| The Role of Target Age in Personality Judgment Accuracy
Dissertation Abstract—Idaho State University (2020)
Accuracy of person perception is an important social skill that influences our day-to-day interactions and interpersonal relationships. While demographic characteristics such as target age have been found to influence judges’ perceptions (Chan et al., 2012; Correll et al., 2007), this research has not been extended to the accuracy of those judgments. The current study investigated the distinctive accuracy (accuracy of judging how someone is unique) and normativity (accuracy of judging how someone is similar to the average person) of personality trait and well-being judgments made by young adults about three age groups. It was hypothesized that distinctive accuracy and normativity would decrease as discrepancy in age etween judges and targets increased; and that judge characteristics including psychological well-being, life satisfaction, affect balance, attributional complexity, openness to experience, explicit ageism, anxiety about aging, knowledge of aging, and exposure to older adults, middle adults, grandparents, and parents would moderate these differences. Judges included 251 young adults who observed either young adult, middle adult, or older adult targets via video observations. Judges rated each target on personality, trait affect, and life satisfaction, and filled out a series of self-report measures. Regardless of age group being judged, young adults perceived personality and trait affect with statistically significant levels of distinctive accuracy and normativity (measured in units of beta), and life satisfaction with significant levels of normativity. For judgments of personality traits, middle adults were judged with higher levels of normativity compared to young adults and older adults. Several judge characteristics, including life satisfaction, affect balance, and exposure to grandparents, middle adults, and parents,moderated levels of distinctive accuracy and normativity of judgements of personality and life satisfaction of different age groups. Most of these moderations increased differences in accuracy across conditions, with older adults being judged less accurately compared to other age groups. While young adults are capable of accurately judging different age groups across different domains, certain judge characteristics may be less beneficial, and sometimes even hinder judgments of older adults compared to other age groups.
Keywords: personality, well-being, age, accuracy of person perception, judgmental accuracy |