Open AccessInterpersonal complementarity and gender: Contextual influences on perception of personality
Author(s) -
Kalyani Vishwanatha,
Camilla Hakelind,
Anders Steinvall,
Johan Svensson,
Mats Deutschmann
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
social behavior and personality
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.362
H-Index - 58
eISSN - 1179-6391
pISSN - 0301-2212
DOI - 10.2224/sbp.9812
Subject(s) - psychology , agreeableness , conscientiousness , big five personality traits , social psychology , personality , openness to experience , complementarity (molecular biology) , interpersonal communication , hierarchical structure of the big five , trait , extraversion and introversion , interpersonal perception , developmental psychology , big five personality traits and culture , perception , social perception , genetics , neuroscience , biology , computer science , programming language
Contextual influences have long been recognized as an important factor explaining individual differences in perception of personality traits. In this study we investigated whether interpersonal complementarity creates a context for the perception of personality traits, and whether gender stereotypes play a role in the process. Participants were 205 students taking a personality psychology course. They evaluated personality traits in the context of observing an interpersonal exchange that reflected complementarity. Among the respondents, 103 made the evaluation based on a gender stereotypical exchange (dominant male–submissive female) and 102 based their evaluation on a gender counterstereotypical exchange (dominant female–submissive male). Results reveal that interpersonal context had a stronger influence on ratings of conscientiousness, openness, and emotional stability traits than it did on extraversion and agreeableness trait ratings. Furthermore, openness and conscientiousness were particularly susceptible to gender-based stereotypes in the context of interpersonal complementarity. These results suggest that both interpersonal complementarity and gender stereotypes influence the perception of personality traits, but that they do so in a way that is unique to each trait.