 28. Self‑Regulation and Personality  611
to a wide range of outcomes (e.g., academic 
performance, social life, health and well -
ness), many focus on task performance. For 
such goals, a mental representation that is 
specific and imagines a future state that will 
be difficult to attain typically produces the 
highest level of motivation and, ultimately, 
superior performance.
The adoption of a goal typically is fol -
lowed by pursuit of that goal. Goal pursuit  
involves the enactment of means aimed at 
reducing the discrepancy between the cur -
rent state and the state reflected in the ad -
opted goal. Among the many considerations 
relevant for goal pursuit are sources of mo -
tivation, persistence, maintenance of interest 
and commitment, and monitoring of prog -
ress. As will be evident later in the chapter, 
these considerations are primary points of 
overlap between self-  regulation and person -
ality.
Goal pursuit may terminate for two gen -
eral reasons: (1) the goal has been attained 
(i.e., the gap between the desired state and 
the current state is zero) or (2) pursuit of 
the goal has been discontinued. The latter 
reason is of particular interest, because it 
ensures that the goal will not be attained. 
Such goal disengagement  could result from 
self- regulatory failure—  the goal remains 
relevant and important but pursuit has 
ceased—  or self-  regulatory success—  the goal 
is no longer relevant or is unlikely to be at -
tained and therefore should be abandoned 
(Wrosch, Miller, Scheier, & Brun de Pontet, 
2007) or put on hold (Davydenko, Werner, 
& Milyavskaya, 2019). Goal disengagement 
and its opposite, persistent goal pursuit, are 
influenced both by performance during goal 
pursuit and stable characteristics of the per -
son engaged in goal pursuit.
Connecting Self -Regulation and  Personality
Drawing on this broad sketch of self- 
regulation, in the remainder of the chapter 
we review conceptual models and empiri -
cal findings that illustrate and explain the 
interconnection of self-  regulation and per -
sonality. We organize the review in two 
parts. The first focuses on selected major 
models of personality that offer insight 
into one or more aspect of self-  regulation. In some cases, principles and processes in 
self- regulation are explicitly addressed by 
the model. In other cases, the connection 
with self-  regulation is not explicit; rather, 
it is evident either from empirical evidence 
or conceptual overlap. The second part fo -
cuses on traits that reflect individual dif -
ferences in preferences and approaches to 
self- regulation. A subset of these traits of -
fers insight into stable tendencies that dis -
tinguish between people who are generally 
effective at self-  regulation and people who 
are not. Others focus more on different pref -
erences or styles of self-  regulating, suggest -
ing that there are multiple routes to effective 
self- regulation.
When considering connections primarily 
evident in empirical relations, we sometimes 
focus on behaviors that imply effective or 
ineffective self-  regulation. Most consequen -
tial behaviors are multiply determined; thus, 
our assumption is that such behaviors are 
“noisy” indicators of self-  regulation. None -
theless, when correlated with personality, 
they offer useful, if imperfect, clues as to 
how and when personality influences self- 
regulation and, in turn, adaptive behavior. 
This form of evidence is particularly useful 
in research connecting foundational features 
of temperament in infancy and childhood 
with behavior in adolescence and young 
adulthood, a body of research to which we 
turn first.
Accounts of Self -Regulation  
in Models of Personality
The connections between self-  regulation 
and personality highlighted in this section 
have not always been evident. The earliest 
accounts of self-  regulation focused primar -
ily on cognitive, affective, and motivational 
processes presumed to operate similarly for 
all people (e.g., Carver & Scheier, 1981; 
Duval & Wicklund, 1972; Kanfer, 1970). 
Newer models and elaborations on early 
accounts have highlighted stable individual 
differences in how people self-  regulate and 
how (in)effective they are when they do (e.g., 
Higgins, 1997; Kruglanski et al., 2000; 
Lynam & Miller, 2004). Early comprehen -
sive models of personality focused primar -
ily on the latent structure of personality 