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AN OBSERVED AGE DIFFERENCE IN RESPONSES TO A PERSONALITY INVENTORY
Author(s) -
CRAIK F. I. M.
Publication year - 1964
Publication title -
british journal of psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.536
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8295
pISSN - 0007-1269
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1964.tb00932.x
Subject(s) - psychology , personality , heron , developmental psychology , association (psychology) , meaning (existential) , social psychology , clinical psychology , paleontology , psychotherapist , biology
The two parts of the Heron Inventory give scores on two dimensions—emotional adjustment and sociability—which are held to be independent. However, results from a small sample study indicated that there was a strong positive association between the dimensions in a ‘young’ group but that no such relationship held in an ‘old’ group. This finding was confirmed for a group of 240 men ranging in age from 20 to 79. It was not confirmed in a similar group of 240 women. In the male group, the result did not appear to be due to concomitant changes in non‐verbal intelligence; it was apparently not caused by an increased tendency of the older subjects to agree or disagree with the items; it did not seem to be due to a change in the meaning or relevance of the items to older subjects, nor did it seem to be due to a decrease in the reliability of older subjects' responses. The result did, however, appear to be related to degree of adjustment. Possible reasons for this finding are discussed.