Ideal personhood through the ages: tracing the genealogy of the modern concepts of wellbeing.

This inquiry traces the recent history of modern conceptualizations of personhood and wellbeing. It explores a general transition from traditional frameworks emphasizing social embeddedness, external obligations, and cosmic meaning to modern views privileging self-determination, authenticity, and self-expression. The inquiry shows that contemporary conceptions of wellbeing have emerged in Western cultures through the gradual accumulation of influences, including the Enlightenment ethos, liberal ideals, romanticism, existentialism, countercultural movements, and modern psychology.

Level and stability of self-esteem mediate relationships between personality traits and life satisfaction: Bayesian multilevel modeling with annual data.

This study examined the relationships among the Big Five personality traits, self-esteem levels, self-esteem stability, and life satisfaction over a 15-year period. The primary objectives were to examine whether: (1) self-esteem stability contributed to the prediction of life satisfaction beyond self-esteem level, and (2) both self-esteem level and stability mediated the associations between personality traits and life satisfaction. Bayesian multilevel modelling was conducted on a sample of Dutch adults ( = 4,880), with self-esteem stability operationalised using within-person variance and mean square successive difference.

Increases in sense of purpose predict future positive changes in personality traits.

This longitudinal study examined the reciprocal relationship between the Big Five personality traits and sense of purpose over a 13-year period using a nationally representative sample of American adults (N = 11,010). The random intercept cross-lagged panel model revealed unidirectional effects: increases in sense of purpose predicted subsequent increases in openness, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and extraversion, as well as decreases in neuroticism. Conversely, changes in personality traits did not predict future changes in sense of purpose.

No evidence for a reciprocal relationship between daily self-control failures and addictive behavior in a longitudinal study.

Introduction: We all experience occasional self-control failures (SCFs) in our daily lives, where we enact behaviors that stand in conflict with our superordinate or long-term goals. Based on the assumption that SCFs share common underlying mechanisms with addictive disorders, we tested the hypothesis that a generally higher susceptibility to daily SCFs predicts more addictive behavior, or vice versa.

Methods: At baseline, 338 individuals (19-27 years, 59% female) from a community sample participated in multi-component assessments.