Shared Human and Unique Individual Experiences: Personality Development in Vulnerable Youth

Abstract

Personality development is a shared human and a unique individual experience. This dissertation describes both perspectives in the exploration of personality development of vulnerable youth. By examining personality traits, characteristic ways of adapting to the environment, narrative identity, and functioning – following an integrative model described by D. McAdams – the studies shed light on maladaptive pathways of personality development. Understanding such pathways may additionally contribute to a developmentally sensitive and dimensional perspective on personality pathology. First, this dissertation focusses on adaptive and maladaptive personality traits and their cross-sectional or longitudinal associations with social problems, relationships with parents and symptoms. Generally, we find that the personality traits of youth, and particularly neuroticism, are meaningfully associated with these constructs. However, differences concerning specific trait profiles or levels of social problems or symptoms, emphasize the particularities of personality development, next to its generalities. These shared and unique characteristics are also represented in the narrative identity, which is the second focus of this dissertation. Through the lens of turning point narratives, stories about moments that describe a change in one’s perspective on the self, others or life in general, these studies consider such meaning making in relation to personality traits and functioning. We find that general characteristics of these highly unique stories, namely a negative valence, little agentic or communal language and negative self-event connections, are associated with maladaptive personality development. Taken together, we conclude that both the general and the particular – the nomothetic and the idiographic – perspectives are necessary for understanding personality development in vulnerable youth.