Traits, motives, and depressive styles as reflections of agency and communion

Helgeson proposed a comprehensive model of agency, communion, and well-being that was based on a review of the literature on agentic and communal personality traits, power and intimacy motivation, and self-critical and dependent depressive styles. The present study empirically examined the overlap among these personality dimensions as well as their relations to positive and negative affect, life satisfaction, and social adjustment. A factor analysis of the various personality measures yielded two factors, labeled communion and agency. Power motivation loaded negatively with four communal qualities: communal traits, communal role behaviors, intimacy motivation, and dependency. Self-criticism loaded negatively with two other agentic qualities: agentic traits and agentic role behaviors. Both agency and communion were significantly positively associated with positive affect and social adjustment. Agency also was significantly associated with higher life satisfaction and lower negative affect. The positive adjustment outcomes related to agency were confirmed by peer reports.