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General Personality Science

Temperament

Innate behavioral tendencies present from birth — the biological foundation of personality. Includes traits like activity level, emotional reactivity, sociability, and attention span.

Temperament is the biological substrate of personality — the part you're born with. While personality develops through the interaction of temperament and experience, temperament provides the starting point.

Key temperamental dimensions (Thomas & Chess, 1977): Activity Level (high/low energy), Emotional Reactivity (intense/mild emotional responses), Sociability (approach/withdrawal tendency), Attention Span (sustained/shifting focus), and Adaptability (ease of adjusting to change).

Temperament maps onto adult personality: high emotional reactivity → high Neuroticism; high sociability → high Extraversion; sustained attention → high Conscientiousness. Understanding that some traits are temperamental (biological, ~50% heritable) helps people stop blaming themselves for inherent characteristics.

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Related Terms

Introversion
A personality preference for lower stimulation environments. Introverts recharge through solitude and deep focus, prefer small groups over large parties, and think before speaking.
Personality Trait
A relatively stable pattern of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that distinguishes one person from another. Traits are continuous dimensions (not categories) measured on a spectrum.
Ambivert
A person who falls near the middle of the introversion-extraversion spectrum, displaying both introverted and extroverted behaviors depending on context. Most people (60-70%) are ambiverts.
Dark Triad
Three socially aversive personality traits: Narcissism (grandiosity, entitlement), Machiavellianism (manipulation, cynicism), and Psychopathy (callousness, impulsivity). Present to varying degrees in the general population.
Five Factor Model (FFM)
The scientific framework behind the Big Five personality test. Developed through decades of factor analysis, identifying five broad dimensions that account for most of the variance in human personality.
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