We all have the people or groups in our lives that we “mesh” with, what I mean by that is we have individuals that we enjoy hanging out with because they have similar likes or interests as we do. Researchers that study such interactions between groups are called dynamic interactionism (Asendorpf & Wilpers, 1998). The authors of the article that I will be discussing talks about how personality traits influence social groupings but social groups do not influence our personality traits as it relates to the the Big Five (extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism).
The study found that people who scored below average on shyness and compared with shy participants, reported nearly twice as many new friends (Asendorpf & Wilpers, 1998). This evidence suggests that people who are not as shy paired with shy individuals are more likely to make new friends. People scoring below average on that scale may show that they are willing to engage in conversations with shy individuals. This was interesting to me because I do not consider myself a shy person but when there are shy people in the room I tend to engage in conversation to make them feel more comfortable.
The authors continue their study by researching the effects that specific personality traits have on our relationships. For example, high scores of agreeableness showed no conflict between sexes, this makes sense because people who are high in agreeableness tend to argue less and just go with the flow (Asendorpf & Wilpers, 1998). Something that the authors did not expect was that people who scored high in conscientiousness were close with their family members, which can be explained by people who are conscientious tend to invest in long-term relationships (Asendorpf & Wilpers, 1998).
In conclusion, this article is from 1998 and I know that makes this research a bit outdated, however, I feel like there is still some relevance to it. The old saying that “opposites attract” seems to be true as shown by evidence in this study. This study kind of motivated me to continue to connect with others because networking is a powerful piece in the world we live in.
Asendorpf, J. B., & Wilpers, S. (1998). Personality effects on social relationships.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74(6), 1531-1544. doi:https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.74.6.1531