The dark side of conscientiousness: Conscientious people experience greater drops in life satisfaction following unemployment

Citation

Boyce CJ, Wood AM & Brown GDA (2010) The dark side of conscientiousness: Conscientious people experience greater drops in life satisfaction following unemployment. Journal of Research in Personality, 44 (4), pp. 535-539. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2010.05.001

Abstract
Conscientious individuals tend to achieve more and have higher well-being. This has led to a view that conscientiousness is always positive for well-being. We hypothesize that conscientiousness could be detrimental to well-being when failure is experienced, such as when individuals become unemployed. In a 4-year longitudinal study of 9570 individuals interviewed yearly we show that the drop in an individual's life satisfaction following unemployment is significantly moderated by their conscientiousness. After 3 years of unemployment individuals high in conscientiousness (i.e. one standard deviation above the mean) experience a 120% higher decrease in life satisfaction than those at low levels. Thus the positive relationship typically seen between conscientiousness and well-being is reversed: conscientiousness is therefore not always good for well-being.

Keywords
Conscientiousness; Subjective well-being; Unemployment; Applied psychology; Psychology; Unemployment Great Britain Psychological aspects; Unemployment Social aspects

Journal
Journal of Research in Personality: Volume 44, Issue 4

People

Dr Christopher Boyce

Honorary Research Fellow, SMS Management and Support