The Nearest Thing to Mind Reading

Instead of focusing on personal Web sites and blogs, UA psychology
researchers
used stream of consciousness writings in their research to determine a
more
accurate measure of individual personlity traits.

Stream of consciousness, a century-old literary device, is helping
University of
Arizona researchers get to the core of individual personality.

Typically, researchers have focused on more public spaces and forms of
self-expression to determine personality - e-mail messages, Web sites,
blogs,
office spaces, handshakes, face-to-face interactions, fashion choices
and the
way people loops G's and dot I's in their signatures.

But UA assistant psychology professor Matthias R. Mehl and Shannon E.
Holleran,
a doctoral degree candidate in psychology, wanted to delve into the
difficult-to-measure, private nuances of personality. So they set out
on a study
using stream of consciousness writing.

They found that reading private thoughts manifest in a writing surge
resulted in
the ability to make "surprisingly accurate" measures of a person's
personality
traits.

Their findings are published in the June issue of Journal of Research
in
Personality in an article titled, "Let Me Read Your Mind: Personality
Judgments
Based on a Person's Natural Stream of Thought."

Mehl said "the general sense is that just by looking at someone's
picture or Web
site or by reading somebody's blog, you can get a very good sense of
what that
person is like."

That may not be entirely true.

"A person can put up a good face and avoid disclosing different types
of
information," he added. "You would think depressed people party less,
talk less,
laugh less and interact less. But the students who reported having the
most
depressive symptoms did those things as much as anyone else."

Mehl and Holleran were interested in understanding how individuals can
better
understand others and also how the individual perceives the self, so
they set
out to get as close to mind reading as possible.

Personality, Without the Filters

The two, seeking out "natural expression of personality" without the
influence
of filters, placed nearly 100 undergraduate students in private
cubicles and
encouraged them to type for 20 minutes tracking their thoughts. They
also urged
their subjects not to concern themselves with grammar or accuracy and
to type
whatever came to mind while also paying close attention to their
feelings and
sensations while typing.

Most people wrote about school, downtime, recent experiences and their
plans for
the day.

Mehl and Holleran then had nine "naïve judges" - individuals who were
not privy
to the initial phase of the research project - read over the texts and
evaluate
the writings based on the "Big Five" dimensions: emotional stability,
agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness and extroversion.

The researchers uncovered a few things: Stream of consciousness
writing often
speaks more loudly about private personality traits than do public
forms of
expression and those who read personal narratives written by other
people can
most often come up with an accurate judgment of that person's
character.

The research also revealed that it was easy to pick up on specific
traits, such
as low self-esteem, the tendency to worry, evidence of anxiety and
depression,
or even neuroticism.

Those are the type of personality traits not easily detected based on
how people
arrange their blankets and pillows or how many sticky notes a person
keeps
plastered on a computer screen.

"Anxiety and depression are traits that tend to be more hidden when we
first
meet people," said Holleran, also a UA graduate researcher who has
done quite a
bit of research on how people form first impressions.

Holleran, a personality and social psychologist, said the research
could help
determine ways to improve relationships and also aid family members
and peers in
being better at detecting symptoms of depression in those nearest
them.

Mehl had already co-authored a paper with a Washington University
colleague
detailing strong data showing that "people generally think they have
privileged
knowledge about themselves but, in fact, their friends and peers can
predict
their daily behavior just as well as they themselves can - in some
cases even
better."

He also co-authored a paper with University of Texas at Austin
professors
exploring how personality becomes apparent in varying environments and
situations depending on location, mood and other variables.

Turns out that the readers "were not just accurate for private things
and how
anxious and worried they are, but were also quite accurate across the
board,"
Mehl said about the most recent study, adding that it was funded by
the National
Institute of Mental Health and National Science Foundation.

"They had a good sense of how hard working, conscientious, how
agreeable or how
nice a person was," he said. "We were surprised."

Where Responsibility Comes In

Mel and Holleran's research could have applications for employers, law
enforcement agencies, courts and others, but Mehl said that a certain
amount of
discretion is necessary.

Part of the concern is intent.

The difference between personal narratives and Web blogs or social
networking
sites like MySpace and Facebook is that people willingly offer up
personal
information to their sites on the Internet.

Stream of consciousness writing may not show up on a public space,
just as a
person's private traits may not be revealed in a public setting.

"We used to have a role separation where you had your personal self at
home and
your professional self at work," Mehl said, adding that given the age
of the
Internet and technology, that's not always the case.

"An interesting question is to what extent should this kind of
information be
accessible? You have a potential risk when people reveal more about
themselves
than they intended," he said. "I do think people need to be aware of
what type
of information they convey. That is important."

Source: University of Arizona
http://www.physorg.com/news131980774.html