My division of interest is personality and social psychology and I reviewed
thePersonality and Social Psychology Review(PSPR) journal. One of the
most prominent topics being discussed is agreeableness and its
consequences amongst other topics such as reshaping social relationships
in adulthood and receptiveness to opposing views. Thinking about the
trending topics, I came to realize my own personality in the workplace and
that of many young people of faith entering the workforce. We can easily
come across as “too agreeable” or “too nice” which can often lead to
unhealthy working conditions.
Agreeableness is a personality trait not only applicable to the workplace,
but to everyday life as well. Current trends in research suggest that all in
all “eight general themes that describe Agreeableness’ characteristic
functioning across variables: self-transcendence, contentment, relational
investment, teamworking, work investment, lower results emphasis, social
norm orientation, and social integration” exist (Wilmot, 2022).
The HEXACO model is another important tool used in psychology to
evaluate personalities. These dimensions are able to be replicated in all
personality structure lexical studies. The agreeableness domain is one
where people are trusting, forgiving, gentle, patient, and flexible. This
proves true based on my personal struggles of being an agreeable person.
Even if an individual has caused me harm, it is easy for me to trust them
again. Gentleness comes into play when evaluating others; it is easy for
agreeable people to judge leniently. Flexibility goes hand-in-hand with
compromising even in unreasonable situations. Lastly, agreeable people
are notorious for their calmness according to Ashton and Lee (2021).
This topic is especially interesting to me because I see people of faith in a
more agreeable manner than not. Reading the Bible allows us to have
good intentions, love, and understanding for others. Therefore, personality
and social psychology is my area of research interest.
References
Ashton, M. C., & Lee, K. (2021). On the relations between Hexaco
Agreeableness (versus anger) and honesty‐humility.Scandinavian Journal
of Psychology,62(6), 887–894. https://doi.org/10.1111/sjop.12772
Wilmot, M. P., & Ones, D. S. (2022). Agreeableness and its consequences:
A quantitative review of meta-analytic findings.Personality and Social
Psychology Review, 108886832110730.
https://doi.org/10.1177/10888683211073007
