Reading Someone’s Personality Through One Question

One type of question may indirectly reveal a great deal about someone’s personality.

Asking people what they think about others reveals a great deal about their own personalities.

The reason is that people tend to see many of their own personality traits in others.

A generous person sees others as generous, while a selfish person sees others as selfish.

Dr. Dustin Wood, the study’s lead researcher, says:

“A large set of negative personality traits is associated with viewing others negatively.

The tendency to see others negatively is itself an indicator of a high likelihood of depression and various personality disorders.”

These conclusions come from a series of three studies.

In one study, participants were asked to assess the positive and negative traits of three other people.

The more positively they judged these people, the happier, more optimistic, stronger, and more emotionally stable they themselves proved to be.

People who described others positively also proved to be more satisfied with their lives.

In contrast, participants who described others more negatively had high levels of narcissism and antisocial behavior.

When the researchers returned to the same people a year later, they found the same results.

This suggests that what people’s assessments of others reveal about themselves remains stable over time.

Personality disorders are often diagnosed, at least in part, through how people view others, the researchers say:

“Although narcissistic people see others as uninteresting or worthless, this does not reflect how they see themselves.”

Similarly, people who display behaviors consistent with paranoia may believe that others are spiteful and untrustworthy, even though they may not see themselves that way.

[…]

Machiavellianism is usually measured in part by asking people to what extent they perceive dishonesty, a lack of integrity, or a lack of altruism in the actions of others. Narcissistic behavior is believed to be driven partly by the conviction that other people are inferior, uninteresting, and undeserving of attention.”

The study was published in:

(.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology  (Wood et al., 2010

Source: Dr. Jeremy Dean

Image: Atos on Flickr