How personality traits impact life choices
The field we choose to study or the career we opt to pursue is among the most economically consequential decisions we make in our lives. But what drives these decisions? According to Thomas Buser(opens in new window), a professor of Behavioural Applied Microeconomics at the University of Amsterdam(opens in new window), our personalities play a big part. “There is a growing awareness that, on top of cognitive skills, personality traits and non-cognitive skills play a key role in determining one’s success at work and in school,” he says. One such trait might be willingness to perform under different kinds of pressure. With the support of the EU-funded CTSM project, Buser is looking at whether willingness to compete, speak in public, work under time pressure and multitask predicts career outcomes.
Creative experiments to measure willingness to perform under pressure
To start, the European Research Council(opens in new window) supported project devised innovative ways to measure these new traits in controlled experiments. “I think we came up with some creative new experimental designs to measure willingness to speak in public, perform under time pressure and multitask,” notes Buser. For example, to measure public speaking, the project designed an experiment that required participants to give a short presentation about Emperor Otto I. Students were given an option to get out of the presentation, but doing so required that they leave money on the table. “Most participants were willing to give up substantial sums of money to avoid giving this presentation,” adds Buser. “When replicated in a lecture setting, many students refused to present in front of their peers, even when offered EUR 500 to do so!” The project developed similar experimental designs to measure one’s ability and willingness to compete, work under time pressure, juggle multiple tasks and work amid distractions.
Linking personality traits to labour market outcomes
The project used the results from these experiments to validate survey questions that elicit a certain trait, such as a willingness to compete. They then elicited the questions in large-scale surveys that were linked to labour market outcomes. “Empirically, we showed that a willingness to perform under different sources of pressure is highly predictive of career choices and success in the labour market,” notes Buser. “This holds true even when controlling for things like education, cognitive skills and standard personality traits.”
Success requires more than being smart and conscientious
The CTSM project has shed new light on how our personalities can impact our life choices. “While being smart and conscientious – and therefore doing well in education – is a very strong predictor of how well people will do in the labour market and which careers they end up in, our research shows that many other skills and personality traits matter too – and willingness and ability to perform under pressure is one of them,” concludes Buser. The project aims to make the extensive personality data it collected available to other researchers and decision makers. Buser himself is currently working on several projects that build on CTSM’s results to explore the overall impact skills and personality have on one’s life outcomes and decisions.
