their lives and those of others. The notion
that stable individual dierences arise out of dierences in bodily
humors is an ancient one and there has been an enduring interest in
attempting to classify and predict individuals on the basis of traits
assumed to be part of the constitutive nature of human beings. These
have often been thought of as aspects of people that they have and
that they carry with them through the contexts, challenges, and pivotal
moments of their lives.
The Big Five: Major Factors of Personality Traits
Consensus has gradually emerged that stable features of human
personality can be adequately described by ve factors of neuroticism,
extraversion, openness to experience, agreeableness, and
10
conscientiousness (e.g., McCrae & John, 1992; Wiggins, 1996).
Neuroticism is characterized by attributes such as being nervous,
worried and feeling emotionally insecure. Extraversion is depicted by
attributes such as excitement seeking and activity level. Openness
entails broad interests and imaginative dispositions. Agreeableness
involves tendencies toward being good natured and trusting.
Conscientiousness is associated with characteristics such as being
organized and disciplined.
Thus, at rst blush, Eve, in our opening image, might be described by
others as being a rather extraverted, open individual; Adam could be
regarded as agreeable and conscientious, while Nikki might be seen as
at least incipiently neurotic.
Much of the current conceptual and empirical research in the eld of
personality is concerned with the descriptive, explanatory, and
predictive implications of the ve factor model. The ve factor model is
seen by most psychologists as primarily a taxonomic description of
personality structure rather than a causal model that precisely predicts
behavior. Indeed, there are a number of dierent explanatory models
for each of the big ve factors of personality, two of which in particular,
extraversion and neuroticism, have been well developed. As one
example, extraversion has been postulated by Eysenck (1970) as a
dispositional tendency to seek out stimulation, particularly social
stimulation, as a result of chronically low levels of activation in the neo-
cortex.
A somewhat dierent model of extraversion formulated by Gray (1981),
assumes that extraverts are particularly sensitive to reward cues, while
introverts are more sensitive to punishment cues (particularly so if the
individuals in both cases are also high in neuroticism). Both these and
other models of extraversion based on a biological model have been
bolstered by evidence that there appears to be a strong genetic base
underlying extraversion as well as the other big ve factors.
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Thus, under these models, we might expect the extraverted Eve of our
example to be particularly keen to seek out stimulation and to absorb
herself in the conversation about grad school, and not to notice that it
was time to go to class. We might also predict that she would be more
likely than her introverted peers to need a good dose of caeine in the
cafeteria to sustain her through her stats class. And we might anticipate
that she may not yet have thought through some of the down side issues
in applying for graduate school ( Hey, what are these GRE thingies
we re supposed to take ?).
As well as having descriptive and explanatory functions, traits are
increasingly being used for purposes of prediction in applied areas. For
example, there is evidence that conscientiousness is a robust predictor
of success in many areas where achievement is important, particularly
achievement based on conformity to clearly specied goals (see Hough,
Eaton, Dunnette, Kamp,& McCloy, 1990). However, there appears to be
one intriguing exception. Hogan and Hogan (1993) have reported that
conscientiousness is negatively correlated with peer rated success
among Tulsa jazz musicians. Given that the ability to jam involves
being able to ex to the shifting cadence and intonations of others,
the goal-oriented persistence of the conscientious person may become a
liability. This exception may not, in fact, be so exceptional. It is
interesting to speculate whether organizational life, particularly in fast-
paced high tech companies, is more likely to require the skills of
juggling and jamming than those of dogged linear pursuit. So even
though traits may be fairly stable, the personality psychologists using
them as predictive instruments are fully aware of the need to monitor
their predictive validity in domains that are changeable and dynamic.
How might our three students be understood in terms of the Big Five
trait approaches to contemporary personality psychology? Eve would
appear to be an open, agreeable extravert, seeking stimulation,
condent in her expectations, and generally engaged in zestful project
12
pursuit. Adam might be seen as more introverted and conscientious. He
seems to be agonizing over the question of grad school and is trying to
balance it against other claims on his life. We might see Nikki as
distinctly neurotic: she is angry, anxious, hurting, and inexpressibly sad.
Level II ( Doings ): Personal Projects, Tasks, and Strivings
Over the past couple of decades, another family of conceptual units of
analysis in personality psychology has arisen which complement, and in
some ways challenge, trait units. They have as a common focus an
emphasis upon personal action: on the doing side of personality
(Cantor, 1990; Little, 1999a). These personal action constructs (or PAC
units) include personal projects (Little, 1972, 1983; 1989), personal
strivings (Emmons, 1986), and life tasks (Cantor, 1990).
Personal projects are extended sets of personally salient activity that
can range from short bursts of action, such as meeting Adam for
coee to the dening commitments of one s lifetime, such as try to
respect my parent s wishes. Projects are conceived of as middle level
units in personality (Little, 1987, 1989) in that they are inuenced by
superordinate goals such as core values, and they generate subordinate
acts through which the project is implemented. Though projects are
action units, the fact that they are personal means that they cannot be
directly inferred from mere observation of an individual s acts. Personal
projects typically proceed through the stages of project inception,
planning, action, and termination. However, the fact that they are
embedded in a daily ecology that involves u bugs, returning
boyfriends, irate roomates and computer system crashes (sometimes
simultaneously) means that projects are in continual ux and their
successful management involves a blend of tenacity and suppleness.
Quintessentially, personal projects analysis is about the social ecology of
muddling through.
To illustrate, let s follow Adam for a while. We catch sight of him as he
arrives on campus on Wednesday morning. He sits alone in the
13
cafeteria, skims a few pages of his Personality text, and heads o to a
Physics lecture. He sits frozen faced, trying to suppress his yawning,
leaves quickly after class, pauses momentarily in the hallway, and then
slowly walks along the river to his residence. He slams the door, puts on
a CD, and starts to cry: What s up?
From a trait perspective we might say that he is showing signs of
introversion by avoiding much contact with others and perhaps that he
is a bit neurotic (his crying might be seen as dysphoric). But at Level II
his behavior is approached rather dierently. From a personal projects
perspective we would ask the crucial question What have you been up
to today to which he may well respond with trying to get a date with
Jennifer . The outward and visible signs of his behavior may have made
little thematic sense until we get that crucial piece of personal
construing. His cafeteria stop prior to class had been a reconnaissance
mission to see if Jenn was there that morning. His boredom in class
may have made more sense to the physics professor (who may have
been attributing unwarranted thickness to the student) if he had
known that Adam wasn t even registered in the course: the only reason
he was there was to be near Jennifer, a physics major. Adam s dithering
in the hall was a failed implementation of his intention to approach
Jennifer, who only knows him as a rather wimpy person who seems to
be following her around. His emotional release back in residence was in
frustration that once again he lacked the courage to ask her out.
Research on personal projects involves asking people what their current
personal projects are, and then to appraise each project on a set of
approximately twenty dimensions that have both theoretical and applied
importance for personality psychology (e.g., enjoyment, stress, control).
These ratings, which can be appraised at both the individual level of
analysis and normatively, can be summarized as falling under ve major
theoretical factors: project meaning, structure, community, ecacy, and
stress. Research to date conrms the proposition that subjective well-
14
being is related to the extent to which people are engaged in personal
projects that are worthwhile (meaning), managed eectively (structure),
supported by others (community), likely to succeed (ecacy), and not
unduly onerous (low stress) (Little, 1989, 1999a, b, 2000a, b).
The content of personal projects has also been shown to be important.
For example, being engaged in intrapersonal projects, those dealing
with trying to change or deal with aspects of one s own personality
(e.g., be less subservient to my parents , try to gure out why I am
always so angry , be more outgoing ), is positively associated both
with a tendency to experience depressive aect but also with the Big
Five factor of Openness to Experience (Little, 1989). From a personal
projects view then, Nikki might be expected to be engaged in a number
of such intrapersonal projects. But whether she sees them as likely to
succeed or not might well inuence whether she ourishes as a creative
intellectual or becomes immobilized in self-hatred.
Two other PAC units, each in part derived from personal projects
methodology, have stimulated considerable research interest. Nancy
Cantor and her colleagues (e.g., Cantor, 1990) have examined personal
action in the context of what they term life tasks . Life tasks are
undertakings that are important to accomplish at dierent stages of life.
Cantor explored these in her inuential study of the transition of
University of Michigan students through undergraduate life (Cantor,
Norem, Niedenthal, Langston, & Brower, 1987). Students generated lists
of personal projects which they then categorized in terms of alignment
with several types of life task deemed important for university students.
Subjects were able to categorize many of their projects as being in the
service of life tasks such as getting independent of parents, forming
friendships, or succeeding academically.
Cantor s research has shown how the successful management of life
tasks requires social intelligence, particularly the sensitive deployment
of appropriate strategies through which tasks can be successfully
15
accomplished (Cantor & Fleeson, 1994). Two such strategic approaches
have been identied by researchers on life tasks: defensive pessimism
and illusory glow optimism (Norem, 1989). The former strategy involves
envisaging a worst case scenario ( I m going to fail this exam ) and
harnessing the anxiety to motivate studying and task persistence. The
opposite strategy involves imaging best case scenarios ( I m going to ace
this exam! ) and having this positive incentive motivate studying. The
life task researchers have shown some intriguing implications of the
adoption of these two strategies. They seem to be equally eective in
terms of actual academic attainment, but the defensive pessimists seem
to incur social costs in terms of being more of a burden on others. Thus,
Nikki s repeated bemoaning of the diculties of nishing up term
without falling apart may work just as well as a motivational strategy for
studying as Eve s optimism. But friends start to tune Nikki out and
potentially valuable resources for her appear not to be answering their
phones at college that month.
Another PAC unit that has stimulated considerable research activity is
that of Emmons personal strivings (Emmons, 1986). A personal striving
is something that a person is typically trying to do. Thus, Adam s acts of
listening empathetically to Nikki and writing a letter home may be in
the service of the personal striving of being nice to people. Emmons
and his colleagues have shown that human well-being is enhanced to
the extent that personal strivings are appraised as likely to be
accomplished and are not in conict with each other. If Adam s Be
nice striving is in conict with a be intellectually tough striving, his
well-being is likely to be compromised (Emmons & King, 1988).
Clearly, these three PAC units are closely related, though each has a
particular zone of applicability that suggests it is worthwhile to preserve
the subtle distinctions between them (cf. Krahe, 1992). My own
perspective sees personal projects as middle level units that can be in
the service of both personal strivings and life tasks. Eve s personal
16
project of completing her stats assignment may serve both her striving
of competing with her brother and the normative life task of doing
well in academic tasks. But she may also be involved in personal
projects that are only loosely coupled with a personal striving or life
task such as talking to Nikki about the way she dresses.
Nikki s whole project system at college may be a protracted exercise in
meaningless pursuits, unlinked to superordinate goals, and bereft of
intrinsic meaning. Each of the PAC perspectives would see this state of
aairs to be problematic. It should also be noted here that one of the
major dierences between the Big Five and PAC units is that the former
are postulated to be relatively unchangeable after about the age of thirty
(Costa & McCrae, 1994). So, while there may be some latitude left for
Nikki to change her trait of neuroticism as she stumbles through her
early twenties, there is greater tractability for change in her personal
projects, and perhaps in her life tasks and personal strivings . At the
very least there is the possibility of helping to clarify them and enhance
the likelihood of them being pursued eectively. And, unlike traits,
these reformulations and transformations can be tried on throughout the
life-spaneven when Nikki gets old and wobbly.
Level III ( Beings ): Life Stories and Personal Narratives
A third major growth area in contemporary personality theory and
research is the narrative turn that has occurred in recent years (Sarbin,
1986). The major thrust of this perspective is that humans have a
deeply rooted need to construct narratives within which their lives
make sense. We construct stories not only about our relationships, our
achievements, and our aspirations, but we also tell stories in order to
establish an identity, to establish validation about the type of being
we are or are becoming.
McAdams (1993) has developed an elegant theory of personality in
which life stories form the central focus. Life stories are built around
various representations of self. Indeed, the very process of selng as
17
McAdams calls it, emerges only in the construction of a compelling life
story that meets certain critical features such as being coherent. A key
element of the life story is the development of imagoes which are like
stock characters in a story and are often personications of the themes
of agency and communion.
The narrative theorists in contemporary personality psychology would
have much to say about our cafeteria conversations. First and most
obviously, the students are conversing! During conversation we typically
tell each other stories about how things are going, what s up, who s
doing what (and where and why). Second, the stories we tell as we talk
with others enable us to tie together personally salient information from
the other two levels of personality research. Eve doesn t just list her
trait characteristics or her projects, she casts them in narrative form ( I
know I m too pushy with Eric, and he really doesn t want me to go to
grad school, but I think he s fooling himself and I ll straighten him out
before the end of April. More coee Adam? ) In these conversations
and story telling, Eve s imago seems to be a blend of agency and
communionperhaps seeing herself as the Directive Therapist. Eric, on
the other hand, may see her as Eve, the Avenging Traveler.
A third consequence of the narrative perspective to personality is that
the mere telling of our tales can have a salutary eect. Pennebaker
(1989) has shown that when students are asked to write personal
narratives that deal with previously unshared painful material, there is
an initial increase and then a long term decrease in measures of
autonomic arousal. The eect is particularly notable with students who
choose to tell deeply revealing stories. These results are consistent with
the research of Wegner (1994) who has shown that not thinking about
certain things can be taxing. (Wegner directs his subjects, for example,
to not think of a White Bear. I admonish the reader not to think about
this example.) Thought suppression actually increases the likelihood of
thinking about the suppressed image and can extract an autonomic cost.
18
If Nikki, then, were nally to get the chance to unload, to open up and
tell her story, she may be less likely to anesthetize herself against the
unspoken aspects of her life.
Voices from the Cellar: Psychodynamic and Evolutionary
Perspectives in Personality
We have tried to capture the kind of theoretical conversations that we
would hear at each of three dierent levels in the house of personality.
In some respects, the metaphor is tting often the research being
carried out on one oor is done in ignorance (not necessarily willful) of
work going on at the other two levels. I also think that the second oor
oers ways of listening in on conversations on the narrative upper
deck and down below with the trait-ers. But, to extend the metaphor
one level further, I think there is a need to acknowledge some very
strong rumblings from the basement cellar. Here is where power plants
and sump pumps are chugging along and the kind of discourse going on
down there about personality is similarly foundational and, some would
say, earthy.
I see two basement areas operating at this deepest level of personality:
psychodynamic theory and evolutionary psychology. The rst provides a
line of continuity with the modern origins of personality theory. The
second provides a link with the Darwinian roots of modern life sciences.
A spirited treatment of the contemporary revival and sustained
relevance of psychodynamic theory for personality psychology can be
found in Westen (1990). One of the most noteworthy accomplishments
of contemporary psychodynamic theory has been wide spread
acceptance of one of its most basic assumptions: the pervasive impact
of unconscious inuences on personality functioning (Erdelyi, 1974). For
example, when patients are exposed to subliminal stimuli that are
symbolically related to their particular problem, there appears to be
some relief of symptoms ( Silverman & Weinberger, 1985). That such
messages are not consciously recognized yet have a discernible impact
19
on human functioning means that at least some of the dynamics going
on in the college cafeteria are not accessible to the participants or to
their personality research professors (not unless armed with hidden
portable tachistoscopes). A general sense of tension and pervasive
unease between Nikki and Adam, for example, may be the result of the
continuous inuence of impulses that each has imperfectly repressed.
To an astute psychodynamicist, there may be subtle hints revealed in
gesture and the parapraxes (such as slips of the tongue and memory
lapses) that lead to mixed messages and missed meetings. Such
inuences are perplexing and their detection requires probative work
that is both demanding and subtle.
On the other side of the basement are the evolutionary psychologists.
David Buss (1991), in particular, has pioneered the study of how
evolutionary adaptation has shaped human personality. The essential
argument of this perspective is that in the course of evolution various
strategies which conferred adaptational advantage were selectively
retained and transmitted to the next generation. Though these
adaptations evolved in adaptive landscapes radically dierent from
those that confront us today, the mammalian brain still shows evidence
of these primordial adaptations.
One of the important claims of the evolutionary perspective is that there
will be sex dierences in the criteria that guide selection of future
mates. It is argued that women will place a premium on the status of
prospective mates, while men will regard the physical attractiveness of
mates as dierentially important. Note that it is not being claimed that
these will be the most important or the only important criteria, in fact
pleasantness of personality is the top criterion in mate selection for both
sexes. But it is argued that the sexes should dier in the rankings of
these attributes for evolutionary reasons. Physical attractiveness serves
as a marker of potential fecundity in the female, and status cues serve

20
as markers that a male will be able to provide resources that will
support the viability of ospring.
Evolutionary personality theory also posits that there will be important
sex dierences in emotions, such as jealousy. Males are more jealous
when their mates engage in sexual indelity and women more if their
mates establish emotional romantic interests in another woman.
An early and similar perspective to the evolutionary personality
psychologists is Hogan s (1982) socioanalytic theory. Hogan was one of
the rst to emphasize the signicance of the fact that human personality
evolved in the context of group life. Group living requires that
individuals be particularly sensitive to two key issuesestablishing social
bonds with others and negotiating the power hierarchy: in short of
getting along and getting ahead (Hogan,1982).
Like psychodynamic forces, those arising from evolutionary principles
may have an inuence that eludes awareness. Adam may not have
consciously chosen to ask Jennifer out because she was drop dead
gorgeous (let alone likely to bear his child), though she is sure that this
is the main reason he keeps hanging around. He may well have
consciously formulated the goal of taking her out because she seemed
nurturing and responsive at a party in September. Meanwhile Eve will
feel deep frustration when Nikki asks her why she wore provocative
clothes when Professor Buss gave a colloquium in their department.
Give me a break says Eve, and rolls her eyes, while Nikki responds
with a smile that is part twinkle, part smirk.
My own view of the evolutionary perspective in personality theory is
that it provides some intriguing hypotheses about the distal roots of
human personality that otherwise seem inexplicable. My concern is that
we not underestimate the importance of another achievement of
mammalian evolutionthe development of a neocortex that allows us to
formulate and carry out core projects that can override the primitive
motivational processes of more ancient origin. In my view, peoples
21
accounts of what they are doing should take initial priority particularly
when we are dealing with things that are important to them in their
lives. Thus, I would be more inclined to believe Adam s explanation of
his reasons for pursuing Jennifer than those that might be oered under
the evolutionary hypothesis. Such a credulous approach, which is
consistent with Kelly s view of the individual as co-scientist, works well
within the normal boundaries of daily conduct. If, however, there is
consistent evidence that all of the people Adam nds nurturing just
happen to be beautiful women, I would be inclined to look to
evolutionary theory to help explain why this is so. Perhaps it is in the
dark passages of personality and the extreme edges of human conduct
that both the psychodynamic and evolutionary perspectives deservedly
attract our attention. The prevalence of violent jealousy and the
pervasiveness of powerful man, nubile woman partnerships reminds
us that we are, after all, an evolved mammalian species with adapted
minds and that this heritage has the potential to inuence us in
powerful ways. (Do not think of a White House.)
Personality in Context: Situations, Places and Environments
One of the central tenets of behaviorism, as well as the Mischellian
critique of traits, was that human conduct is often generated by the
context within which it is embedded. Murray, too, it will be recalled,
insisted on the need to appraise the press of the environments within
which human needs were satised or frustrated. A brief word, then,
about the role of contextual features in contemporary personality. How
do the theorists on the three levels view the environments within which
personality processes are played out?7
On the rst oor, trait psychologists are concerned with the extent to
which there is an appropriate degree of t between persons and their
environments. Extraverts, for example, require stimulating environments
for optimal functioning, while more introverted individuals require more
structured and modulated environments. While Eve may thrive on a
22
week lled with parties and recreational diversions, Adam may nd
walking by the river for getting his thoughts together about Jennifer, his
folks and the upcoming GRE exams. Along with tools for the assessment
of personality characteristics, there are abundant scales and inventories
for the appraisal of the personality of environments, so that there are
practical ways of determining the degree of t between people and their
contexts along a number of key dimensions. Such tools allow us to
formulate and answer the essential question about persons and
environments talked about on the rst oor: got a match ?
On the second oor, the PAC theorists are more concerned with the
extent to which environmental contexts serve to generate, facilitate, or
frustrate personal action. The pursuit of one s core projects, cherished
strivings, or vital life tasks requires an environment within which such
pursuits are valued, or at the very least not impeded. Personal contexts
may be the major source of the projects that people regard as worthy of
exploration , but they may also proscribe the kind of pursuits that
people even dare to consider. Eve s home environment may have been
such that the thought of doing anything other than pursue a graduate
degree after college was simply not an option. Nikki s home
environment may have been one in which the possibility of graduate
school brought blank stares of incredulity and the blunt question of
who the hell is going to pay for that? Unlike trait perspectives, then,
second oor theorists are more likely to look at the environment less in
terms of t than in terms of ecological factors such as aordances,
resources, impedances, and constraints (Little, 1999b; Phillips, Little &
Goodine, 1997).
The third oor narrative theorists are positioned to view the
environment with a broader sweep and they are particularly interested
in locating individual life stories in their historical contexts. Sarbin
provides a fascinating analysis of how life trajectories can be entrained
to the cultural myths that dene a particular historical time and place
23
for example, the pervasive myth of the avenging hero who sacrices his
life to avenge wrongs done against his people in the past (Sarbin, 1996).
Linking Levels: A Contemporary Example of Meeting the Integrative
Challenge
Personality theorists have argued that the enduring mission of
personality psychology has been to provide both theoretical and
methodological tools for integrating the diverse system of inuences
aecting the lives of individuals and accounting for their dierences. We
have also shown that much of contemporary personality research is
taking place in three relatively independent sectors concerned with
traits, action, and narratives, each of which has its own integrative task.
Trait psychology provides an impetus for integration of taxonomic work
on stable personality characteristics with, as just one example,
neurophysiological research thus providing an integrative bridge to the
neurosciences. Personal action psychology, particularly in the focal role
given to the concept of goals, provides a natural bridge to cognitive
science as well as to social ecological perspectives that explore the ways
in which goal pursuit is embedded in and contributes to middle level
dynamic contexts. Narrative psychology provides a natural bridge to the
humanities and to a broad corpus of literary, historical, and political
scholarship that charts the larger currents of thought, tradition, and
myth that dene culture.
Although we may well have horizontal integration within each of these
three levels of contemporary personality research, is there a way of
vertically integrating them so that we might bridge the full spectrum of
inuences on human personality? Not only do I think the answer is a
strong yes, indeed , I also think that it is precisely in this bridging
research between levels in personality that some of the most interesting
new ndings are emerging. Such bridging or linking research should
also allow us access to the theoretical insights of the classical

24
perspectives in personality whose voices guided us through the early
history of the eld.
Not surprisingly, given my own theoretical orientation, I feel that it is on
the second oorwhere the action isthat we are oered the best
opportunity for conceptual commerce with the trait-ERs downstairs and
the narrative theorists up in the loft. We shall even show how our
understanding of personal projects can be enriched by taking a trip
down to the basement on occasion. I want to illustrate this by showing
how research on personal projects allows us to move through each of
the dierent levels of research in personality and, in this way, to
continue to struggle with the broad band integrative challenge that
denes our eld.
To illustrate this, let s return to the cafeteria and take Getting into
graduate school in psychology as a prototypical personal project and
one shared by all three students. Research studies from several dierent
theoretical perspectives and levels of analysis in personality have
addressed the content, appraisal, and dynamics of personal projects.
We can start in the basement. Although the evidence from this level is
more indirect than at the other levels, it oers one of the most
intriguing areas of interlevel inuences on personality and one of the
most challenging areas for future research.
Unconscious Inuences: Particularly at the inception stages of a
personal project, it is likely that unconscious processes may play a
subtle, even powerful role, in directing its course of including whether
the project is even considered in the rst place. For example, Baldwin,
Carrell & Lopez (1990 ) reported an intriguing study in which graduate
students at the University of Michigan appraised the likely success of
their research projects for the next term. For half the students, prior to
their ratings, a tachistoscopic image was ashed of the scowling face of
a highly distinguished and rather threatening Michigan professor. For
the other half, the smiling face of a less threatening post-doctoral fellow
25
was ashed. Those exposed to the threatening face rated the likely
success of their research projects to be lower.
In other words, pre-conscious images that involve threat may lead us to
evaluate our projects in powerful ways. Indeed, such images may
actually serve to proscribe a project as something that one simply
cannot do or should not do. Thus Adam s ruminations about grad
school as he walks by the river, may well be guided by the image of his
parents disapproving looks and snippets of conversation about grad
school being a waste of time.
Do the other cellar dwellers have relevance to the pursuit of our
students projects? Though more speculative, I think the evolutionary
perspective oers some intriguing possibilities for explaining project
choice (see Buss, 1989). When we look at the content of the projects
generated in the listing of our student research collaborators, it is easy
to see projects that represent quintessential evolutionary tasks of mate
selection, competition, social bonding, etc. It would be possible to
create an evolutionary task template (based on relevant project
appraisal dimensions such as the extent to which this project involves
competing with other males, etc.) that would allow a researcher to
estimate the degree to which appraisals of projects can be explained by
their match with the theoretical expectations of evolutionary theory.
Moving up a level to that of the trait psychologists, there has been
extensive research showing the relationships between traits and the
content and appraisal of personal projects (e.g., Little, Lecci, &
Watkinson, 1992; Salmela-Aro, 1992). Among the most robust ndings
have been that conscientiousness is strongly related to the personal
project factors, such as ecacy and absence of stress. Perhaps more
surprisingly is the consistent evidence that conscientiousness is also
strongly related to the perceived meaningfulness of projects, particularly
to its enjoyment. The image of someone who is highly conscientious as
a rather joyless creature slogging away on her ANOVAs at the computer
26
terminal is more myth than reality. If Eve happened to score high on
conscientiousness, her seemingly cavalier tactic of applying only to
three schools may not be so cavalier at all. She may already have
thrown herself into researching the schools, having email
correspondence with prospective advisors, and actually visiting the
campuses before sending o her applications. And our research would
suggest that for Eve these projects would be a delight, not a drag. Nikki,
on the other hand, has probably procrastinated again, and regards the
whole application process as a Royal Pain. This pattern likely reects
Nikki s status on another of the big ve dimensions, neuroticism.
Salmela-Aro (1992) has provided important evidence that depression is
signicantly associated with the tendency for personal projects to be
pursued with less eectiveness and less likelihood of successful
completion, and Pychyl s extensive program of research on
procrastination and well-being provides clear evidence of the
deleterious eects of Nikki s style of dealing (or not dealing) with her
projects (e.g., Pychyl & Little, 1998).
Two aspects of environmental inuences have also been shown to be
associated with appraisals of our personal projects. For example,
Ruehlman and Wolchik (1988) have explored the extent to which people
in our social networks can both help and hinder the likelihood of
successful project pursuit. Eve s project of going to Ann Arbor may be
frustrated by Erik s apparent disapproval, but facilitated by the fact that
beyond any one else, Erik has challenged her intellectually and given
her the condence to aspire well beyond where she had thought
possible in September. The reason we choose to undertake certain
projects rather than others has been approached in a very imaginative
way by Ogilvie and Rose (1995) who, after grappling with the diculties
of categorizing projects in terms of content, realized that projects fall
neatly into four categories that are rooted in classical learning theory:

27
whether the project is a positive or negative goal and whether it is
something that is being sought or avoided.
Omodei & Wearing (1990) provided a clear demonstration of the
relationship between the classical Murrayan needs, personal projects,
and well-being. They had respondents rate each of their current
personal projects on dimensions that represented each of the major
needs posited by Murray as central to individual dierences, and found
that the extent to which projects were satisfying their needs, overall life
satisfaction was higher. Indeed, they were able to show that need
satisfaction of personal projects served as an excellent proxy for overall
life satisfaction ratings. Thus, Nikki may be deeply unhappy at this point
in her life because she has been unable to formulate and act upon
personal projects that satisfy some of her most important needs. Though
changing the needs may be very dicult, nding projects through which
they might be met may oer greater tractability for Nikki at this stage in
her life (Little & Chambers, 2000).
Finally, there are also compelling theoretical reasons to see personal
projects as interpenetrating with the narrative level of personality theory
and research. Sarbin (1996), in tracing through the importance of
cultural myth and its impact on lives, suggests that tragically conceived
projects, such as terrorist campaigns, may derive their motivational
force from the myths to which children are exposed from an early age,
and which are reinforced by media attention and the collective stories
about heroes and villains which saturate our cultural landscape. Under
such a view, and depending on one s belief systems, another Adam s
project ( Do not eat that Apple ) may be seen as a generative proto-
project of humankind.
The Prospects for Personology: Consolidating the Integrative Center
in Psychology
It should be apparent that I feel that the eld of personality psychology
is an exceptionally exciting place in which to take up permanent
28
residence. I see its aspiration to provide the integrative center for
psychology as a continuing challenge. The three levels that we have
discussed in this chapter, will, I believe, continue to grow in importance
and yield insights that will advance both theoretical understanding and
applications in elds such as clinical, health, and organizational
psychology. So too, undoubtedly, will the personologists in the
basement continue to expand our understanding of the remote roots of
human conduct. In addition to these, I think there are ve areas that
deserve to be promoted to positions of importance in our collective
research agenda.
First, I think there are rich possibilities for expansion of our
understanding of the biological base of personality traits, particularly
given the rapid advances in techniques for monitoring brain activity on-
line. Though there is a fairly substantial research literature on the
neurophysiological substrates of extraversion and neuroticism, work on
the rest of the big ve dimensions is still in the early stages. Recent
advances in the neurobiology of temperament (with its own Big Three
factors) seems particularly promising (Clark & Watson, 1999).
Second, I think that non-human studies of personality, particularly
among the higher primates, but involving a whole range of species, will
pay very rich dividends in understanding how evolutionary forces have
shaped human personality. There are already signs that an emerging
animal personality psychology research agenda is well under way
(Gosling, in press). Given my conviction that project pursuit is an
inherently mammalian propensity, I do not see such research as
restricting itself to trait-like behaviors. Extended sets of salient activity
in the pursuit of valued goals applies to Nikki s cat as well as Nikki.
While we will never be able to herd either Nikki or her cat, I think the
comparative psychology of unpredictability is itself an intriguing focus
for collaborative research between ethologists and personality
psychologists.
29
Third, particularly at Level II, I believe there is considerable scope for
expanding personality psychology s intellectual collaboration with the
elds of ethical philosophy, legal theory, and the philosophy of action
(Little, 1987, 1999a). Scholars in these areas are already grappling with
questions of how the nature of our ground projects or core tasks bear
upon issues of ethics and of dierent conceptions of justice. (For a
compelling treatment of such issues see Nussbaum (1992). Nussbaum
looks at various Hellenistic philosophies through the eyes of Nikidiona
probably ctitious student of Epicurus, who is seeking instruction on
living a ourishing life. Nikki in the present chapter is a modern
descendent of Nikidion. Some day I hope to take her on a more
extensive trip through what contemporary personality psychology can
say about human ourishing.) I believe that such discourse will be
enriched by the importation of empirical work of personality
psychologists, and that our work will be enriched by the conceptual
precision aorded by philosophical inquiry.
As one example of this kind of interdisciplinary analysis, I have recently
been exploring the concept of free traits, which I see as trait-like
behavior carried out in the service of a personal project even though it
may run against one s rst nature . For example, some of us are
pseudo-extraverts, by which I mean we are Eysenckian introverts
who, because of professional duty or love, act extravertedly in order to
accomplish valued goals. I believe such apparently disingenuous
behavior can extract a toll on the autonomic nervous system and that
this can lead to burn out. However, such a consequence can be
mitigated by the availability of restorative niches in which we can,
every now and then, indulge our rst natures ( Little, 1999b, 2000a).
One of the intriguing questions raised by such an analysis (which
integrates research from Levels I and II), is whether such disingenuous
behavior is, in fact, a bad thing (not only in the sense of possibly
being stressful, but in terms of being unnatural, even phony). If Adam
30
decides to go back to the family business and forego grad school, how
should we think about the tradeo between delity to family and
honesty to oneself? Clearly these are questions of value that can not be
exclusively adjudicated by empirical inquiry. But I strongly believe they
can be informed by such inquiry, and personality psychologists are
ideally positioned to provide precisely the kind of rich textured
information about the complexities of people s lives.
Fourth, I believe the narrative perspective in personality will continue to
ourish and I hope that the traditional ways of getting individuals to tell
their stories will be enriched by adoption of new technologies and
methodologies. For example, simply asking individuals to tell about
their daily lives by providing us with images and captions from an
imaginary videotape (called an idio-tape machine), allows individuals
some adaptive exibility in bringing into conceptual focus concerns and
elements of emotional signicance to them (Little, 2000a). Similarly, just
as computing science and cognitive psychology have proceeded in
virtual lock step, I believe that the eld of personality can benet from
joining forces with the New Media , including the imaginative use of
interactive multi-media to assist individuals in exposing and exploring
their personal wishes, needs, projects, traits, and life narratives. For
example, Nikki has been depicted throughout this essay as someone
who has pain beyond words. Perhaps by using media that do not rely
solely upon words, she will be able to construct images and scenarios
with greater richness and precision. Such multimedia meditations might
help her both express and expunge some of that hurt.
If students ask me if I think they should pursue graduate work in
personality psychology, I usually schedule two meetings. In the rst
meeting I tell them that I cannot think of a more fascinating area of
research and proceed to tell them much of what has been compressed
into this chapter.

31
They occasionally ask me how I got into the eld of personality
psychology. Depending on how much time they have to indulge what I
call my anecdotage , I tell them the following. I have long felt a strong
attraction to both the humanities and the biological sciences, with
classics and microbiology being among my favorite undergraduate
courses. When it came time to choose a major, psychology seemed to
be the most likely eld in which I could maintain a joint focus on ions
and Ionians. Though I had originally been accepted at Berkeley to study
neuropsychology, a chance event in the library just prior to leaving for
graduate school launched me on another trajectory. I was searching for
a book called the Stereotaxic Atlas of the Brain when I accidentally
pulled down a wayward copy of George Kelly s Psychology of Personal
Constructs. I leafed through the rst few pages, developed a very severe
intellectual itch and have been scratching it ever since. I do not
recommend to my students that they take this random walk through the
stacks as a strategy for choosing their specialties in psychology, though
it is an honest account of how our professional lives can sometimes
wind their ways along unpredictable paths (Bandura, 1982).
In the second meeting, I am usually rather more cautious. Personality
psychology is a fundamentally intellectual pursuitit is concerned with
themes that go back to antiquity and challenges its serious students to
ponder issues that cut across the full spectrum of the humanities and
sciences. I point out that if the student s overriding concern is with a
particular practical problem, such as abuse or depression or
occupational success or criminal behavior, then that student should
seriously consider going into an applied eld such as clinical or
organizational psychology. But if they are interested in how all of these
disparate phenomena are linked together, then they may well have
found an intellectual home. We usually discuss where the strong
programs are in personality psychology and I direct them to the
splendid website called the Personality Project run by Bill Revelle at
32
Northwestern. I am also delighted as of a few months ago, to be able to
direct them to the Association for Research in Personality website and
urge them to join the Association immediately. The philosophy and
sense of excitement for the personality eld in this new Association
overlaps exactly with my own and I see it as a major source of
stimulation and support for the eld in the future.
If the student comes back for a third meeting, I know that the line of
succession from Freud, Murray, Allport, Kelly, and all the secular saints
of personology will likely remain unbroken. But if that particular student
doesn t come back, I can take some solace from knowing that there are
three other students waiting outside at this very moment. They want me
to go have a coee with them in the cafeteria and chat about grad
school. In fact there s loud banging on my door even as I wrap up this
chapter. Hang on, Nikki, I m coming.

33