Latest news with #neuroticism
Yahoo
20-07-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
The science of redesigning your personality
For years, Olga Khazan, a Virginia-based staff writer at The Atlantic, knew she had a big problem: she hated much of her own personality. "I was constantly worried about everything," she said. "Just never living in the moment. And I didn't really like doing anything fun with other people. Just wasn't my thing." How might she function at a party? "I would kind of stand off to myself, and honestly, sometimes just, like, read articles on my phone or just basically not engage," she laughed. Not surprisingly, a lot of folks didn't want to engage with Khazan, either. "One person called me a pressure addict, that I was sort of obsessed with working, and just doing as much work as possible, and never taking a minute to appreciate life," she said. "One person told me that she was kind of afraid of me when we worked together." Predictably, when she took a personality test four years ago, she was off the charts – way off – in neuroticism, or negative emotions … not that she hadn't tried to find help: "This whole time I'd been in therapy," Khazan said. "I had taken different medications. I did yoga. And I did all the self-care things. Nothing was truly working." Frustrated, Khazan set out to do something much more radical: She vowed to redesign her whole personality. "I decided to spend a year trying to change my personality traits," she laughed. Professor Shannon Sauer-Zavala described one's personality as "your characteristic way of thinking, feeling, and behaving. It's how you think about your behavior and how you act." I asked, "I always assumed that once you had reached a certain age, your personality was your personality?" "That really is, I think, the prevailing way to think about personality, but it doesn't line up with our science," Sauer-Zavala replied. Personality science is her specialty, and her research at the University of Kentucky could be a game-changer for how we approach mental health issues. She says data tells us it is possible to scientifically change your personality, and that, with the right intervention, introverts can become extroverts … sloppy people can get neater … slackers can gain ambition … and anxious people can learn to be calm. "In my almost 20 years of treating people with anxiety disorders, I've seen dramatic changes in 12, 16, 20 weeks," Sauer-Zavala said. Step one is a baseline personality test, which asks questions such as: "I sometimes manipulate people into doing what I want." The next step is forcing yourself to act the opposite of how you normally would. If you're shy, make conversations. If you're messy, make the bed. Sauer-Zavala said, "When we make intentional changes to our thinking, our feeling, and our behaviors, and we maintain those changes over time, then we're essentially shifting our personality. We're changing the way we're gonna fill out those bubbles on the personality questionnaire." "So, you consciously adopt the behavior of the personality that you think you want?" I asked. "You make it sound easy." "It's not easy," Sauer-Zavala replied. "The principles are simple, but the execution is difficult." It wasn't easy for Olga Khazan, the lifelong introvert. Among other strategies to tackle her social anxiety, she enrolled in an improv class with total strangers … something completely outside her comfort zone. "I was very, very scared," she said. "Probably for the first three or four months that I did it, my heart was really beating in my chest, and I was deeply uncomfortable." What about it scared her? "I didn't like looking silly!" she laughed. Murphy McHugh, who was Khazan's improv teacher, said, "For me, doing improv was a life-changing thing. I opened up socially. I became a better listener, a better collaborator." He said as Khazan continued coming to class, he noticed changes in her: "Relaxing, a little bit less of the cross-armed body language. You see someone relaxed, you see their shoulders drop. You see them laughing, and coming into scenes with an idea." Along with improv, Khazan meditated, went sailing, took conversation classes, and kept a journal, as she describes in a new book, "Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change." "Journaling kind of helps you focus on some of the more positive elements of your life that, if you're very neurotic, you tend to kind of gloss over or forget," she said. I asked, "Is this a case of fake it 'til you make it?" "Yeah, it is fake it 'til you make it," Khazan said. "Because if you think about it, anything is gonna feel fake if it feels new, right? Anything that you're not accustomed to doing is gonna feel really unnatural. But the only way to make it natural is to do it over and over and over again" "And just incorporate it in who you are?" "Exactly." Today, Khazan is happily married, with a 14-month-old baby. As for that personality she once so disliked, she said, "I feel like I am a different person today than I was three years ago. I think I genuinely have a different way of living my life, and approaching problems, than I did before." So, what advice does Shannon Sauer-Zavala have for everyone watching with completely unsatisfactory personalities? "Not to get stuck in a personality-type box," she said. "Think about the life that you want to have, and then know that you can intentionally develop the traits that will facilitate that journey for you." READ AN EXCERPT: "Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change" For more info: "Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change" by Olga Khazan (S&S/Simon Element), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Khazan, The AtlanticShannon Sauer-Zavala, associate professor, Department of Psychology, University of KentuckyDC Arts Center Story produced by Amiel Weisfogel. Editor: Ed Givnish. See also: Introverts and the making of a "Quiet Revolution" ("Sunday Morning") Would you go on a retirement cruise? A Civil War landmark in downtown D.C. Life within Naples' volcanic "red zone" Solve the daily Crossword
CBS News
20-07-2025
- Health
- CBS News
The science of redesigning your personality
For years, Olga Khazan, a Virginia-based staff writer at The Atlantic, knew she had a big problem: she hated much of her own personality. "I was constantly worried about everything," she said. "Just never living in the moment. And I didn't really like doing anything fun with other people. Just wasn't my thing." How might she function at a party? "I would kind of stand off to myself, and honestly, sometimes just, like, read articles on my phone or just basically not engage," she laughed. Not surprisingly, a lot of folks didn't want to engage with Khazan, either. "One person called me a pressure addict, that I was sort of obsessed with working, and just doing as much work as possible, and never taking a minute to appreciate life," she said. "One person told me that she was kind of afraid of me when we worked together." Predictably, when she took a personality test four years ago, she was off the charts – way off – in neuroticism, or negative emotions … not that she hadn't tried to find help: "This whole time I'd been in therapy," Khazan said. "I had taken different medications. I did yoga. And I did all the self-care things. Nothing was truly working." Frustrated, Khazan set out to do something much more radical: She vowed to redesign her whole personality. "I decided to spend a year trying to change my personality traits," she laughed. Professor Shannon Sauer-Zavala described one's personality as "your characteristic way of thinking, feeling, and behaving. It's how you think about your behavior and how you act." I asked, "I always assumed that once you had reached a certain age, your personality was your personality?" "That really is, I think, the prevailing way to think about personality, but it doesn't line up with our science," Sauer-Zavala replied. Personality science is her specialty, and her research at the University of Kentucky could be a game-changer for how we approach mental health issues. She says data tells us it is possible to scientifically change your personality, and that, with the right intervention, introverts can become extroverts … sloppy people can get neater … slackers can gain ambition … and anxious people can learn to be calm. "In my almost 20 years of treating people with anxiety disorders, I've seen dramatic changes in 12, 16, 20 weeks," Sauer-Zavala said. Step one is a baseline personality test, which asks questions such as: "I sometimes manipulate people into doing what I want." The next step is forcing yourself to act the opposite of how you normally would. If you're shy, make conversations. If you're messy, make the bed. Sauer-Zavala said, "When we make intentional changes to our thinking, our feeling, and our behaviors, and we maintain those changes over time, then we're essentially shifting our personality. We're changing the way we're gonna fill out those bubbles on the personality questionnaire." "So, you consciously adopt the behavior of the personality that you think you want?" I asked. "You make it sound easy." "It's not easy," Sauer-Zavala replied. "The principles are simple, but the execution is difficult." It wasn't easy for Olga Khazan, the lifelong introvert. Among other strategies to tackle her social anxiety, she enrolled in an improv class with total strangers … something completely outside her comfort zone. "I was very, very scared," she said. "Probably for the first three or four months that I did it, my heart was really beating in my chest, and I was deeply uncomfortable." What about it scared her? "I didn't like looking silly!" she laughed. Murphy McHugh, who was Khazan's improv teacher, said, "For me, doing improv was a life-changing thing. I opened up socially. I became a better listener, a better collaborator." He said as Khazan continued coming to class, he noticed changes in her: "Relaxing, a little bit less of the cross-armed body language. You see someone relaxed, you see their shoulders drop. You see them laughing, and coming into scenes with an idea." Along with improv, Khazan meditated, went sailing, took conversation classes, and kept a journal, as she describes in a new book, "Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change." "Journaling kind of helps you focus on some of the more positive elements of your life that, if you're very neurotic, you tend to kind of gloss over or forget," she said. I asked, "Is this a case of fake it 'til you make it?" "Yeah, it is fake it 'til you make it," Khazan said. "Because if you think about it, anything is gonna feel fake if it feels new, right? Anything that you're not accustomed to doing is gonna feel really unnatural. But the only way to make it natural is to do it over and over and over again" "And just incorporate it in who you are?" "Exactly." Today, Khazan is happily married, with a 14-month-old baby. As for that personality she once so disliked, she said, "I feel like I am a different person today than I was three years ago. I think I genuinely have a different way of living my life, and approaching problems, than I did before." So, what advice does Shannon Sauer-Zavala have for everyone watching with completely unsatisfactory personalities? "Not to get stuck in a personality-type box," she said. "Think about the life that you want to have, and then know that you can intentionally develop the traits that will facilitate that journey for you." READ AN EXCERPT: "Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change" For more info: Story produced by Amiel Weisfogel. Editor: Ed Givnish. See also:
Washington Post
09-07-2025
- Health
- Washington Post
Hate exercising? Factoring in your personality type could help.
Having trouble making exercise fun? Try matching your workouts to your personality, according to a new study, which found that such traits are reliable predictors of the type and intensity of exercise people enjoy. The peer-reviewed study, published Tuesday in Frontiers in Psychology, found that extroverts tend to enjoy higher-intensity training, while conscientious people are likelier to engage in longer hours of regular physical activity. And people who scored high for 'neuroticism' on a pre-study questionnaire — which the authors associate with emotional instability — are likely to enjoy private and independent exercise programs.
The Guardian
08-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Extroverts and exercise: how personality affects our approach to the gym
Name: Gym personalities. Age: Genetically hardwired since ancient times. Appearance: Well, that depends on your personality. My personality is 'enjoys cake'. That doesn't sound very scientifically thorough, but it's a start. Do you enjoy exercise? On the basis that I'm not a masochist, no, of course not. Interesting. And why is that? Well, what if I'm at the gym and all the big men look at me? In that case I have good news and bad news. The good news is that you fit an established archetype. A study has determined that people with higher levels of neuroticism are less likely to exercise regularly. Tell me more about this study. University College London invited 132 volunteers to follow an eight-week exercise course, with questionnaires to fill in about their enjoyment levels. Who doesn't love a sweaty questionnaire? After that, they had their personalities assessed to see if they generally exhibited signs of extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism or openness. And all the neurotics hated the exercise? Kind of. All the neurotics felt shy about exercising in front of other people, and preferred to do light workouts in short bursts away from everyone. What about the others? Those who scored highly in extroversion loved high-intensity training such as weightlifting or spin classes. Finally, a scientific explanation for why spin classes are so obnoxious. However, they didn't have the best overall fitness. That went to those who scored highly in conscientiousness, because they possessed a better understanding of the long-term benefits of regular exercise. Aside from underlining how awful extroverts are, what's the point of all this? Well, it's understood that exercise is good for you. But perhaps the reason why people don't do it is because they're picking the wrong exercise for their personality type. When was the last time you went to the gym? Several years ago. There were lots of big men, and potentially some of them were aware of my existence. So that isn't the right exercise type for your personality. What if you bought some resistance bands and worked out at home every morning? Yeah, maybe I'd stick to that. There we go. And you should, especially if you consider yourself neurotic. The study showed that, of all the five main personality types, neurotics were the only group who experienced a significant reduction of stress after exercise. So exercise might make me less neurotic? It's certainly a possibility. And who knows, if you really start enjoying it, you might even become a little bit of an extrovert. I'm going back to bed. I suppose that's understandable. Do say: 'I should pick a workout that matches my personality.' Don't say: 'I hear that cowering at the state of the world burns a ton of calories.'
The Guardian
08-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Extroverts and exercise: how personality affects our approach to the gym
Name: Gym personalities. Age: Genetically hardwired since ancient times. Appearance: Well, that depends on your personality. My personality is 'enjoys cake'. That doesn't sound very scientifically thorough, but it's a start. Do you enjoy exercise? On the basis that I'm not a masochist, no, of course not. Interesting. And why is that? Well, what if I'm at the gym and all the big men look at me? In that case I have good news and bad news. The good news is that you fit an established archetype. A study has determined that people with higher levels of neuroticism are less likely to exercise regularly. Tell me more about this study. University College London invited 132 volunteers to follow an eight-week exercise course, with questionnaires to fill in about their enjoyment levels. Who doesn't love a sweaty questionnaire? After that, they had their personalities assessed to see if they generally exhibited signs of extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism or openness. And all the neurotics hated the exercise? Kind of. All the neurotics felt shy about exercising in front of other people, and preferred to do light workouts in short bursts away from everyone. What about the others? Those who scored highly in extroversion loved high-intensity training such as weightlifting or spin classes. Finally, a scientific explanation for why spin classes are so obnoxious. However, they didn't have the best overall fitness. That went to those who scored highly in conscientiousness, because they possessed a better understanding of the long-term benefits of regular exercise. Aside from underlining how awful extroverts are, what's the point of all this? Well, it's understood that exercise is good for you. But perhaps the reason why people don't do it is because they're picking the wrong exercise for their personality type. When was the last time you went to the gym? Several years ago. There were lots of big men, and potentially some of them were aware of my existence. So that isn't the right exercise type for your personality. What if you bought some resistance bands and worked out at home every morning? Yeah, maybe I'd stick to that. There we go. And you should, especially if you consider yourself neurotic. The study showed that, of all the five main personality types, neurotics were the only group who experienced a significant reduction of stress after exercise. So exercise might make me less neurotic? It's certainly a possibility. And who knows, if you really start enjoying it, you might even become a little bit of an extrovert. I'm going back to bed. I suppose that's understandable. Do say: 'I should pick a workout that matches my personality.' Don't say: 'I hear that cowering at the state of the world burns a ton of calories.'
