Comment on Hogan and Foster: The future is here

Abstract

This response to Hogan and Foster’s (2016) rethinking of personality refutes their claim that both neuroticism and personality psychology are meaningless. Paradoxically, they also argue that traits are meaningful if they predict outcomes, which in particular the neuroticism personality trait does best of all, as outlined in our comment. Moreover, their defeatist perspective on personality psychology is contrasted with several promising developments, including support for the five factors outside of their lexical roots, and alternative theories to explain personality trait covariance without latent trait factors. In this short literature overview personality psychology is presented as a highly diverse and progressive field, which we believe to have a meaningful future ahead.

Keywords

• neuroticism
• emotional stability
• normality
• fitness indicator
• network perspective