Workshop 7: States, Traits, and Fates 2004

When asked about personality, most I-O psychologists immediately think about stable traits and dispositions that can be used for selection purposes. A review of the personality literature, on the other hand, shows that what we consider personality is only a small slice of the picture, with far more research proposing that people are far from fixed entities and indeed respond dramatically to social contexts and processes. Using Magnussons concept that personality is the mediator between contexts and behavior, this review will highlight the distinction between personality as a trait and personality as a process.

The search for individual differences that can reliably predict behavior in organizations has long been among the most sought-after quantities in all of I-O psychology. In recent years, clear evidence has shown that the broad traits represented in the five factor model of personality are able to predict such important outcomes as job satisfaction, task performance, deviance, leadership effectiveness, and organizational citizenship. However, effect sizes are typically modest, and evidence increasingly suggests that within-person variations over time which can explain all of these outcomes as well.

Moods, emotions, cognitions, and other ephemeral states may be at the heart of this within-person variation. In concept, these states are closely linked to traits, but they also help to explain when and how traits have their effects of attitudes and behaviors. Given the recency of research on states, it is not surprising that research on traits and states has not been integrated. In this presentation, we will present preliminary models that show how states and traits are related, and show how these models have much to offer for understanding and predicting work attitudes and behaviors.

Timothy A. Judge is a professor in the Department of Management, Warrington College of Business, University of Florida. He obtained his PhD from the University of Illinois. His research interests are in the areas of personality and individual differences, job attitudes, careers, and leadership. Tim is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association and of SIOP. In 1995, he received the Ernest J. McCormick Award for Distinguished Early Career Contributions from SIOP, and in 2001, he received the Larry L. Cummings Award for mid-career contributions from the Organizational Behavior Division of the Academy of Management.

John D. Kammeyer-Mueller is an assistant professor of Management in the Warrington College of Business at the University of Florida. He obtained his PhD from the University of Minnesota. His research examines organizational entry, job change, career processes, and the impact of individual differences on these areas. His work has been published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, Industrial Relations, Research in Personnel and Human Resources Management, and the International Handbook of Work and Organizational Psychology.

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