HHS Public Access Author manuscript Author Manuscript
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01. Published in final edited form as: Psychol Assess. 2016 June ; 28(6): 726–736. doi:10.1037/pas0000226.
Assessment of Social Traits in Married Couples: Self-Reports versus Spouse Ratings around the Interpersonal Circumplex Timothy W. Smith and Paula G. Williams University of Utah
Abstract Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Personality traits predict the quality of intimate relationships, and as a result can be useful additions to assessments of couple functioning. For traits involving social behavior, the affiliation (i.e., warmth, friendliness vs. hostility, quarrelsomeness) and control (i.e., dominance vs. deference, submissiveness) dimensions of the interpersonal circumplex (IPC) are an alternative to the five-factor model traits of agreeableness and extraversion, given that they may provide a more specific and relevant description of social behavior in the context of couple functioning. The couple context creates an opportunity to supplement commonly used self-reports with informant ratings. Although substantial correlations between self-reports and partner ratings of personality are well-documented, differences between these assessment modalities in levels of affiliation and control have not been examined previously. The present study of 301 middle-aged and older couples addressed this issue by comparing self-reports and spouse ratings, using parallel forms of a measure of the interpersonal circumplex derived from the NEO PI-R. Participants reported lower trait dominance relative to spouses’ ratings, and less trait hostility. For dominance, this discrepancy was evident at all levels of marital quality, but for hostility it was particularly apparent among couples reporting low marital quality. The tendency to self-report less dominance relative to ratings by spouses was stronger among women than men. These discrepancies may be important in couple assessment and intervention.
Keywords self-presentation; agency; communion; interpersonal circumplex; NEO-PI-R; sex differences
Author Manuscript
Personality characteristics predict the quality of intimate relationships (Malouff et al., 2010), and consideration of partners’ personalities can inform interventions to prevent or reduce relationship difficulties (Bradbury & Lavner, 2012; Stanton & Nurse, 2009). As a result, personality traits and related characteristics (e.g., emotional adjustment) are increasingly included in assessments of couple functioning (Snyder, Heyman, & Haynes, 2005). The couple context presents an opportunity to go beyond the usual reliance on self-report measures of personality to include informant ratings by the intimate partner. Informant ratings often have greater predictive utility for many outcomes (Connelly & Ones, 2010;
Address for correspondence: Timothy W. Smith, PhD, Department of Psychology, University of Utah, 380 South 1530 east (BEH 502), Salt Lake City, UT 84112, ; Email: [email protected], Phone: 801-581-6124, Fax: 801-581-5841
Smith and Williams
Page 2
Vazire & Carlson, 2011), including marital quality (Cundiff et al., 2012; South et al., 2008).
Author Manuscript
Correlations between self-reports and informant ratings are well-documented, but differences between self-reported and informant-rated levels of personality traits are not (Achenbach, Krukowski, Dumenci, & Ivanova, 2005). Yet, such comparisons can identify important differences in perspective regarding personality functioning (Carlson, Vazire, & Oltmanns, 2013), especially in the case of intimate partners (Piedmont & Rodgerson, 2013; Sullivan & Davila, 2014) where such differences are related to relationship quality (e.g., Claxton, O’Rourke, Smith, & Delongis, 2012; Furler, Gomez, & Grob, 2014). The present study compared self-reports and partner ratings of personality traits that parallel closely important dimensions of couple functioning.
An Interpersonal Approach to Personality Assessment and Couple Author Manuscript
Functioning In selecting traits for comparing self-reports and partner ratings, both (low) neuroticism and (high) conscientiousness in the five-factor model (FFM) predict higher quality intimate relationships (Malouff et al., 2010). For the FFM traits that reflect social behavior more directly, agreeableness has a consistent positive association with relationship quality, whereas extraversion has a weaker and less consistent positive association (Malouff et al., 2010), and in some studies has an inverse association (Iveniuk et al., 2014).
Author Manuscript
The interpersonal circumplex (IPC) provides an alternative to the FFM in the description of individual differences in social behavior in this context (Fournier, Moskowitz, & Zuroff, 2011). As shown in Figure 1, the IPC dimensions of affiliation and control are rotational equivalents of agreeableness and extraversion (McCrae & Costa, 1989; Traupman et al., 2009). The weaker and inconsistent association of extraversion with relationship quality may be due to the fact that it blends warmth (i.e., high affiliation) and dominance (i.e., high control), and these IPC dimensions reflect distinct biobehavioral processes (Depue, 2006; Johnson, Leedom, & Muhtadie, 2012). Although warmth has a consistent positive association with relationship quality (Malouff et al., 2010), unwanted or excessive dominance and control from a spouse is often related to lower relationship quality (Cundiff et al., 2015; Ehrensaft et al., 1999; Sanford, 2010).
Author Manuscript
Further, compared to agreeableness and extraversion, the IPC dimensions of affiliation and control provide a more direct parallel with two of the most common and challenging problems presented in couple therapy — the expression of love and warmth, and power struggles (Whisman, Dixon, & Johnson, 1997). Dominance (i.e., high control) and hostility (i.e., low affiliation) are also relevant to aggressiveness in high-conflict couple interactions, and self-reports and partner ratings often disagree substantially in this domain (Simpson & Christensen, 2005). Hence, in exploring differences between self-reports and partner ratings of trait social behavior in intimate couples, the IPC may provide a useful alternative to the FFM. Because power and affection are important issues in couple therapy, differences between self-reports and partner ratings of characteristic dominance and warmth may have clinical implications, as disagreements between partners regarding the nature or importance
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 3
Author Manuscript
of presenting concerns are associated with reduced engagement and poor couple therapy outcomes (Biesen & Doss, 2013). Also depicted in Figure 1, the IPC describes blends of affiliation and control that are relevant to couple functioning. For example, warm dominance can be seen in gregarious and outgoing behavior, whereas hostile dominance involves critical, demanding, and manipulative behavior. Similarly, hostile submissiveness can involve withdrawal and defensiveness, whereas warm submissiveness includes trust and cooperation. Thus, the IPC provides a description of trait social behavior that facilitates integration of personality characteristics related to marital adjustment with related interactional processes, such as the demand/withdraw pattern during couple conflict discussions (Baucom et al., 2015; Knobloch-Fedders et al., 2014).
Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Discrepancies between self-reports and intimate partner ratings of affiliation, control, and blends of these dimensions could arise from several sources (Vazire & Carlson, 2011), including self-presentation processes in which socially-undesirable social traits are minimized in self-reports and spouse appraisal biases in which negative characteristics are maximized in ratings by the partner (c.f., La Motte, Taft, Reardon, & Miller, 2014). Selfpresentation can involve both impression management (i.e., efforts to influence others’ judgments) and self-deception (i.e., efforts to manage one’s privately held self-image) (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008). These processes lead individuals to report lower levels of socially undesirable personality traits (or higher levels of desirable traits) relative to ratings provided by their intimate partners, especially in the case of traits with strong external manifestations, such as social behavior (Vazire, 2010). In couples experiencing relationship difficulties, individuals often hold an excessively negative view of their partner (Snyder et al., 2005). Thus, the same pattern of discrepancy can also reflect a negative appraisal bias in spouse ratings. As an additional source of such discrepancies, intimate partners in wellfunctioning relationships often view each other more positively than would be suggested by either self-reports or objective assessments (Fletcher & Kerr, 2010).
Author Manuscript
Self-presentation in self-reports can involve motives that correspond to the IPC (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008). Communal motives involve concerns about getting along with others and result in excessive claims regarding, “agreeableness, dutifulness, and restraint” (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008, p. 503). Agentic motives involve the pursuit of social status, and lead to excessive claims regarding, “dominance, fearlessness, emotional stability, intellect, creativity, and even one’s attractiveness” [emphasis added] (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008, p. 503). These motives correspond to the affiliation and control IPC dimensions, respectively. Thus, some self-presentation concerns would contribute to excessive claims toward the friendly pole of the IPC, and minimization of hostile tendencies. In the model described by Paulhus and Trapnell (2008), agentic concerns in self-presentation would contribute to excessive claims of dominance, in self-reports versus ratings by spouses. However, as noted above, dominance is often seen negatively in couples (Cundiff et al., 2015; Ehrensaft et al., 1999; Sanford, 2010), perhaps reducing or even reversing this tendency. Regarding spouse ratings, individuals who report more trait negative affect (i.e., depression, anger) rate spouses as displaying more dominance and hostility, and less warmth during marital conflict discussions, relative to independent observer ratings (Traupman et al., 2011). Hence, the IPC
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 4
Author Manuscript
may provide a useful framework for understanding the association of trait social behavior with intimate relationship quality, and for examining potentially important differences in self-reports versus partner ratings of those traits.
The Present Study
Author Manuscript
To examine differences between self-reports and spouse ratings of trait social behavior we compared parallel self-report and informant ratings on a measure of the IPC derived from the NEO PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992; Traupman et al., 2009) in a sample of married couples. Because the NEO PI-R has the same items and response format for self-reports and informant ratings, raw scores provide a direct comparison of the relative endorsement of interpersonal traits in these two modalities. Although prior analyses using this sample have demonstrated that IPC-based self-reports and spouse ratings of affiliation and control are strongly correlated (Traupman et al., 2009), differences in levels between these views of social behavior have not been tested. We predicted that compared to spouse ratings, participants would report more warmth and less hostility. Because dominance is often seen as undesirable in couples, we predicted that participants would also report less dominance relative to ratings by the spouse.
Author Manuscript
We also predicted that these discrepancies between self-reports and spouse ratings would be moderated by relationship quality. As noted previously, individuals experiencing relationship difficulties often hold an excessively negative view of their partner (Snyder et al., 2005), and intimate partners in well-functioning relationships often view each other more positively than would be suggested by objective assessments (Fletcher & Kerr, 2010). Evidence suggests that marital distress is better represented as a categorical distinction between distressed and non-distressed couples, as opposed to a continuous construct (Beach, Fincham, Amir, & Leonard, 2005; Whisman, Beach, & Snyder, 2008). We predicted that the general discrepancy in which participants would report less hostility and dominance relative to the ratings provided by their partners would be greater in distressed couples. However, comparisons of only a distressed and non-distressed group could obscure a positivity bias in spouse ratings for couples reporting high levels of relationship quality. A positivity bias would be evident in a pattern in which partner ratings of warmth, for example, exceed the levels evident in self-reports for couples reporting high relationship quality. Therefore, we compared self-reports and spouse ratings in couples reporting low, intermediate, and high levels of marital adjustment.
Author Manuscript
Finally, we also examined differences between men and women in these discrepancies. Dominance is more closely associated with male or agentic sex roles than with female or communal sex roles, whereas warmth is more closely related to female or communal sex roles (Helgeson, 2015; Hyde, 2014; Williams & Gunn, 2005). To the extent that genderinconsistent social behavior is seen negatively, self-presentational concerns or partners’ appraisal biases could lead to differing patterns of self-report versus partner ratings for men and women.
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 5
Author Manuscript
Method Participants The Utah Health and Aging Study (Smith et al., 2009) enrolled 301 married couples (Wives, M = 53.0 years old, Husbands, M = 55.3), recruited from the Salt Lake City, Utah community through a polling firm, advertisements in local media, and community programs. Most were Caucasian (Wives, 96.6%; Husbands, 95.8%). Median household income was $50,000 – 75,000 per year, and 78% of participants were in their first marriage. Eligibility criteria included: 1) married a minimum of 5 years, 2) no more than a 10 year age difference between members, and 3) English as a primary language. The protocol was approved by the University of Utah Institutional Review Board, and all participants gave informed consent. Measures
Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Participants completed items from the Extraversion and Agreeableness domains of the selfreport (Form S) and observer rating (Form R) versions of the NEO PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Wiggins and Trobst (1998) identified items from these domains to measure IPC octants. They established the internal consistency of scores on the 6-item octant scales (ranging from alpha = .77 for hostile dominance to .58 for warm submissiveness) and their circumplex structure. In the current sample, across four versions (i.e., husband, wife; selfreport, spouse rating), alphas ranged from .75 (Hostility) to .54 (Warm Submissiveness), with a median value of alpha = .68 (Traupman et al., 2009). In the current sample, Traupman et al (2009) confirmed their circular structure, as well as the expected pattern of convergent and discriminant correlations among the octant scales and the affiliation and control dimension scales. Further evidence of the expected structure and construct validity is found in other research using these NEO PI-R based IPC scales (Cain et al., 2012; Smith et al., 2010; Thomas et al, 2014). We formed weighted IPC quadrant scores for dominance, submissiveness, warmth, and hostility, by combining those octants with weighted scores (.707) for adjoining octants. When combining IPC octant scales, ordinarily scores are standardized before combining in order to give them equivalent weights. However, standardization would eliminate the parallel scaling needed for comparison of methods and genders. Hence, we used raw scores when forming the quadrant scores, which correlated highly with traditionally weighted scores (all rs >.98).
Author Manuscript
Participants also completed the Marital Adjustment Test (MAT) (Locke & Wallace, 1959), a widely-used measure (e.g., Funk & Rogge, 2007). Because marital distress is better seen as a categorical variable (Beach et al., 2005; Whisman et al., 2008), we utilized the MAT cutoff of a couple score < 200 to identify marital distress (n = 72). In the present sample the prevalence of distress (i.e., 24%) using this cutoff was lower than in taxometric studies of established couples (30%; Whisman et al., 2008), but other evidence suggests that this cutoff slightly over-identifies marital distress (Funk & Rogge, 2007). We used a second cut-off of 250 to distinguish couples reporting moderate (n = 122) versus high levels of adjustment (n = 107).
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 6
Procedure
Author Manuscript
Questionnaires were mailed to participants prior to laboratory assessments and biomedical testing for other aspects of the study (Smith et al., 2008; 2009), and they were instructed to complete them independently, without consultation with one another. Overview of Analyses
Author Manuscript
As described previously, supportive tests of the circumplex structure and convergent and discriminant associations among the NEO PI-R IPC self-report and spouse rating octant scales has been reported elsewhere for this sample (e.g., Traupman et al., 2009). However, this has not been demonstrated with the IPC quadrant scores. Hence, prior to the main analyses, we examined these issues through correlations between self-reports and spouse ratings, and though their joint factor analysis. In the factor analyses, we utilized principal components analyses with varimax rotation, following the approach of Traupman et al. (2009). However, other extraction and rotation methods produced essentially identical results.
Author Manuscript
The primary analysis was a 3 (Marital Adjustment: low, medium, high) x (2) (Spouse) x (2) (Method; self-report, spouse rating) x (4) (Quadrant: dominance, submissiveness, warmth, and hostility) mixed ANOVA. For effects involving the Quadrant factor, Mauchly’s test of sphericity was significant in each case, all χ2 (5) >350, p< .001. Therefore, MANOVA tests were utilized. Following significant interactions involving the Quadrant factor, univariate ANOVAs of individual quadrant scales were conducted, utilizing the Bonferonni correction. Significant interactions (e.g., Spouse x Method) in these follow-up ANOVAs were explicated with mean comparisons utilizing the appropriate error term (Bernhardsen, 1975). Consistent with our main hypotheses, results are reported in the following order: method effects (i.e., overall differences between self-reports and spouse ratings), moderation of method effects by marital adjustment, and gender differences in method effects. To provide more fine-grained analyses, individual IPC octant scales were examined in 3 (Marital Adjustment) x (2) (Spouse) x (2) (Method) x (8) (Octant) mixed ANOVAs. These are reported in each section following the quadrant results. For effects involving the Octant factors, Mauchly’s test of sphericity was significant in each case, all Χ2 (27) >506, p
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01. Published in final edited form as: Psychol Assess. 2016 June ; 28(6): 726–736. doi:10.1037/pas0000226.
Assessment of Social Traits in Married Couples: Self-Reports versus Spouse Ratings around the Interpersonal Circumplex Timothy W. Smith and Paula G. Williams University of Utah
Abstract Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Personality traits predict the quality of intimate relationships, and as a result can be useful additions to assessments of couple functioning. For traits involving social behavior, the affiliation (i.e., warmth, friendliness vs. hostility, quarrelsomeness) and control (i.e., dominance vs. deference, submissiveness) dimensions of the interpersonal circumplex (IPC) are an alternative to the five-factor model traits of agreeableness and extraversion, given that they may provide a more specific and relevant description of social behavior in the context of couple functioning. The couple context creates an opportunity to supplement commonly used self-reports with informant ratings. Although substantial correlations between self-reports and partner ratings of personality are well-documented, differences between these assessment modalities in levels of affiliation and control have not been examined previously. The present study of 301 middle-aged and older couples addressed this issue by comparing self-reports and spouse ratings, using parallel forms of a measure of the interpersonal circumplex derived from the NEO PI-R. Participants reported lower trait dominance relative to spouses’ ratings, and less trait hostility. For dominance, this discrepancy was evident at all levels of marital quality, but for hostility it was particularly apparent among couples reporting low marital quality. The tendency to self-report less dominance relative to ratings by spouses was stronger among women than men. These discrepancies may be important in couple assessment and intervention.
Keywords self-presentation; agency; communion; interpersonal circumplex; NEO-PI-R; sex differences
Author Manuscript
Personality characteristics predict the quality of intimate relationships (Malouff et al., 2010), and consideration of partners’ personalities can inform interventions to prevent or reduce relationship difficulties (Bradbury & Lavner, 2012; Stanton & Nurse, 2009). As a result, personality traits and related characteristics (e.g., emotional adjustment) are increasingly included in assessments of couple functioning (Snyder, Heyman, & Haynes, 2005). The couple context presents an opportunity to go beyond the usual reliance on self-report measures of personality to include informant ratings by the intimate partner. Informant ratings often have greater predictive utility for many outcomes (Connelly & Ones, 2010;
Address for correspondence: Timothy W. Smith, PhD, Department of Psychology, University of Utah, 380 South 1530 east (BEH 502), Salt Lake City, UT 84112, ; Email: [email protected], Phone: 801-581-6124, Fax: 801-581-5841
Smith and Williams
Page 2
Vazire & Carlson, 2011), including marital quality (Cundiff et al., 2012; South et al., 2008).
Author Manuscript
Correlations between self-reports and informant ratings are well-documented, but differences between self-reported and informant-rated levels of personality traits are not (Achenbach, Krukowski, Dumenci, & Ivanova, 2005). Yet, such comparisons can identify important differences in perspective regarding personality functioning (Carlson, Vazire, & Oltmanns, 2013), especially in the case of intimate partners (Piedmont & Rodgerson, 2013; Sullivan & Davila, 2014) where such differences are related to relationship quality (e.g., Claxton, O’Rourke, Smith, & Delongis, 2012; Furler, Gomez, & Grob, 2014). The present study compared self-reports and partner ratings of personality traits that parallel closely important dimensions of couple functioning.
An Interpersonal Approach to Personality Assessment and Couple Author Manuscript
Functioning In selecting traits for comparing self-reports and partner ratings, both (low) neuroticism and (high) conscientiousness in the five-factor model (FFM) predict higher quality intimate relationships (Malouff et al., 2010). For the FFM traits that reflect social behavior more directly, agreeableness has a consistent positive association with relationship quality, whereas extraversion has a weaker and less consistent positive association (Malouff et al., 2010), and in some studies has an inverse association (Iveniuk et al., 2014).
Author Manuscript
The interpersonal circumplex (IPC) provides an alternative to the FFM in the description of individual differences in social behavior in this context (Fournier, Moskowitz, & Zuroff, 2011). As shown in Figure 1, the IPC dimensions of affiliation and control are rotational equivalents of agreeableness and extraversion (McCrae & Costa, 1989; Traupman et al., 2009). The weaker and inconsistent association of extraversion with relationship quality may be due to the fact that it blends warmth (i.e., high affiliation) and dominance (i.e., high control), and these IPC dimensions reflect distinct biobehavioral processes (Depue, 2006; Johnson, Leedom, & Muhtadie, 2012). Although warmth has a consistent positive association with relationship quality (Malouff et al., 2010), unwanted or excessive dominance and control from a spouse is often related to lower relationship quality (Cundiff et al., 2015; Ehrensaft et al., 1999; Sanford, 2010).
Author Manuscript
Further, compared to agreeableness and extraversion, the IPC dimensions of affiliation and control provide a more direct parallel with two of the most common and challenging problems presented in couple therapy — the expression of love and warmth, and power struggles (Whisman, Dixon, & Johnson, 1997). Dominance (i.e., high control) and hostility (i.e., low affiliation) are also relevant to aggressiveness in high-conflict couple interactions, and self-reports and partner ratings often disagree substantially in this domain (Simpson & Christensen, 2005). Hence, in exploring differences between self-reports and partner ratings of trait social behavior in intimate couples, the IPC may provide a useful alternative to the FFM. Because power and affection are important issues in couple therapy, differences between self-reports and partner ratings of characteristic dominance and warmth may have clinical implications, as disagreements between partners regarding the nature or importance
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 3
Author Manuscript
of presenting concerns are associated with reduced engagement and poor couple therapy outcomes (Biesen & Doss, 2013). Also depicted in Figure 1, the IPC describes blends of affiliation and control that are relevant to couple functioning. For example, warm dominance can be seen in gregarious and outgoing behavior, whereas hostile dominance involves critical, demanding, and manipulative behavior. Similarly, hostile submissiveness can involve withdrawal and defensiveness, whereas warm submissiveness includes trust and cooperation. Thus, the IPC provides a description of trait social behavior that facilitates integration of personality characteristics related to marital adjustment with related interactional processes, such as the demand/withdraw pattern during couple conflict discussions (Baucom et al., 2015; Knobloch-Fedders et al., 2014).
Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Discrepancies between self-reports and intimate partner ratings of affiliation, control, and blends of these dimensions could arise from several sources (Vazire & Carlson, 2011), including self-presentation processes in which socially-undesirable social traits are minimized in self-reports and spouse appraisal biases in which negative characteristics are maximized in ratings by the partner (c.f., La Motte, Taft, Reardon, & Miller, 2014). Selfpresentation can involve both impression management (i.e., efforts to influence others’ judgments) and self-deception (i.e., efforts to manage one’s privately held self-image) (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008). These processes lead individuals to report lower levels of socially undesirable personality traits (or higher levels of desirable traits) relative to ratings provided by their intimate partners, especially in the case of traits with strong external manifestations, such as social behavior (Vazire, 2010). In couples experiencing relationship difficulties, individuals often hold an excessively negative view of their partner (Snyder et al., 2005). Thus, the same pattern of discrepancy can also reflect a negative appraisal bias in spouse ratings. As an additional source of such discrepancies, intimate partners in wellfunctioning relationships often view each other more positively than would be suggested by either self-reports or objective assessments (Fletcher & Kerr, 2010).
Author Manuscript
Self-presentation in self-reports can involve motives that correspond to the IPC (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008). Communal motives involve concerns about getting along with others and result in excessive claims regarding, “agreeableness, dutifulness, and restraint” (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008, p. 503). Agentic motives involve the pursuit of social status, and lead to excessive claims regarding, “dominance, fearlessness, emotional stability, intellect, creativity, and even one’s attractiveness” [emphasis added] (Paulhus & Trapnell, 2008, p. 503). These motives correspond to the affiliation and control IPC dimensions, respectively. Thus, some self-presentation concerns would contribute to excessive claims toward the friendly pole of the IPC, and minimization of hostile tendencies. In the model described by Paulhus and Trapnell (2008), agentic concerns in self-presentation would contribute to excessive claims of dominance, in self-reports versus ratings by spouses. However, as noted above, dominance is often seen negatively in couples (Cundiff et al., 2015; Ehrensaft et al., 1999; Sanford, 2010), perhaps reducing or even reversing this tendency. Regarding spouse ratings, individuals who report more trait negative affect (i.e., depression, anger) rate spouses as displaying more dominance and hostility, and less warmth during marital conflict discussions, relative to independent observer ratings (Traupman et al., 2011). Hence, the IPC
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 4
Author Manuscript
may provide a useful framework for understanding the association of trait social behavior with intimate relationship quality, and for examining potentially important differences in self-reports versus partner ratings of those traits.
The Present Study
Author Manuscript
To examine differences between self-reports and spouse ratings of trait social behavior we compared parallel self-report and informant ratings on a measure of the IPC derived from the NEO PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992; Traupman et al., 2009) in a sample of married couples. Because the NEO PI-R has the same items and response format for self-reports and informant ratings, raw scores provide a direct comparison of the relative endorsement of interpersonal traits in these two modalities. Although prior analyses using this sample have demonstrated that IPC-based self-reports and spouse ratings of affiliation and control are strongly correlated (Traupman et al., 2009), differences in levels between these views of social behavior have not been tested. We predicted that compared to spouse ratings, participants would report more warmth and less hostility. Because dominance is often seen as undesirable in couples, we predicted that participants would also report less dominance relative to ratings by the spouse.
Author Manuscript
We also predicted that these discrepancies between self-reports and spouse ratings would be moderated by relationship quality. As noted previously, individuals experiencing relationship difficulties often hold an excessively negative view of their partner (Snyder et al., 2005), and intimate partners in well-functioning relationships often view each other more positively than would be suggested by objective assessments (Fletcher & Kerr, 2010). Evidence suggests that marital distress is better represented as a categorical distinction between distressed and non-distressed couples, as opposed to a continuous construct (Beach, Fincham, Amir, & Leonard, 2005; Whisman, Beach, & Snyder, 2008). We predicted that the general discrepancy in which participants would report less hostility and dominance relative to the ratings provided by their partners would be greater in distressed couples. However, comparisons of only a distressed and non-distressed group could obscure a positivity bias in spouse ratings for couples reporting high levels of relationship quality. A positivity bias would be evident in a pattern in which partner ratings of warmth, for example, exceed the levels evident in self-reports for couples reporting high relationship quality. Therefore, we compared self-reports and spouse ratings in couples reporting low, intermediate, and high levels of marital adjustment.
Author Manuscript
Finally, we also examined differences between men and women in these discrepancies. Dominance is more closely associated with male or agentic sex roles than with female or communal sex roles, whereas warmth is more closely related to female or communal sex roles (Helgeson, 2015; Hyde, 2014; Williams & Gunn, 2005). To the extent that genderinconsistent social behavior is seen negatively, self-presentational concerns or partners’ appraisal biases could lead to differing patterns of self-report versus partner ratings for men and women.
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 5
Author Manuscript
Method Participants The Utah Health and Aging Study (Smith et al., 2009) enrolled 301 married couples (Wives, M = 53.0 years old, Husbands, M = 55.3), recruited from the Salt Lake City, Utah community through a polling firm, advertisements in local media, and community programs. Most were Caucasian (Wives, 96.6%; Husbands, 95.8%). Median household income was $50,000 – 75,000 per year, and 78% of participants were in their first marriage. Eligibility criteria included: 1) married a minimum of 5 years, 2) no more than a 10 year age difference between members, and 3) English as a primary language. The protocol was approved by the University of Utah Institutional Review Board, and all participants gave informed consent. Measures
Author Manuscript Author Manuscript
Participants completed items from the Extraversion and Agreeableness domains of the selfreport (Form S) and observer rating (Form R) versions of the NEO PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Wiggins and Trobst (1998) identified items from these domains to measure IPC octants. They established the internal consistency of scores on the 6-item octant scales (ranging from alpha = .77 for hostile dominance to .58 for warm submissiveness) and their circumplex structure. In the current sample, across four versions (i.e., husband, wife; selfreport, spouse rating), alphas ranged from .75 (Hostility) to .54 (Warm Submissiveness), with a median value of alpha = .68 (Traupman et al., 2009). In the current sample, Traupman et al (2009) confirmed their circular structure, as well as the expected pattern of convergent and discriminant correlations among the octant scales and the affiliation and control dimension scales. Further evidence of the expected structure and construct validity is found in other research using these NEO PI-R based IPC scales (Cain et al., 2012; Smith et al., 2010; Thomas et al, 2014). We formed weighted IPC quadrant scores for dominance, submissiveness, warmth, and hostility, by combining those octants with weighted scores (.707) for adjoining octants. When combining IPC octant scales, ordinarily scores are standardized before combining in order to give them equivalent weights. However, standardization would eliminate the parallel scaling needed for comparison of methods and genders. Hence, we used raw scores when forming the quadrant scores, which correlated highly with traditionally weighted scores (all rs >.98).
Author Manuscript
Participants also completed the Marital Adjustment Test (MAT) (Locke & Wallace, 1959), a widely-used measure (e.g., Funk & Rogge, 2007). Because marital distress is better seen as a categorical variable (Beach et al., 2005; Whisman et al., 2008), we utilized the MAT cutoff of a couple score < 200 to identify marital distress (n = 72). In the present sample the prevalence of distress (i.e., 24%) using this cutoff was lower than in taxometric studies of established couples (30%; Whisman et al., 2008), but other evidence suggests that this cutoff slightly over-identifies marital distress (Funk & Rogge, 2007). We used a second cut-off of 250 to distinguish couples reporting moderate (n = 122) versus high levels of adjustment (n = 107).
Psychol Assess. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 June 01.
Smith and Williams
Page 6
Procedure
Author Manuscript
Questionnaires were mailed to participants prior to laboratory assessments and biomedical testing for other aspects of the study (Smith et al., 2008; 2009), and they were instructed to complete them independently, without consultation with one another. Overview of Analyses
Author Manuscript
As described previously, supportive tests of the circumplex structure and convergent and discriminant associations among the NEO PI-R IPC self-report and spouse rating octant scales has been reported elsewhere for this sample (e.g., Traupman et al., 2009). However, this has not been demonstrated with the IPC quadrant scores. Hence, prior to the main analyses, we examined these issues through correlations between self-reports and spouse ratings, and though their joint factor analysis. In the factor analyses, we utilized principal components analyses with varimax rotation, following the approach of Traupman et al. (2009). However, other extraction and rotation methods produced essentially identical results.
Author Manuscript
The primary analysis was a 3 (Marital Adjustment: low, medium, high) x (2) (Spouse) x (2) (Method; self-report, spouse rating) x (4) (Quadrant: dominance, submissiveness, warmth, and hostility) mixed ANOVA. For effects involving the Quadrant factor, Mauchly’s test of sphericity was significant in each case, all χ2 (5) >350, p< .001. Therefore, MANOVA tests were utilized. Following significant interactions involving the Quadrant factor, univariate ANOVAs of individual quadrant scales were conducted, utilizing the Bonferonni correction. Significant interactions (e.g., Spouse x Method) in these follow-up ANOVAs were explicated with mean comparisons utilizing the appropriate error term (Bernhardsen, 1975). Consistent with our main hypotheses, results are reported in the following order: method effects (i.e., overall differences between self-reports and spouse ratings), moderation of method effects by marital adjustment, and gender differences in method effects. To provide more fine-grained analyses, individual IPC octant scales were examined in 3 (Marital Adjustment) x (2) (Spouse) x (2) (Method) x (8) (Octant) mixed ANOVAs. These are reported in each section following the quadrant results. For effects involving the Octant factors, Mauchly’s test of sphericity was significant in each case, all Χ2 (27) >506, p
