According to a study of your “digital fingerprints,” you are likely drawn to people with similar personalities.
Science and intuition suggest that we choose friends and romantic partners based on things we have in common. These include age, education level, race and religion, attitudes, and general intelligence. What role does personality have in attraction? Are conscientious people attracted to other conscientious individuals? Are extroverts attracted to other extroverts or vice versa?
Michal KOSINSKI is an assistant professor of organizational behavior at Stanford Graduate School of Business. He says psychologists have studied this topic for years, and the results are precise: friends and partners do not share similar personalities. This was surprising because we intuitively know that people select friends and partners with similar characters. We wondered if the researchers had done something wrong.
In surveys, people are asked to answer questions about their personality. People who fill out personality questionnaires tend to evaluate themselves within the context of others. An introvert who is the most outgoing of his introverted friends may describe himself as an extrovert – a subjective judgment rather than an objective, absolute measure. This is called the “reference group effect.”
Kosinski, along with three other colleagues, decided to take a different approach when it came to assessing personality. The researchers used data from Facebook, including the “likes” users give to other people’s opinions or posts and their word choice in their seats and responses to create a more accurate portrait of each user. Kosinski’s paper, which he co-authored with Wu Youyouopen in new windows and David Stillwellopenin new windows of the University of Cambridge and H. Andrew Schwartz from Stony Brook University (New York), published a paper in Psychological Science. As the title suggests, the article concludes: “Birds of a Feather Flock Together.”
Kosinski coordinates the MyPersonality Project to open a new window – a global collaboration of over 100 universities that studies Facebook digital footprints from 8 million volunteers. People log into Facebook daily, leaving a lot of digital prints. They don’t think of it as something unusual.
He says that this is a better way to report on behavior than using a survey or being observed in the lab. When people become aware they are being followed, they change their behavior and stop acting naturally.
Kosinski believes digital footprints can be used to calculate personality scores as accurately as traditional methods.
It could have profound implications for business areas where personality assessments are critical, like hiring and human resource management. Kosinski, for example, says that corporate leaders trying to create effective teams in their organization understand that they need “some thinkers, others doers, leaders, and followers.” These labels are helpful for non-scientists in management. It wasn’t known before that personality could or should be used to match people.
Kosinski claims that digital footprint assessments have other benefits besides avoiding the reference group effect. They are not only nearly impossible to misrepresent or cheat but can also be used to assess large populations quickly and at a low cost.
He adds that “any personality assessment method has advantages and disadvantages.” If used correctly, a digital footprint-based personality assessment can be more accurate. This is good for both the company and the individual. You might hire the wrong person if the measurement is inaccurate.
The most recent study, an offshoot from Kosinski’s previous digital personality assessments, may be the most significant conclusion they have drawn. We didn’t plan to find this, but we did. Self-assessment can have a profound influence on test results. This could mean that many things we’ve believed about personality psychology are invalid. “How many other established psychological truths are inaccurate or wrong because of this effect?”
Kosinski claims the study casts doubt on the old saying, opposites attract. Sometimes, they might, but these are exceptions and not the norm. He says that “it turns out” most of his interactions with others are similar to himself.