"The idea that personality never changes once you reach adulthood continues to be challenged by study after study. There's one big problem, however, even with the most sophisticated study, they use the wrong measure of personality. The well-known Five Factor Model, or Big Five, with its scales that measure neuroticism, openness, extraversion, conscientiousness, and agreeableness, wasn't designed for anything other than one-time, stable measurements."
"Eventually, though, researchers began to give it on repeated occasions, anywhere from months to years apart. What emerged were findings that showed people did, in fact, change over time, throwing into disarray the previous assumptions about personality traits as so-called "enduring dispositions." In a new study by University of Basel's Fabian Gander and colleagues (2025), the lack of validated measures to study momentary changes in personality created "potentially biased findings" (p. 2)."
"What's more, Gander and colleagues believe that traits are no more than collections of "states," or fluctuations in emotions, behaviors, and thoughts. Think about your own personality. Maybe you're feeling pretty calm and centered today, so if someone gave you a neuroticism measure, you'd come out smelling like a rose. What about yesterday, though? Did you experience frustrations come your way?"
Personality is often assumed to be stable after adulthood, but measurable change occurs over time. Traditional Big Five scales were designed for one-time, trait-level assessments and are ill-suited for tracking short-term fluctuations. Traits can be understood as aggregates of momentary states that fluctuate across emotions, behaviors, and thoughts. Lack of validated momentary measures can bias conclusions about personality stability. A concise 15-item instrument enables repeated simple ratings that chart daily personality variations. Recognizing personality adaptability can help individuals prepare for and cope with challenging life events more effectively.
Read at Psychology Today
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