Job Conditions and Personality: A Longitudinal Assessment of Their Reciprocal Effects

TLDR

Earlier work established a longitudinal causal model of the reciprocal effects between job substantive complexity and intellectual flexibility. This paper expands that model to simultaneously examine several job structural imperatives and three major personality dimensions—ideational flexibility, self‑directed orientation, and distress. The authors use a longitudinal causal modeling framework that incorporates these job and personality variables. The analysis demonstrates that job structural imperatives shape personality, with self‑directed work promoting ideational flexibility and self‑directed orientation and oppressive conditions increasing distress; these personality changes influence job placement and social stratification, leading over time to more responsible, self‑directed roles, thereby supporting a learning generalization model.

Abstract

In earlier work, we assessed a longitudinal causal model of the reciprocal effects of the substative complexity of work and intellectual flexibility. In this paper, we greatly expand the causal model to consider sumultaneously several structural imperatives of the job and three major dimensions of personality-ideational flexibility, a self directed orientation to self and society, and a sense of distress. The analysis demonstrates that the structural imperatives of the job affect personality. Self-directed work leads to ideational flexibility and to a self-directed orientation to self and society; oppressive working conditions lead to distress. These findings strongly support a learning generalization model. Personality, in turn, has important consequences for an individual's place in the job structure and in the system of social stratification. In particular, both ideational flexibility and a self-directed orientation lead, over time, to more responsible jobs that allow greater latitude for occupational self-direction.