Can therapy change your personality? The answer might surprise you!
Franco Greco • January 28, 2020
Research has shown that just a few weeks of therapy is associated with significant and long-lasting changes in clients’ personalities.
A meta-analysis under by Professor Roberts and his team from University of Illinois (reference below) looked at over 200 psychotherapy and related studies published between 1959 and 2013, involving over 20,000 participants, with measures of personality taken repeatedly over time.
The analysis found that just a few weeks of therapy is associated with significant and long-lasting changes in clients’ personalities, especially reductions in the trait of Neuroticism - emotional instability is an especially important risk factor for future poor mental and physical health.
The research also found that personality change appeared to occur remarkably quickly. Roughly four or more weeks of therapy was enough to induce meaningful change. In fact, beyond eight weeks, more therapy was not associated with greater personality change.
Why this is Important?
Undertaking effective therapy can drive changes in your personality traits. In particular, and probably most appropriately, seeing a therapist was found to change Neuroticism
for the better. The remaining Big Five with the exception of openness, showed small, if statistically significant changes.
For more detail on the Big Five refer to my post on What is the Big Five and How Can It Help You?
which can be found at https://www.yourpsychologist.net.au/what-is-the-big-five-and-how-can-it-help-you
Therapy-related changes to trait Neuroticism
were especially significant as a few weeks of therapy led to about half the amount of increase in emotional stability that you would typically expect to see someone exhibit over an entire lifetime. Generally most of us become (albeit slowly) more emotionally stable as we get older.
What Therapy is Most Effective?
The research do not support arguments for the superiority of
CBT, psychodynamic, or
interpersonal approaches.
Of course, it may be the case that all of these approaches work well enough that they should all be deemed viable ways of changing personality traits.
Who Experienced the Greatest Change?
Clients diagnosed with anxiety disorder, depression
or personality disorders
exhibited the greatest personality change compared with other conditions; and the size of the effects were the same across gender and age.
This last finding concerning age is especially intriguing. As the researchers said, it appears to support “the plasticity principle that personality is an open system and amenable to change” through the lifespan.
Some limitations
The studies under review almost entirely relied on clients’ ratings of their own personalities. However, not all traits changed positively in response to therapy which argues against a general effect on self-presentation or personality-related self-esteem).
The research also leaves unanswered a big question for the future: just how is psychotherapy enacting these personality trait changes?
In Summary
This research points to: 1) the significant benefits of psychotherapy on personality change, and 2) the important role of personality in mental health. This later point is important as personality is inaccurately perceived as static and at times not considered relevant to behaviour change models.
Personality research is one of the most rigorous areas of psychological research and not mired by the replication crisis found in other areas of psychology.
The research also speaks to an ongoing debate in personality science about just how much personality changes, with the new findings arguing against the idea that change can only ever occur slowly.
In conclusion, the researchers argue that:
“Personality traits are not only robust predictors of important life outcomes, but also appear amenable to intervention. This fact opens the door to a new era of research that more strongly links personality and clinical psychology ... and other groups, such as educational psychologists and economists, who are interested in changing people and their behaviours in order to help them with their lives.”
References
This article draws on the initial article written by Christian Jarrett - at the Editor of BPS Research Digest. His article can be located at https://digest.bps.org.uk/2017/01/19/a-little-discussed-effect-of-therapy-it-changes-your-personality/
Roberts, B. W., Luo, J., Briley, D. A., Chow, P. I., Su, R., & Hill, P. L. (2017). A systematic review of personality trait change through intervention. Psychological Bulletin, 143(2), 117-141.
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