MODERATED ANALYSES OF LONGITUDINAL PERSONALITY STABILITY

Private self-consciousness, personal agency, self-monitoring, and Openness to Experience were examined as possible moderators of differential stability of personality. Self-reports and observer ratings on the NEO Personality Inventory from 2 longitudinal studies were reanalyzed using moderated multiple regression; no consistent moderator effects were found. Furthermore, analyses of raw change and individual stability scores across observers failed to find significant agreement. In adults, changes in personality scores across occasions are apparently due chiefly to error of measurement, and subsets of individuals showing true changes cannot be reliably identified. It is concluded that stable individual differences in basic dimensions are a universal feature of adult personality. Future research on moderators of stability might be better focused on changes in attitudes, habits, roles, and relationships.