It was also interesting to note that respondents thought it essentially as easy to change sexual preferences as it was the body mass index

Beliefs about personal change. Adrian Furnham, Ryne A. Sherman. Acta Psychologica, Volume 232, February 2023, 103821. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2022.103821

Abstract: In all, 510 Europeans completed an online questionnaire rating their beliefs about personal change, including the established Dweck Mindset measure. Their ratings of 27 characteristics from BMI to sexual preference factored into 5 interpretable factors labelled Personality, Beliefs and Habits, Health, Social Status and Physical. Correlation indicated beliefs about change were most related to religious beliefs but also sex and age. Dweck ratings of ability and personality growth were logically related to beliefs about change on the five factors and also to religious beliefs and self-rated optimism. Regressions indicated that being religious was the most consistent predictor about change, as well as age and education. Many beliefs about change were in direct contraction to the academic literature on the topic. Implications and limitations are acknowledged.

Keywords: AbilityChangePersonalityGrowthMindset

4. Discussion

The issue concerning the possibility of (positive) change over a life-time in personal characteristics could be dichotomised as an optimistic vs pessimistic, idealist vs realist or essentialists vs non essentialist difference (Haslam et al., 2004). Our question is why some people favour one approach over another and their correlates; what personal factors predict whether individuals believe in change? Dweck has addressed this but focusing on just two characteristics.

Probably academics are just as divided as lay-people on this issue, possibly because of the difficulty of doing research. To answer the question means getting very high quality, longitudinal data over long periods of time (up to 50 years) where a wide variety of possibly confounding, mediating and moderating factors that influence changes in behaviour at different points in time are also assessed. While some researchers have been able to tap into various existent data banks (in education, medical and military) environments, each has problems associated with it making it difficult to answer some of the fundamental questions of change (Furnham and Cheng, 2015a, Furnham and Cheng, 2015b, Furnham and Cheng, 2016, Furnham and Cheng, 2017).

In this study we looked at people's beliefs about change about a wide range of characteristics including those variables often examined by differential psychologists, namely personality and intelligence. It appears that overall they believe Neuroticism and Conscientiousness were more likely to change compared to Openness and Extraversion. They also believed both EQ and IQ were equally likely to change, while there is extensive evidence of the stability of IQ and the many and extensive failure of efforts to improve it (Deary et al., 2000). The four features they thought least likely to change were height, religious beliefs, punctuality and trait Openness while those most likely to change were physical health, wealth, EQ and looks. It was also interesting to note that respondents thought it essentially as easy to change sexual preferences as it was BMI. Again, the academic literature would suggest the opposite (Seligman, 2007). One question is where people get their ideas about change, and indeed how easy it is the change their beliefs about change. Further there is the question of how much change (fundamental vs trivial) and whether the change is long lasting. Thus diets can lead to change in BMI but often there is a clear return to the original BMI.

As may be expected, people who were more likely to believe that they had changed were more likely to believe change possible. This makes it all the more desirable to have observer data on change. Indeed, when people meet at reunions (school, university, military) after long periods they appear to be surprised how little people had changed in their personality, beliefs and behaviour compared to their physical appearance. This suggests a classic attribution error.

The factor analysis of 27 characteristics made sense and reasonably confirmed the a-priori classification of the items. The positive correlations between the five factors (0.20 < r < 0.63) with half being greater than r > 0.40 suggests a Mindset type factor: Chango-philes and Chango-phobes.

Correlations with the two Dweck Mindset factors showed an interesting difference. It was the ability growth mindset that seemed most related to the change factors, which makes sense. Some would see this as a naïve optimism that ability, and many more human characteristics are susceptible to change, rather than the concept growth which is not as clear.

Age was not strongly related to beliefs about change but two of the five correlations were significant in the expected direction proving some support for H1. No doubt religious people endorse the concept of change more than non-religious people as most religions focus on personal change and consequent redemption. This confirmed H2. Equally it was interesting to observe that political beliefs were unrelated to beliefs about change which did not confirm H3. There was strong evidence for H4 and H5 that optimistic people with high self-esteem believed most in the opportunity for change.

Lay beliefs about change is certainly relevant to all those attempting to help people change their behaviour like clinicians, coaches and counsellors. Presumably people would not seek out help if they did not believe they could undergo some sort of beneficial change though understanding their beliefs about how the process works and their part in it, as well as how much they can change are important. Thus being naively optimistic may be as much as predictor of failure as cynical skepticism about change. Indeed it is not clear whether many “self-help” change books and programmes promise much more than they can possibly deliver.

Like all studies this had limitations. It would have been desirable to know more about the participants, particularly their personal attempts at changing any aspect of their lifestyle or themselves. Similarly it would have been desirable to have actual measures of their IQ, health and personality to determine whether these are related to change beliefs.