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Personality predictors of communication skills

University of British Columbia

The objectives of this exploratory study were (1) to investigate various methods for assessing adult communication skills, and to attempt to develop adequate measures in this area; (2) to discover personality traits which predicted individual differences in communication skills; and (3) to test a number of hypotheses from cognitive-developmental theory regarding the antecedents of communication skills. Past measurement of communication efficiency and skills was reviewed, and the lack of reliability and validity estimates for most available adult measures was noted. Two measures of communication skills with adequate split-half reliability were developed. The Password technique yielded encoding and decoding scores for each subject, and the peer rating technique when factor analyzed yielded encoding and decoding skill factors, encoding and decoding frequency factors, and two situational factors. Although each measurement technique yielded scores labelled "Encoding" and "Decoding", the two techniques, were poorly correlated with one another, indicating that they did not for the most part measure the same thing. Within each measurement technique, the Encoding and Decoding scores were sufficiently correlated with one another to suggest a fair amount of common variance. Multiple regression analyses were conducted with a number of personality measures, using the Password and Rating encoding and decoding scores as dependent variables. All four major communication skill scores could be predicted at highly significant levels from personality variables. Personality measures used as independent variables included the California Psychological Inventory, the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory, and various measures of cognitive structure, empathy, and person- and thing-orientation. A measure of combined word and ideational fluency was found to be a good predictor of both Rating and Password communication scores. Both good Password performance and high Rating communication scores were also predicted by a moderate level of interpersonal emotional responsiveness. Since the personality factor and scales measuring this variable showed significant sex differences, with females achieving higher scores, the best communicators were relatively high-scoring males and relatively low-scoring females. The factor which differentiated those subjects with their primary preference and skill directed toward encoding from those with their primary preference and skill directed toward decoding was Extraversion-Introversion, extraversion being necessary for encoding skill but not for decoding skill. This applied to Rating communication scores and to same-sex Password communication scores. Password communication scores were significantly higher in same-sex groups than in mixed groups. This difference was explained in terms of greater emotional arousal and stress in the mixed groups. The predictors of communication scores were consequently somewhat different in same-sex groups from those in mixed groups. In addition to those variables already mentioned, communication skill (encoding and decoding) as measured by the Rating task was a function of high scores on various personality traits associated with intellectual ability, cognitive decentering (although measures of this were inadequate), CPI Dominance, CPI Responsibility, and classical Jungian (Myers-Briggs) introversion, as well as relative behavioral rigidity. Cooperation, self-discipline, and mental health were characteristic of successful Password communicators. In the stressful cross-sex Password communication situation, intellectual flexibility and a relatively low level of arousal or emotional responsiveness were associated with good Password performance. Male subjects succeeded at Password if behaviorally rigid, females if behaviorally flexible or accommodating. A model of communication processes in relation to cognitive developmental level of adult communicators was presented, and the findings of the study were interpreted in terms of this model. Particular attention was given to the difference between stress and non-stress communication, and to the rigidity-flexibility-lability dimension of cognitive structure. The question of situation versus trait variance in sex differences was also discussed.

Text

2010-02-12

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/20181

Psychology

University of British Columbia

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