Nathan Hudson

Who they are

The work of Nathan Hudson reaches this site through the paper listed below. On this site the name is tied to Volitional Personality Change, The Five-Factor Model, Mean-Level Change, The Self-Report Problem.

Key papers

Hudson, N. W., & Fraley, R. C. (2015). Volitional personality trait change: Can people choose to change their personality traits? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 109(3), 490-507. What it reports: Two 16-week experiments. People who set goals to change a personality trait generally showed real change in that trait in their reports and daily behaviour, and training in specific if-then plans helped them get there.

Key ideas

Volitional Personality Change: The finding that people who want to change a trait, and then actually do the things that trait involves, do shift it.

The Five-Factor Model: The mainstream structural model of personality, which describes people on five continuous dimensions rather than sorting them into kinds: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism.

Mean-Level Change: The average shift in a trait across age groups, a statement about populations and not about any one person.

The Self-Report Problem: What happens when the only instrument available for measuring a faculty is that same faculty.

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