Running head: THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 1

Three-Dimensional Trait System:

Binding Together the Main Sources of Diversity in Personality Traits

Sergei Shchebetenko

National Research University Higher School of Economics

Perm State University

Author Note

Sergei Shchebetenko, School of Psychology, National Research University Higher

School of Economics, Moscow, Russia; Department of Developmental Psychology, Perm

State University, Perm, Russia.

The author is grateful to Juliana Patokina for her helpful assistance and recommendations while preparing this paper.

The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The article was prepared within the framework of the Academic Fund Program at the National Research University Higher School of

Economics (HSE University) in 2019—2020 (grant № 19-01-003) and within the framework of the Russian Academic Excellence Project “5-100”.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Sergei Shchebetenko,

School of Psychology, National Research University Higher School of Economics, 20 ulitsa

Myasnitskaya, 101000, Moscow, Russia.

E-mail: [email protected] THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 2

Abstract

Why are there various personality traits and why are those traits revealed in widely- acclaimed models such as the Big Five? The Three-Dimensional Trait System (3D-TRASY) states that any personality trait can be defined in terms of three basic sources. The first source represents traits’ variability with regard to the brain’s functioning in terms of bottom- up and top-down processes. The second source connects to positive (rewards) and negative

(punishments) social reinforcements of the trait. The third source reflects a multitude of situations in which a trait may unfold. Thus, Extraversion can be defined as a proximate bottom-up positive while Conscientiousness is a distal top-down positive. 3D-TRASY provides a framework for formal, non-tautological definitions of traits; it provides explanations for various phenomena in trait research including the super-traits of Stability and Plasticity and the maturity principle of lifespan development. 3D-TRASY presumes that some traits can occasionally closely correlate and thus establish an amalgam, which exemplifies itself in Eysenckian Psychoticism and the Big-Five’s Agreeableness. In the history of trait research, this amalgamation may explain controversies that would have facilitated emergence of novel models such as the Big Five or HEXACO. The paper contains empirical demonstrations on how 3D-TRASY can explain apparently empirical artifacts.

Key words: personality structure; personality traits; individual differences; the Big Five; five- factor model. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 3

Three-Dimensional Trait System:

Binding Together the Main Sources of Diversity in Personality Traits

We must guard ourselves against supposing that the moral faculties which we distinguish by different names, as courage, sociability, niggardness, are separate entities. On the contrary, they are so intermixed that they are never singly in action.

Francis Galton

Like sensation seeking, impulsiveness is a hybrid, neither clearly a trait nor clearly a type concept, lying in the hierarchical model rather uneasily between level 3 and level 4.

Hans Eysenck

Few would argue today that human personality is complex. One area in which personality researchers have achieved considerable success is structure. A five-factor solution or the “Big Five” (Costa & McCrae, 1992; Goldberg, 1981) has dominated the field for decades, at least ‘as a useful working approximation of psychometric structure’

(Matthews, 2018). This structure was discovered in an empirical way, mainly inspired by the so-called lexical hypothesis (Allport & Odbert, 1936; Galton, 1884). Such a purely empirical approach addresses associations of observed behavior (or one’s thoughts about it) and in this respect derives surface traits as opposed to “needless” source traits (Cattell, 1945), i.e., cross- cutting parameters that may lie behind the Big Five, parameters that would organize and eventually explain the origin of this structure (Deary, 2009). Instead, the Big Five has been THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 4 consistently viewed as ‘an empirical fact, like the fact that there are seven continents or eight

American presidents from Virginia’ (McCrae & John, 1992: p. 194).

This leaves open the question on why exactly these traits comprise such models, and thereby offers great further opportunities for proposing alternative ones, from those trying to quest for a new, sixth (Ashton & Lee, 2007; Piedmont, 1999) and even more “continents”

(Cheung, Cheung, Leung, Ward, & Leong, 2003; Jonason, Kaufman, Webster, & Geher,

2013). Moreover, the trait paradigm, being mostly exploratory, becomes vulnerable to severe criticism. Particularly, models such as the Big Five may be thought to merely describe the traits, giving neither proof of the existence nor explanation to the latter (Cervone, 2004;

Deary, 2009).

In this paper I propose a framework that mostly taps into the basic problems of the trait theory on why exactly particular traits constitute model such as the Big Five and what source traits exist beyond these surface traits. This framework is based on the idea that personality can be considered as a system, a set of interrelated units forming an integrated whole (Kreitler, 2019). The interconnectedness of these units, source traits, consequently provides a variation in the surface traits. Extant personality models have normally established the multidimensionality of traits, either across the hierarchical inclusiveness

(facets, habitual and specific responses) of a trait (Eysenck, 1970; Goldberg, 1993) or across non-simplicity, circumplexity of personality structure (De Raad, 2000). Either way, the difference between the traits, which has been established in many models as “a horizontal dimension” of the personality structure, merely mirrors the fact of a principal distinction between them. This horizontal dimension ‘concerns the segmentation of categories at the same level of inclusiveness’ (De Raad, 2000: p. 71). As there is no definite sequence in this dimension of the traits, the order of elements therein is thus ‘completely arbitrary’ (Goldberg,

1993: p. 171). THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 5

In particular, within the Big Five nomenclature, the traits are normally defined descriptively (e.g., DeYoung, 2015; Matthews, 2018), which allows for defining them with regard to the following characteristics: 1) Extraversion, positive affect and rewards; 2)

Neuroticism, negative affect, punishment, or handling of social threat; 3) Openness/Intellect, cognitive exploration and interpretation, self-directed reasoning, and curiosity against traditionally received knowledge and pragmatism; 4) Conscientiousness, systematic efforts, following rules and non-immediate goals; and 5) Agreeableness, coordination of goals, interpretations, and strategies with those of others and the pursuit of cooperation against competitive social strategies. These definitions need, in turn, their own definitions since they do not arrange the diversity of the traits but simply describe them (Hogan & Foster, 2016).

Contrary to this view, much evidence has been provided on substantial associations between the traits within the Big Five (DeYoung, 2015; Digman, 1997; Musek, 2007). The framework presented in this paper takes into account these associations and calls into question the arbitrariness of the elements in that horizontal dimension. In a general sense, I presume that the basic personality traits result from an interaction between three cross-cutting sources which constitute a Three-Dimensional Trait System (3D-TRASY). In this regard, any personality trait can be defined in terms of these three dimensions which ultimately allows for giving formal, non-recursive definitions of any trait presented in models such as the Big Five.

Three-Dimensional Trait System

The first dimension represents the specificity of the brain’s functioning and its two fundamental processes. The former, bottom-up processes are presumably phylogenetically older and subcortical in their nature; they generate behavioral activity, impulsivity and overall regulation of personality and behavior by emotions. The latter, top-down processes are presumably phylogenetically more novel and cortical in their nature. They generate THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 6 inhibition, control and conscious or rational regulation of behavior. The second dimension represents the specificity of interactions between the individual and social environment, which expresses itself in positive (rewards) and negative (punishments) reinforcements of any personality trait. These two dimensions are entirely dichotomous in that they ensure the formation of a pair of opposing traits normally deemed as a single bipolar entity. The third dimension represents the diversity of situations in which the individual can find her/himself.

This dimension is continuous as the diversity of situations is deemed to be indefinite. In the following sections I describe 3D-TRASY in greater depth and provide some initial empirical evidence for it. As a basis for examining 3D-TRASY, I will employ the Big Five model and its outcomes.

Dimension 1: Bottom-Up/Top-Down Streams

3D-TRASY states that the diversity in personality traits primarily results from the dual, automatic/controlled (Norman & Shallice, 1986), or bottom-up/top-down (Evans &

Stanovich, 2013) processes that occur in the human brain. Any personality trait can thus be characterized as either a bottom-up or top-down. Although the dual processes have been used extensively with regard to numerous issues in social cognition and self-regulation

(Strack & Deutsch, 2004; Nigg, 2017), the theorization of personality traits has, to my knowledge, largely bypassed them (as an exception see Back, Schmukle, & Egloff, 2009, who made an important contribution to the implicit and explicit personality).

Personality traits are normally considered as bipolar constructs (Paunonen & Hong,

2015). 3D-TRASY states that the poles of each trait are determined by either the bottom-up or top-down processes. Generally, one can note that practically any personality trait has an inner contrast of the impulsive and inhibitory processes. In other words, people vary in their tendencies to act automatically, associatively, rapidly, and ruled by drives. Contrariwise, they vary in acting deliberately, slowly, inhibitory, and ruled by norms. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 7

The bottom-up processes are automatic, stimulus-driven, rapid, and do not require mental capacity (Nigg, 2017). In the personality context, traits, such as impulsiveness and sensation seeking (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1977; Zuckerman, Kuhlman, Thornquist, & Kiers,

1991), can be seen as valid representatives of the bottom-up processes. Impulsiveness and sensation-seeking have been often seen as hybrid, cross-trait constructs (Eysenck, 1991)1.

One possible reason for this is their overarching status as these characteristics represent the basic brain processes. The processes are called ‘bottom-up’ because they are presumably linked with “feed-forward” neural signaling (e.g., subcortical to cortical, or posterior to anterior cortical signaling; Miller & Buschman, 2012). Presumably, one pole in each personality trait has the same bottom-up origin.

The top-down processes are subjectively deliberate, slow, sequential, require working memory, and are capacity-limited (Nigg, 2017). Self-regulation (Karoly, 2010) can be seen as a valid representative of the top-down processes, although it has been at times treated as an outcome of the traits (McCrae & Löckenhoff, 2010). The top-down processes are so called because brain imaging and single cell recording data link them to “feed-backward” neural signaling (i.e. cortical to subcortical or anterior to posterior cortical; Miller & Buschman,

2012). Again, the poles opposite to those deemed to be bottom-up in each trait have presumably the same, top-down origin. More specifically, within the Big Five framework,

Extraversion, Neuroticism, Openness/Intellect/Unconventionality, and Non-

Conscientiousness represent the bottom-up stream, whereas Introversion, Emotional Stability,

Closeness to the New/Conventionality, and Conscientiousness represent the top-down stream.

1 Eysenck distinguished two kinds of impulsiveness, which in the factor analysis terms empirically weighted two out of three basic traits of his model (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1978). “Venturesomeness” was associated with Extraversion, whereas “narrow impulsivity” was related to Psychoticism. In the cited paper, however, impulsivity positively correlated with all three traits, whereas venturesomeness positively correlated with Extraversion and Psychoticism and further approached significance in a negative correlation with Neuroticism. Therefore, impulsiveness looks like a common component of all three basic Eysenckian traits. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 8

This vertical juxtaposition seemingly unfolds not only at the trait level, but also at the facet level (DeYoung, 2015; Saucier & Ostendorf, 1999; Soto & John, 2017). For instance, both Extraversion facets in the DeYoung’s (2015) model, enthusiasm and assertiveness, correlate positively and represent the bottom-up stream. Accordingly, a lack of enthusiasm and a lack of assertiveness are both deliberate, inhibitory top-down characteristics. In a similar fashion, all three Extraversion facets in the Soto & John’s (2017) model (sociability, assertiveness, and energy level) correlate positively and all represent the bottom-up stream as well. The same is true for the majority of the other Big Five traits.

The only trait that looks consistently problematic in this regard is Agreeableness. It often includes positively correlating facets of opposing vertical streams. In particular, the trait consists of bottom-up facets, such as compassion and trust, along with top-down facets, such as politeness, respectfulness, morality, affability, and modesty (DeYoung, 2015; Lynam

& Miller, 2019; Soto & John, 2017). Respectively, on its negative pole, Antagonism includes bottom-up facets such as hostility, suspicion, immorality, combativeness, and arrogance, along with top-down facets such as callousness, distrust, and indifference (ibid.).

An appealing idea would be to consider this vertical dimension as a universal continuum for personality variation. However, this would be in stark contrast to what we already know about personality structure: It consists of numerous domains rather than a single parameter like impulsiveness/self-regulation. Some other factors should, therefore, explain the origin of this diversity.

Dimension 2: Social Reinforcement

The vertical streams reflect the brain’s architectonics and thus do not directly characterize interactions between the individual and environment. However, these interactions should by no means influence the individual’s behavior and thus must be taken into account in determining the diversity of personality traits. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 9

Eysenck (1991), considering some findings in the context of Cattell’s model, wondered, “How can socially objectionable acts not be opposed by a person’s superego?”

The claim of socially objectionable acts clearly leads us to the point that social appraisals and social objections are crucial factors for the classification of the traits. From a broader behavioral perspective, this means that personality can vary due to social reinforcement, from social rewarding of some traits to social punishment or “sanctions” (Saucier, 2019) of the rest.

It is widespread knowledge that the polarity of the traits varies in terms of social valence, in other words, in terms of positivity and negativity. Normally this point relates to the social desirability issue inherent in peoples’ responses to questionnaire items (e.g.,

Ellingson, Sackett, & Hough, 1999; Konstabel, Aavik, & Allik, 2006). However, one may take a much broader look at this tendency. The social valence of personality traits itself can result not from a responding style but from divergent social reinforcements of various forms of behavior, i.e., from ‘the social and personal value of objective features of personality’

(McCrae & Costa, 1995: p. 456). This perspective brings us closer to the general factor of personality model (GFP; Musek, 2017), which postulates that a “good personality” (i.e., people with socially adapted and effective traits) opposes a “difficult personality” (i.e., people with “socially less acceptable non-pleasant” traits).2

Addressing this issue, 3D-TRASY focuses on the idea that individual behavior is constantly reinforced (Estes, 1972; Skinner, 1958), first of all, by the social environment

(Bandura & McDonald, 1963). From an evolutionary perspective, social selective pressures have been major for both recent human ancestors and modern humans (Figueredo, Gladden, 2 Biderman and colleagues (Biderman, McAbee, Hendy, & Chen, 2019; Biderman, Nguyen, Cunningham, & Ghorbani, 2011) have provided an alternative explanation and asserted that a general factor obtained after reversing negative-key items of a personality questionnaire is a characteristic of positive and negative affects. This conclusion has been based on numerous correlations reported between the general factor and measures of affectivity. However, a clearer explication for this claim is needed, especially with regard to mostly non-emotive traits such as Conscientiousness or Openness/Intellect. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 10

Vásquez, Wolf, & Jones, 2009; Geary, 2005). In this regard, the GFP’s “goodness” and

“difficulty” can reflect consistent social reinforcement of different traits, either via reward or punishment. As a behavioral tendency, every personality trait should ultimately be either socially rewarded, and thus regarded as “positive”, or socially punished, and thus regarded as

“negative”. For instance, emotions of joy and satisfaction are “positive” in that they are normally welcomed by other people and in this sense “rewarded”. By contrast, emotions of sadness and fear are “negative” in that they are normally avoided by other people and thus

“punished”, although many scholars see various adaptive advantages in these “negative traits” (Denissen & Penke, 2008; Watson & Casillas, 2003). Going back to the GFP model, its empirical relevance can mirror the fact that there are individuals who consistently drift in their personality either toward social rewards or toward social punishments.

Biderman et al. (2019) revealed that the general factor, being evaluative in its nature, can affect academic achievement incrementally beyond the Big Five and HEXACO traits and asserted that these are positive affects that lie behind this contribution. Alternatively, 3D-

TRASY explains it in terms of social reinforcement: Individuals whose personality profiles match better to social rewards ultimately achieve what they are through society’s eyes: greater success in academia since academic achievement is a special and important sort of social reward.

The vertical streams seem to be orthogonal with respect to the social reinforcement dimension. It means that every bottom-up and top-down trait is either socially rewarded or punished. Consequently, there are some bottom-up positives and some bottom-up negatives among traits. In this regard, the formal distinction between Extraversion and Neuroticism presumes that the former is a case of bottom-up positive while the latter is a bottom-up negative, which in this sense may even be perceived as “pejorative” (Ashton & Lee, 2007: p. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 11

152). Correspondently, Conscientiousness is an instance of top-down positive whereas

Closeness to the New/Conventionality is a top-down negative.

In contrast to GFP, 3D-TRASY emphasizes the diversity in personality traits, and this diversity comes from the fact that various bottom-up/top-down streams are either socially rewarded or punished. Furthermore, the interpersonal variability in the traits comes from the fact that people respond differently to these social reinforcements. In other words, individuals demonstrate different resistance or malleability to social reinforcement. For example, one can be hostile, despite regular social punishment of being hostile and numerous social rewards for its opposite, politeness. The reasons for this can vary. They may include the specifics of bottom-up/top-down brain processes of the individual (e.g., differences in activation of brain reward and punishment systems; Corr, 2004) as well as the effects from the environment such as education and media influences, which ultimately result in personal values (Schwartz, 2012) and attitudes toward traits (Shchebetenko, 2014) of that individual.

From an evolutionary standpoint (Figueredo et al., 2009), in highly competitive or harsh environments, individuals can become adaptive due to insensitivity to social reinforcements.

In such cases, hypervigilant or aggressive individuals who have socially punished personality traits can outperform “nice guys” which would make negative traits attractive and thus ensure diversity in the traits.

These social reinforcement trends are not constant and partly determined by the given social environment and culture; therefore, the status of positivity or negativity of a given trait may vary across cultures and historical epochs. In some cultures or in some historical periods in the same culture a trait could drift from extremely positive toward moderate, or even from the positive toward negative pole, and vice versa. For instance, Openness/Intellect can be treated a positive trait in the contemporary, Western-oriented social environment, but as a negative trait in some other, traditionalistic environment. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 12

A fruitful account in the D2 context has been provided by Peabody and Goldberg

(1989) who emphasized that all of the Big Five factors are confounded with evaluation. The authors proposed that factor analytic instruments should disentangle “purely evaluative dimension” from two descriptive dimensions, impulsiveness and assertiveness. The explicit separation of evaluation from the descriptive factors should thus provide a conceptual clarity, which is missing in the varimax-rotated factors confounding evaluative and descriptive aspects (ibid: P. 564). As an example, the authors address the love-hate dimension, which is highly related to evaluation and the interpersonal circle of personality, and is thus divided sharply into favorable and unfavorable halves (ibid.).

What exactly do we obtain by subtracting the evaluative component from love and hate? Is it really possible and does it make any sense beyond statistics? Love and hate represent emblematic modes of conduct and attitude, and these modes are clearly rewarded and punished in their own right (by evaluations, among other things). 3D-TRASY claims that both the vertical brain streams and social reinforcement valence determine the essence of a trait. Accordingly, Neuroticism is not a “response to punishment” (DeYoung, 2015); from a general perspective, it is an emotional and behavioral reason to be socially punished.

That’s why the basic emotions constituting Neuroticism are called “negative”. There is, therefore, no need to employ convoluted factors to explain various aspects of Neuroticism by means of quite enigmatic “defensive mechanisms” (DeYoung, 2015). After all, what brings different aspects of Neuroticism together is that these are all socially punished, i.e. they have emotions called “negative” beyond it.

Taking the vertical steams and reinforcement valence factors into consideration, we would end up here with the classical two domain / four type models going back to Pavlov,

Eysenck, Jung, or Hippocrates, to name a few. However, again, it would contrast to ample THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 13 empirical evidence from the modern era that personality structure is far more complex. So, why, then, are the better models so complex?

Dimension 3: Situational Layers

Brain and reinforcement factors alone depict the personality structure as too stiff, in that they do not tap into another, more fluent factor of personality, situations (Jajawickreme,

Zachry, & Funder, 2019; Rauthmann, Sherman, & Funder, 2015). Usually trait models such as the Big Five are considered universal, and to this end are in opposition to contexts and situations. However, further evolution of the trait theory into exploratory personality psychology presumes an integration of stable dimensional structures with changeable situations and other processes (Baumert, Schmitt, & Perugini, 2019; DeYoung, 2015). 3D-

TRASY calls into question the universality of traits and thus postulates that variability in them beyond Dimension 1 and Dimension 2 can result from emerging situational contexts.

These contexts create a kind of “situational layers” in which different traits can express themselves. It definitely appears as if Conscientiousness or Neuroticism both require appropriate situations to adequately manifest themselves (ten Berge & De Raad, 2001;

Rauthmann, Sherman, Nave, & Funder, 2015). To fit the Big Five, Dimension 3 uses three values of situational layers: proximate, intermediate, and distal (Figure 1).

[Figure 1]

First, a certain kind of situation is associated with the physical conditions of an individual. These situations activate fluent, and, therefore, short-term experiences within an individual, which are not focused on other people and communications with them. These situations of physical conditions constitute a proximate situational layer. In terms of basic emotions (Plutchik, 1980), the proximate layer is relevant to the basic positive and negative affects such as joy/ecstasy or fear/terror. Presumably, personality traits relevant to the proximate layer are Extraversion/Introversion and Neuroticism/Emotional Stability, which THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 14 are also seen as counterparts to basic positive and negative affects, respectively (Watson,

2000). Accordingly, these traits determine behavioral tendencies focused on physical conditions of the individual rather than on interpersonal or other role-based relations. Thus, the sociability facet of Extraversion characterizes a drive for positive emotions and rewards that an individual can get from communications per se rather than from particular relations with certain people. Physical conditions are apparently phylogenetically primary situations for the individual; they emerge well before any situations based on social communications.

That is probably why Extraversion and Neuroticism represent basic traits that are included in the majority of personality models and found to demonstrate the strongest cross-species generality among animals (Gosling & John, 1999).

The second situational layer, intermediate, characterizes social situations of interpersonal communications and so-called “close relations”. The intermediate layer is close to the proximal layer in that it contains a reasonable amount of basic emotions. At the same time, it focuses not on one’s basic emotions and physical conditions, but on relations with other people in which the individual is emotionally involved. In terms of basic emotions, the intermediate layer is relevant to various interpersonal affects such as anger/rage, sadness/grief, acceptance/trust, and disgust/loathing. Within the Big Five framework, a trait relevant to the intermediate layer is Agreeableness. This trait determines behavioral tendencies focused on emotional interpersonal relations rather than on inner physical conditions or role-based communications. It is of interest that Agreeableness shows strong cross-species generality only slightly weaker than Extraversion and Neuroticism (ibid.).

The third, the distal layer, characterizes social situations of formal, role-based communications. To assess personality traits relevant to the distal layer, as compared to the proximate one, long-term observations of the individual may be required. Being weakly related to physical conditions, the distal layer focuses on personal and group norms and THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 15 strategic goals of the individual. In terms of basic emotions, the distal layer can be relevant to expectancy/anticipation and surprise/astonishment. Conscientiousness and

Openness/Intellect are personality traits that represent the distal layer. Both traits are relevant to physical conditions only indirectly; conversely, they are relevant to situations requiring cognitions and those based on social norms and goals. With regard to animals,

Conscientiousness is reported to manifest itself only among chimpanzees, along with their closest relatives, humans (Freeman & Gosling, 2010), while Openness/Intellect was identified in fewer number of species than the reaming three Big Five traits (Gosling & John,

1999).

Openness/Intellect can be seen as somewhat problematic in this context, as it is normally treated as a special domain originated in cognition, aesthetics, etc (e.g., DeYoung,

2015). However, from the 3D-TRASY perspective, Openness/Intellect is a bottom-up counterpart to Conscientiousness. Openness/Intellect is a bottom-up positive in that it is usually rewarded in formal communications, which unfold, for example, in organizations and industry. Indeed, creativity and intellectual curiosity are forms of bottom-up conduct that clearly support one’s career development (Simonton, 2000; Taylor & Littleton, 2016), much like their top-down counterpart, Conscientiousness. Moreover, a well-known alternative to

Openness/Intellect, Unconventionality, which has been uncovered in psycholexical research across various languages (Ashton et al., 2004), looks even more like a socially rewarding counterpart to Conscientiousness also reflecting one’s attitudes toward social norms.

Postulating the situational layers makes 3D-TRASY correspond to the widespread claim (e.g., De Raad, 2000) that a simple structure of personality would be an oversimplification of the state of affairs; many facets have a transitional status between two domains that ultimately support circumplex rather than simple structure models. Within the

3D-TRASY framework, a facet can have a score on the layers’ dimension which can allocate THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 16 it between two neighboring domains identified in models such as the Big Five. For instance, sociability can be closer to the proximate layer, which makes it an Extraversion facet, but, at the same time, not far from the intermediate layer, which makes it a relative to the

Agreeableness domain.

The similar cross-layer difference between traits can be observed in the PEN model by Hans Eysenck (1991). Let us consider the difference between Neuroticism and

Psychoticism. In 3D-TRASY terms, both traits are bottom-up negatives. However, unlike

Neuroticism, Psychoticism characterizes interpersonal communications rather than inner emotional states. Thus, items of the neuroticism subscale tap into the individual’s emotions located outside social communications (e.g., “Does your mood often go up and down?”, or

“Are you an irritable person?”). By contrast, items of the psychoticism subscale tap into social interactions without any direct reference to basic emotions (e.g., “ Do you take much notice of what people think?”, “Would being in debt worry you?”, “Do you prefer to go your own way rather than act by the rules?”).

Further Implications of 3D-TRASY

Taken together, 3D-TRASY allows us to formally define any personality trait. For instance, Extraversion can be defined as a proximal bottom-up positive, whereas

Conscientiousness can be identified as a distal top-down positive. Potentially, 3D-TRASY allows for considering a multitude of traits beyond conventional models assuming that D3 is a continuous dimension. For instance, 3D-TRASY reserves a place involving the traits of religiosity and spirituality (Ashton & Lee, 2019; Saraglou, 2010) and, thereby, predicts the presence of two religious positives, a top-down and a bottom-up. The former can be characterized by modesty and sobriety, which is close to the notion of extrinsic religiousness

(Allport & Ross, 1967), whereas the latter can be characterized by quest (Batson, 1976) for a higher power (God), meaning, and purpose of life, which is close to intrinsic religiousness. A THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 17 problem in terms of 3D-TRASY here is to determine this situational layer for religiosity/spirituality and establish how this layer differs from other levels.

3D-TRASY provides explanations for various important phenomena, which are regularly observed but still theoretically enigmatic. In particular, 3D-TRASY provides a parsimonious rationale to the manifestation of two super-traits, alpha (Stability) and beta

(Plasticity) (DeYoung, 2006; Digman, 1997), or, within the Big-Six paradigm (Saucier,

2009), Social Self-Regulation and Dynamism, respectively. Stability results from moderate positive correlations between the traits of Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Emotional

Stability. Plasticity, at the same time, mirrors a moderate positive correlation between the traits of Extraversion and Openness/Intellect. The cybernetic Big Five theory (DeYoung,

2015) states that there are two different cybernetic functions that lie behind Stability and

Plasticity: the former provides protection of goals, interpretations, and strategies from impulsive disruption, whereas the latter provides exploration, creation of new goals, interpretations, and strategies. The former is to maintain stability and thus to get rid of entropy, while the latter is to explore the unknown and thus to overcome entropy, “turning the unknown into the known”.

3D-TRASY provides an alternative straightforward interpretation to this issue. As mentioned above, various bottom-up/top-down streams are either rewarded or punished by the social environment. This is why we observe these two super-traits instead of a single one.

In particular, Stability consists of the top-down traits (Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and

Emotional Stability) that are rewarded by the social environment; conversely, Plasticity comprises a couple of the bottom-up traits (Extraversion and Openness/Intellect) that are socially rewarded. Since these two groups of positives differ in their top-down/bottom-up vectors, they establish two different super-traits. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 18

Within the Stability super-trait, three different traits pertain to three different situational layers: proximal (Emotional Stability), intermediate (Agreeableness), and distal

(Conscientiousness). In more descriptive terms, the difference between the three is outlined as follows: Emotional Stability characterizes top-down regulation of socially punished emotions and reactions originated from physical conditions; Agreeableness characterizes top- down regulation of socially punished emotions and reactions arising in interpersonal, affiliative communications; Conscientiousness characterizes top-down regulation of socially punished emotions and reactions arising in formal, role-based (e.g., professional) communications. In a similar fashion, differences between two traits of Plasticity are determined by two layers: proximal (Extraversion) and distal (Openness/Intellect). More descriptively, Extraversion characterizes bottom-up socially rewarded responses and emotions originated from physical conditions; and Openness/Intellect/Unconventionality characterizes bottom-up socially rewarded responses and emotions arising in formal (e.g., professional) communications.

In line with 3D-TRASY, a part of Agreeableness should also represent an intermediate bottom-up positive via facets such as compassion and trust. If this is true, then we should observe respective correlational patterns between Agreeableness facets and

Extraversion/Openness; these patterns should differently represent the vertical streams within

Agreeableness. DeYoung, Quilty, and Peterson (2007) revealed, using two different measures, a correlation between the compassion facet and Extraversion/Openness at .30 on average, while the politeness facet correlated with Extraversion/Openness on average at -.02.

Similarly, Soto and John (2017), using two different samples with their BFI-2 questionnaire, reported an average correlation between the compassion facet and the facets of Extraversion/

Open-Mindedness at .16, between the trust facet and the Extraversion/Open-Mindedness facets at .12, while the facet of respectfulness correlated with the Extraversion/Open- THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 19

Mindedness facets only at .03. It is worth noting that respectfulness was the only

Agreeableness facet that at times negatively correlated with facets of Extraversion.

Therefore, at least in two different projects, various facets of Agreeableness showed patterns that correspond to the 3D-TRASY predictions.

De Raad and Peabody (2005), generalizing upon the research on the emic-approach to cross-cultural studies of traits, reported that among diverse cultures and languages, the most consistent is a three-component structure consisting of Extraversion, Agreeableness, and

Conscientiousness rather than the Big Five. In a similar fashion, Eaton and Funder (2003), studying behavioral tendencies via a Q-sort measure, also reported a three-factor structure.

This structure included factors of involvement, positive affectivity, and confidence which resembles the three-component structure by De Raad and Peabody. In terms of 3D-TRASY, these three-component models represent three situational layers and, thereby, do differentiate among them. The three-domain models are adequate and parsimonious by means of reflecting solely Dimensions 1 and 3. Conversely, Dimension 2, the social reinforcement, may mirror peoples’ more subtle distinctions due to differential reinforcement of various bottom-up or top-down conduct within a layer such as the difference between positive

Extraversion and negative Neuroticism or between positive Conscientiousness and negative

Closeness to the New/Conventionality.

Another striking finding which can be explained by 3D-TRASY is a differential pattern of correlations between aggregates of actual behavior and explicit vs. implicit personality trait scores (Back et al., 2009). The implicit Big Five traits were measured by a special personality version of the Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald, McGhee, &

Schwartz, 1998), while the explicit personality traits were measured with a list of 50 IAT stimuli rated by the participants. All five explicit personality traits correlated with relevant behavioral actions stronger than r > .29. Among the implicit traits, however, only THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 20

Extraversion and Neuroticism showed incremental (i.e., controlled for their explicit counterparts) associations with relevant actions, while implicit Agreeableness proved to be a marginally significant predictor of agreeable behavior. The authors assert that both

Neuroticism and Extraversion are closely linked to basic affective dimensions and approach/avoidance tendencies which fosters the automatic execution of behavior and hence the incremental association between the implicit trait measures and relevant conduct appeared. Conversely, Conscientiousness and Openness are “less impulsive and automated processes” (Back et al., P. 543), hence, the implicit trait measures provided no incremental correlations with relevant behavior beyond the explicit ones. Finally, with regard to

Agreeableness, “the situation was less clear” (ibid.) which seemed to result from mixed behavioral aspects of the trait, simultaneously impulsive and controlled in its nature.

3D-TRASY provides an alternative explanation to these findings. Assume that one’s physical conditions and basic emotions (i.e., the proximate layer) can affect one’s actual behavior even without explicit awareness of the former. Therefore, being cases of the proximate layer, Extraversion and Neuroticism measured with the implicit associative tools showed incremental contribution to one’s actual behavior. Conversely, Conscientiousness and Openness/Intellect, being cases of the distal layer, are only indirectly associated with one’s physical conditions and basic emotions; therefore, their implicit tests showed no incremental association with respective behavior. Finally, Agreeableness, which is a case of the intermediate situational layer, i.e., is localized between the proximate and distal layers, and thus correlated with its behavioral counterparts weakly.

3D-TRASY explains yet another well-known phenomenon, the maturity principle, which reflects an increase in Stability traits along with a decrease in Plasticity traits across the life span. The maturity principle has been explained by increasing responsibilities

(Roberts, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2001) and taking on new social roles (Roberts, Wood, & Smith, THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 21

2005) over the course of adult life. 3D-TRASY provides a parsimonious explanation to this principle: Assume that vitality expresses itself in the bottom-up activity; then, due to a general decline in vitality with age (Freude, Seibt, Pech, & Ullsperger, 2005; Smith & Ryan,

2016), people ‘mature’ in that the bottom-up stream constantly decreases whereas the top- down stream gradually increases.

3D-TRASY and a Controversy with Agreeableness

Another outcome from 3D-TRASY is a contradictory status of Agreeableness. The trait Agreeableness remains conceptually controversial and is often used as a reference point to develop six-component models opposing the Big Five (Ashton & Lee, 2007; Saucier,

2009). 3D-TRASY anticipates that Agreeableness is, at least within the Big Five paradigm, a problematic trait given that it is the only trait allocated in this model at the intermediate situational layer, and hence represents a mixture of the bottom-up and top-down positives (cf. the abovementioned claim on the mixed nature of Agreeableness by Back et al., 2009). For instance, across seven languages, Saucier (2009) revealed Agreeableness frequently being split into two components, which he called Even Temper and

Accomodatingness/Cooperation. The former represents ‘hostility and its absence’ while the latter is ‘peaceful, easy-going, and tolerant’ (ibid.: P. 1593).

The Agreeableness case is in a way similar to the problem of Psychoticism, which has been critically treated as a mixture of low Agreeableness and Conscientiousness (Digman,

1990; McCrae & Costa, 1985) along with high divergent thinking, creativity, and enjoyment of research (Rushton, 1990; Woody & Claridge, 1977) and thus of high Openness/Intellect.

Just like Psychoticism, Agreeableness can bring together several phenomena, diverse in certain respects (cf., Ashton & Lee, 2007) and mixed in terms of Dimensions 1 and 2.

Psychoticism, however, according to 3D-TRASY, does not distinguish between the intermediate and distal bottom-up negatives and two oppositely reinforced distal traits, while THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 22

Agreeableness may simultaneously include two vertical positive counter-flows within the intermediate layer.

An extant mainstream six-factor model is HEXACO (Ashton & Lee, 2007), which has in part arisen due to the controversy with Agreeableness. In HEXACO, the content of

Agreeableness has been cleared of bottom-up positives, which have been partially relocated to the new factor called “Emotionality”. Conversely, the content of HEXACO’s

Agreeableness has shifted toward the top-down positivity including features such as patience, gentleness, and flexibility (ibid.). In 3D-TRASY terms, HEXACO’s Emotionality represents a blend of proximal bottom-up traits of various valences. The sixth, the most emblematic to this model factor, Honesty/Humility represents a mixture of bottom-up (honesty) and top- down (humility) positives and has been thus structurally modeled after the Big Five’s

Agreeableness. Therefore, as compared to 3D-TRASY, HEXACO still provides no definite intermediate bottom-up positive which would surround features such as compassion, liking, or sympathy3.

One should note that 3D-TRASY neither challenges nor compromises the Big Five model with regard to consistent empirical emergence of Agreeableness. Instead, it presumes that in many cultural circumstances Agreeableness can manifest from two oncoming vertical brain streams in form of an amalgam (cf., Digman, 1990): Individuals who have strong bottom-up positives such as empathy and liking others also try to inhibit their bottom-up

3 Ashton and Lee (2007) discussed a group of characteristics relevant to the positive impulsivity in close relationships, which is relevant to the intermediate bottom-up positives. These are sympathy, soft-heartedness, generosity, and associated characteristics. The authors, however, contended that “within the six-dimensional framework, these terms apparently represent blends of factors (including Emotionality) rather than manifestations of any one factor alone, as evidenced by their tendency to show substantial secondary loadings and to ‘migrate’ between factors across studies” (ibid., P. 154). Of interest is that Ashton and Lee discussed the blending between “sympathy-related content” and the Emotionality factor. This is not a big surprise from the 3D-TRASY perspective, since both sympathy and emotionality represent the bottom-up stream, albeit unfolding at different situational layers. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 23 negatives such as hostility4. At the same time, the logic of 3D-TRASY presumes that

Agreeableness may be unstable due to this amalgamated nature. The abovementioned different correlational patterns of various Agreeableness facets with Extraversion/Openness

(DeYoung et al., 2007; Soto & John, 2017) as well as the lexical studies (Saucier, 2009) indirectly support this claim. Some traces of this amalgamation are expected to be revealed even with the help of the Big Five instruments. At first glance, the extant Big Five questionnaires by definition do not differentiate the two components of this Agreeableness

“alloy” since one component can be simply underrepresented in an Agreeableness scale. For instance, among ten Agreeableness items from the 50-item set of the International Personality

Item Pool Big Five Factor Markers (IPIP; Goldberg, 1999), there are eight, in my estimation, that match the intermediate bottom-up positive (e.g., “I have a soft heart” or “I feel little concern for others” (reversed)), while only two items are more likely to match the intermediate bottom-up negative (i.e. “I insult people” and “I make people feel at ease”

(reversed)). As mentioned above, within the Agreeableness domain of the BFI-2 (Soto &

John, 2017), two out of three facets, compassion and trust, correspond to the intermediate bottom-up positive, whereas only the respectfulness facet matches the top-down positive.

Nevertheless, the amalgamated nature of Agreeableness may show itself with a six- factor solution even with the use of such five-factor-oriented tools. A demonstration in favor of 3D-TRASY would be the fact that this sixth factor, at least partly, splits Agreeableness into two components, opposing the bottom-up and top-down positives.

4 The reason for the amalgamation may be a strong rewarding and punishing incentive acting at the same situational layer. An instance of such an incentive can be morality (Saucier, 2019). Those individuals who are strongly influenced by morality may inhibit (at least in self-reports) otherwise punished vertical streams in favor of moral reinforcement. Ultimately, any personal conduct is (a)moral in its own evaluative right. However, morality may represent itself the most at the interpersonal layer. That is probably why bottom-up and top-down positives correlate so strongly at this layer and hence produce Agreeableness. THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 24

The use of BFI-2 can meet these criteria since this instrument has an Agreeableness facet that corresponds to the top-down positive along with the other two corresponding to the bottom-up positive. Meanwhile, the use of IPIP, in which Agreeableness scale mostly matches the bottom-up positive, would hardly extract the intermediate top-down positives as the sixth factor. Instead, one would expect to obtain in this case various residual associations usually treated as meaningless artifacts but still reflecting vertical streams, reinforcing valence, or situational layers.

Empirical Test

Method

To test these assumptions, I used two published databases (Shchebetenko, Kalugin,

Mishkevich, Soto, & John, 2019) of a Russian version of the BFI-2 (a student sample, N =

1,024; an Internet sample, N = 1,029) as well as a large sample (N = 1,013,558) of the 50- item IPIP from the Open Source Psychometrics Project (https://openpsychometrics.org/).

Principal component analyses with the promax rotation of six components were applied to these datasets.

Results

The first five components in all three datasets were consistent with the Big Five model

(See Tables S1–S2 in Supplementary materials for details). In both BFI-2 samples, the sixth component was characterized by three Agreeableness items with moderate factor loadings:

‘Is sometimes rude to others’ (.50 and .60 for the student and Internet samples, respectively),

‘Is suspicious of others’ intentions’ (.55 and .54), and ‘Tends to find fault with others’ (.53 and .48). All of them can be treated as bottom-up negatives and represent emotional engagement with others in the form of combativeness and hostility. Of importance,

Agreeableness negative items, which can be characterized as top-down negatives (e.g., “Feel little sympathy for others”, “Helps only if has benefits from it”), did not weigh the sixth THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 25 component substantially. In addition to that, items from various other facets also had moderate loadings on the sixth component including ‘Has an assertive personality’ (.33 and .42; an assertiveness facet from Extraversion), ‘Tends to feel depressed, blue’ (.31 and .31) and ‘Often feels sad’ (.36 and .33; depression facet from Negative Emotionality, a

BFI-2 analogue of Neuroticism), and ‘Is complex, a deep thinker’ (.50 and .32; an intellectual curiosity facet from Open-Mindedness, a BFI-2 analogue of Openness/Intellect). All of them also represent the bottom-up stream.

With regard to the IPIP database, a number of items from the top-down stream of both valences across different layers had moderate positive loadings on the sixth component.

There were negative items from Openness/Intellect: ‘I am not interested in abstract ideas”

(.58), ‘I have difficulty understanding abstract ideas’ (.52), ‘I do not have a good imagination’ (.42); Negative Emotionality: ‘I am relaxed most of the time’ (.50), ‘I seldom feel blue’ (.48); Extraversion: ‘I have little to say’ (.35), and several negative items of

Agreeableness relevant to the top-down negative: ‘I feel little concern for others’ (.36), ‘I am not interested in other people's problems’ (.35), and ‘I am not really interested in others’

(.31).

Discussion of the empirical results

These findings provide some indirect evidence of the validity of 3D-TRASY. Across three samples containing data from two different Big Five measures, Factor Six gave residual combinations of Dimension 1; in other words, it looked interpretable and characterized either bottom-up or top-down streams. It is of interest that it poorly matched the factor of honesty/humility, the sixth trait proposed by the HEXACO model.

With regard to the BFI-2 datasets, the hypothetical amalgam with Agreeableness proved itself. Factor Six was formed around the intermediate bottom-up negatives supplemented with some other bottom-ups of both valences from the proximal and distal THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 26 layers. Generally, all the items comprising the sixth component were representatives of the bottom-up stream; of note is that they entered this component with the same sign of association. It is noteworthy that the positive Agreeableness items did not weigh substantially in the sixth component. To summarize, these findings provide some evidence to the assumption that Agreeableness can substantively differ from the remaining Big Five traits. This trait may be some sort of amalgam of two different but usually highly correlated traits – top-down positives (e.g., politeness or even temper) and bottom-up positives (e.g., compassion and liking). The correlations between different Agreeableness facets with

Extraversion/Openness (DeYoung et al., 2007; Soto & John, 2017) discussed earlier also support this assumption.

In using the IPIP, Factor Six was formed across the distal top-down negative with several contributions from top-downs of both valences taken from the proximate and intermediate layers. No signs of the amalgamation across Agreeableness were revealed, which had been predicted due to the scarcity of bottom-up negative items in this instrument.

Still, Factor Six was somewhat similar to that obtained with BFI-2 as it was formed across a vertical stream of various levels and valences. This means that there were some residual personality trends organized across Dimension 1 (brain activity), which were independent of

Dimensions 2 (social reinforcement) and 3 (situation). To sum up, specific manifestations of various traits pertaining to the same top-down or bottom-up stream can constitute residual personality “alloys” or “amalgams”, which were observed in Factor Six in the present studies.

Formations such as Agreeableness or Psychoticism may constitute “alloys” or

“amalgams” of strongly associated traits. The nature of this amalgamation is obscure but presumably can be an outcome of cultural conditions such as morality (Saucier, 2019). For instance, in the case of Agreeableness, social rewarding of bottom-up positives such as liking and compassion can simultaneously urge one to inhibit bottom-up negatives such as hostility THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 27 by the moral mechanisms and contrariwise to activate top-down positives such as politeness which may ultimately produce Agreeableness.

Theoretical Implications

3D-TRASY aims to step closer to solving the problem of formal, non-tautological definitions of personality traits (Hogan, 2005). For instance, Neuroticism can be identified as a proximal (i.e., related to physical conditions of the individual as opposed to distal social role-based situations) behavioral tendency determined by increased bottom-up brain processes reinforced with social punishments. This framework allows for giving corresponding definitions to any personality traits, while avoiding definitions of the traits in a descriptive, non-systematic fashion. In so doing, 3D-TRASY postulates that personality traits are not stand-alone, independent entities; instead, they represent an outcome, an intermixture (Galton, 1884) of a few key sources. Variability of the latter produces the surface traits as we can identify them empirically in models such as the Big Five. 3D-

TRASY claims that the diversity in personality traits results from three basic sources: brain processes, social reinforcements, and diversity in situations. The continual nature of the third dimension ultimately provides multiplicity in personality traits. All of these basic sources converge in each personality trait, and interactions of the former create the multitude of the latter.

3D-TRASY helps to solve several important problems in trait theory. In particular, the system allows for the generation of hypotheses on the existence of various traits, even those that are non-observable empirically by means of questionnaires due to the effect of amalgamation. In some instances, 3D-TRASY presumes amalgamation or at least moderate associations among layer-neighboring traits such as Extraversion and Agreeableness as

Compassion/Liking (two bottom-up positives of neighboring layers) and precludes amalgamation among oncoming, albeit neighboring traits such as Extraversion and THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 28

Agreeableness as Politeness/Even Temper (neighboring positives of the bottom-up and top- down streams). 3D-TRASY can provide parsimonious explanations to several empirical findings including the maturity principle, the incremental role of implicit traits in actual behavior, or the presence of two super-traits beyond the Big Five or Big Six discussed in this study.

Future Directions and Current Limitations

It goes without saying that 3D-TRASY can raise many questions requiring empirical investigation. For the most part, the system remains hypothetical. For instance, the entire system requires an empirical examination. Its specific assertions such as the amalgamation hypothesis also require explicit examination, both empirically and theoretically. The empirical findings discussed in this paper as well as the history of studying of traits such as

Psychoticism and Agreeableness provide reasons for cautious optimism with regard to the amalgamation claim. Why is such an amalgamation of traits possible and what outcomes can it have? How ubiquitous is the role of morality in trait amalgamation? Does it make sense to treat conventional bipolar traits as pairs of negatively correlated but unipolar traits?

Another crucial issue connects to the origin of Dimension Three treated in 3D-

TRASY as “situational layers”. How can a unit of measurement for this D3 be defined?

How many layers can be identified and which additional, though empirically amalgamated, traits can be predicted thereafter? It also remains unclear if the proximal layer is really a situational rather than an above-situational layer as distinct from the intermediate and distal layers.

Conclusion

For many decades personality researchers, inspired by the lexical approach, have attempted to obtain a necessary and sufficient catalogue of basic and global personality traits.

The pursuit of independent, empirically orthogonal features has focused on their THREE-DIMENSIONAL TRAIT SYSTEM 29 idiosyncraticity. Meanwhile, personality traits hardly look like independent and unique entities. By contrast, they rather constitute a network of interconnected tendencies in conduct

(Cramer et al., 2012); therefore, even at the level of global traits, one can observe similarities between different elements deemed to be perfectly independent. 3D-TRASY as a model undoubtedly overlooks many important details that make personality traits either different or similar. At the same time, 3D-TRASY binds together three core sources, which could lead to the emergence of diversity in personality traits: brain, social reinforcement, and situation.

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Figure. 3D-TRASY locates the basic personality traits along the axes of bottom-up/top-down brain streams (y), reward/punishment social reinforcements (x), and three situational layers (z).