Consistency and stability of narrative coherence: An examination of personal narrative as a domain of adult personality

Journal of Personality
Theodore E A WatersRobyn Fivush

Abstract

Narrative theories of personality assume that individual differences in coherence reflect consistent and stable differences in narrative style rather than situational and event-specific differences (e.g., McAdams & McLean, 2013). However, this assumption has received only modest empirical attention. Therefore, we present two studies testing the theoretical assumption of a consistent and stable coherent narrative style. Study 1 focused on the two most traumatic and most positive life events of 224 undergraduates. These event-specific narratives were coded for three coherence dimensions: theme, context, and chronology (NaCCs; Reese et al., 2011). Study 2 focused on two life narratives told 4 years apart by 98 adults, which were coded for thematic, causal, and temporal coherence (Köber, Schmiedek, & Habermas, 2015). Confirmatory factor analysis in both studies revealed that individual differences in the coherence ratings were best explained by a model including both narrative style and event-/narration-specific latent variables. The ways in which we tell autobiographical narratives reflect a stable feature of individual differences. Further, they suggest that this stable element of personality is necessary, but not sufficient, in ...Continue Reading

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Citations

Jun 11, 2019·Frontiers in Psychology·Louise Vanden Poel, Dirk Hermans
Aug 28, 2020·Academic Medicine : Journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges·Dorene F BalmerBoyd F Richards

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