(Costa, Herbst, et al., 2000). For the most part, it appears that percep -
tions of change in personality are misperceptions. Most people think
they are stable, and those who think they have changed are probablywrong.
With the benefit of hindsight and the results of many longitudinal,
prospective studies, it is interesting to consider results from an early ret -
rospective study . Reichard, Livson, and Peterson (1962), in one of the
seminal books on personality and aging, interviewed a number of re -
tired men to find out how they were adapting to old age and retirement.
The interviewers spent a good deal of time taking life histories of theirsubjects so that they could note patterns of adjustment across the life -
span. Their conclusion: “The histories of our aging workers suggest that
their personality characteristics changed very little throughout theirlives” (p. 163).
MODERATORS OF CHANGE
We have not yet pinned down the case for stability . It seems clear thatmost people do not change much and that those who think they haveare usually mistaken. But perhaps there are subsets of people who reallychange but don’t necessarily perceive it themselves. If people’s percep-tions of change can be wrong, their perceptions of stability can be, too.With theoretically based hypotheses to guide our search, we might beable to identify moderators of change—circumstances or conditionsthat promote growth or decline in a subgroup of people. Using the samebefore-and-after design that we described for the self-perceived changestudy , we could test these hypotheses, and a number of studies havedone so.
Psychological Characteristics
One approach is to look for those characteristics of people that mightmake certain individuals susceptible to change. McCrae (1993) exam -
ined several of these. One obvious candidate is personality itself—espe -
cially the dimension of Openness to Experience. Some people are much
more willing to explore their world, to listen to different views, and toreflect on their own feelings. Perhaps this continued processing of newinformation might lead to changes in emotional maturity or patterns ofsocial interaction, or dedication to goals—to changes in personality128 PERSONALITY IN ADULTHOOD