 21. Emotion and Personality  469
experience. Emotions vary across individu -
als in complex and nuanced ways we are 
only beginning to understand.
These developments point to specific lines 
of personality research with potential to ad -
vance the field. For example, many insights 
await a move beyond studies linking the 
Big Five to broad PA and NA, to examine 
more specific emotions. Studies indicate that 
agreeableness most robustly predicts love 
and compassion; openness predicts awe; ex -
traversion is associated with elevated pride 
and joy; and conscientiousness relates to 
heightened experience of the self-  conscious 
emotions (Fayard, Roberts, Robins, & Wat -
son, 2012; Shiota et al., 2006). As this work 
progresses, a clearer picture of the emotion -
al core of higher-  order personality traits will 
emerge. Work has begun on more specific 
emotional traits as well, including proneness 
to anger (Rosenberg, 1998); pride, shame, 
guilt, and embarrassment (Tracy & Robins, 
2007); awe and interest (Bai et al., 2017; Sil -
via, Fayn, Nusbaum, & Beaty, 2015); com -
passion (Goetz et al., 2010); gratitude (Mc -
Cullough et al., 2002); amusement (Heintz 
& Ruch, 2015); and interest or curiosity 
(Kashdan et al., 2018; Silvia, 2008a, 2008b). 
As this literature continues to expand, it has 
the promise of addressing critical questions. 
How do the tendencies to experience various 
distinct emotions cluster? What are the neu -
rophysiological correlates of these emotional 
traits? Does a more fine-  grained approach 
to emotional traits add predictive power be -
yond the study of positive and negative af -
fectivity? What are the origins of these indi -
vidual differences in emotion? How do more 
fine- grained emotional traits shape the life 
course? How are they are passed from one 
generation to another, and shaped by factors 
such as class background, culture, and fam -
ily dynamics?
In this final section, we turn to ideas for 
the future study of individual differences in 
emotion. Our hope is to set the stage for em -
pirical answers to two enduring questions. 
How do personality traits predict impor -
tant life outcomes, for example, in health or 
work? And how do individuals’ emotional 
propensities, when combined in the con -
text of marriages, friendships, work rela -
tions, and the parent–  child bond, shape the 
quality of long-term relationships? A social functionalist approach offers valuable in -
sights into these questions and is beginning 
to yield empirical fruit. Specifically, this ap -
proach suggests that emotions shape the in -
dividual’s social context through appraisal 
biases and action tendencies. These process -
es contribute directly to a variety of life out -
comes, including the health of the body (e.g., 
Moskowitz & Saslow, 2014; Redwine et al., 
2016; Stellar et al., 2015), the trajectory of 
one’s career (e.g., Lyubomirsky, King, & 
Diener, 2005), and the dynamic unfolding 
of relationships (e.g., Gordon et al., 2012). 
Here we outline two frameworks for this ap -
proach, which we illustrate with empirical 
examples and questions for future study.
Emotions as  Mediators between  Higher‑Order 
Traits and  Life Outcomes
All of the Big Five—  extraversion, agree -
ableness, conscientiousness, openness, and 
neuroticism—  are proving to have distinct 
emotional correlates, as we have seen (John 
& Srivastava, 1999). These five traits also 
predict just about every important outcome 
that shapes the life trajectory, including 
marital quality and stability, career success, 
physical health, successful aging, well-being, 
obesity, alcohol and drug abuse, criminal 
behavior, friendship, and parent–  child dy -
namics (e.g., Bogg & Roberts, 2004; Caspi, 
Elder, & Bem, 1987; Jokela et al., 2013; 
Laursen, Pulkkinen, & Adams, 2002; Luo 
& Roberts, 2015; Sutin, Costa, Miech, & 
Eaton, 2009; Walton & Roberts, 2004). A 
particular challenge in this literature is to 
understand how these higher-  order traits 
predict outcomes of different kinds. The 
individual differences in emotion linked to 
these traits may provide important clues, 
highlighting recurring experience of day-to-
day psychological states that help account 
for behavioral tendencies, ultimately nudg -
ing lives in one direction or another.
For example, in one recent review, neuro -
ticism was found to predict a variety of phys -
ical health maladies, from cardiovascular 
problems to compromised immune function 
(Widiger & Oltmanns, 2017). Emotion states 
that covary systematically with neuroticism, 
such as fear and rejection-  related shame, 
predict neuroendocrine processes—  elevated 
cortisol and inflammation—  that undermine 