In the HEXACO model of personality, which is somewhat similar to the Big Five Personality Factors, "H," the Honesty/Humility factor is considered descriptive and predictive of prosocial traits in general. Those who score low on this endorse unethical business practices and antisocial behaviors at a higher rate. Such things are always controversial, as how one answers a test question may be poorly related to one's actual behavior. This has been the problem with implicit bias research, for example. Everyone seems to agree that implicit bias must, simply must, have an effect on people's behavior. After all, there is prejudice in our society, and we can devise tests that look like they measure the amount of prejudice each of us against others. We might then hope to given them trainings and insights so that they consciousnly work against their own natural biases and become more fair. Unfortunately for the researchers, and all the people designing curricula to help become less biased, there doesn't seem to be a practical connection between implicit bias scores and prejudiced behavior, and giving people training doesn't seem to change anything.
So I am cautious about tests which propose to measure positive and negative qualities at all. As Jonathan Haidt's initial work on Moral Foundations revealed when his UPenn students turned out to have the "best" morality scores, some of test-taking can be influenced by what you believe the test designers or administrators want to see. I am also concerned that "Modesty," one of the traits supposedly being measured, seems to disappear from the discussion quickly.
With all that said as cautionary introduction, I think there is a personality trait that is real, important, and unmeasured which overlaps with some of the description: the ability to look at oneself with some objectivity. It has clear connections to humility, modesty, and honesty, or at least self-honesty. I do not think it is synonymous with all prosocial attitudes and behavior, however. I see it as a specific trait. It may relate to other positive cognitive traits such as intelligence, yet I can easily attest to there being many people with plenty of IQ points who have little of this quality. Yet intriguingly, the people I have known with the most of this humility and self-knowledge, have often been extremely smart as well. That may simply be a selection bias or confirmation bias on my part.
5 comments:
Does this trait "the ability to look at oneself with some objectivity", in your observation, correlate with an inclination to try to improve one's self? I could imagine it leading to a kind of fatalism, but if not, if it leads to trying to do better, then it is a manifestation of wisdom. I wonder how much that's a learned thing.
Maybe similar to what James is saying, I wonder how much of this is actually pattern recognition but by another phrase. If I believe I am excellent at {x}, but consistently fail at {thing that requires skill x}, is it humility or pattern recognition that drives me to reconsider my self assessment? If I refuse to reconsider my own contribution, my ability to accurately recognize any pattern will be severely hampered.
I've known some people who are *unable to conceive that they might be wrong*, about anything..whether it is "where did I leave that thing"" or "this stock will be a great investment," or "X will be a wonderful employee"....they can admit that they are wrong about certain things in retrospect, but *this time* they are sure they are right...
I am modest, for I have so much to be modest about.
@ bs king & james. I am not sure some of these can recognise that they have failed. I look back on myself and wonder at some series of decisions in my teens, then twenties and beyond, that in retrospect should have prompted reevaluation. But at the time, they were other people's fault, bad luck, the result of standing on righteous principle, etc.
Part of the reason I am so good at recognising self-serving rationalisations in online conversation is my deep experience with them at a very personal level. The people I am arguing with are usually amateurs in comparison.
To the larger questions, though, yes. A desire for self-improvement (perhaps that is a personality trait?) can lead to honest pattern recognition in a general way that could emerge as behaviors that look quite unrelated, yet are deeply related to that.
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