824 
What can a geographical perspective add to 
our understanding of personality? All psy -
chological processes occur somewhere. So, if 
we are to develop a thorough understanding 
of personality processes, we must consider 
the broader environments in which those 
processes unfold. Typically, social and per -
sonality psychologists conceptualize the en -
vironment in terms of proximal factors (e.g., 
situations, significant others) as opposed 
to distal factors (e.g., geographical regions, 
cities). However, such distal factors vary in 
important respects—  from temperature and 
topography, to demographics and wealth— 
that have been linked to personality traits. 
Therefore, a geographical perspective has 
the potential to shed light on both the broad 
societal factors that moderate the expression 
of personality traits and the ways traits be -
come expressed at broad population levels. 
Geographical analyses of personality effec -
tively elevate psychological phenomena to a 
level that connects them to historical, eco -
nomic, political, and social factors, which 
have received little attention in psychologi -
cal research. In this way, a geographical 
perspective can function as a bridge for con -necting our understanding of the thoughts, 
feelings, and behaviors of individuals to the 
histories, values, and actions of populations.
A growing body of research in geographi -
cal psychology  seeks to expand psychology’s 
focus on individuals and environments by 
promoting a broad conceptualization of the 
environment that considers multiple levels 
of geographical analysis. As such, much of 
the work in geographical psychology aims to 
(1) map the spatial topography of personal -
ity traits, (2) identify the mechanisms that 
shape and maintain their spatial arrange -
ment, and (3) examine the ways in which the 
spatial arrangement of traits relate to mac -
rolevel phenomena. In this chapter, we or -
ganize our review around these three aims. 
Although there has been important research 
on cultural or national differences in person -
ality and psychological well-being, our focus 
in this chapter is on intranational variation 
in the Big Five personality domains.
Like cultural psychology, geographical 
psychology is concerned with links between 
psychological phenomena and the broader 
environment. However, cultural approaches 
rarely pay attention to the spatial arrange -CHAPTER 40
Putting Personality in  Its Place
A Geographical Perspective on Personality Traits
Peter J. Rentfrow  
Samuel  D. Gosling