One year later: Longer-term maintenance effects of a digital intervention to change personality traits.

OBJECTIVE: Recent research suggests that personality traits can be changed by psychological interventions. However, it is unclear whether these intended personality changes can be maintained or merely reflect ephemeral shifts. METHOD: The present study reports 1-year follow-up effects of a 3-month digital intervention for personality trait change. Personality traits were measured before the intervention (pretest: N = 1523), directly after the intervention (posttest: n = 554), and 3 months (follow-up 1: n = 437) and 1 year (follow-up 2: n = 157) after the end of the intervention. RESULTS: Attrition analyses suggest that participants who completed the 1-year follow-up were significantly more open to experience (d = 0.19), less neurotic (d = 0.20), more agreeable (d = 0.35) and more conscientious (d = 0.27) than participants who did not complete the 1-year follow-up. Also, until the 1-year follow-up, personality trait changes achieved remained stable (for those who wanted to increase in extraversion and conscientiousness) or even changed further in the desired direction (for those who wanted to decrease in neuroticism). CONCLUSION: These results suggest that changes in personality traits due to a targeted intervention are not just ephemeral shifts and can even continue.

Exploring the Potential of Conversational Interfaces for Care of Older Adults: Insights from Stakeholder Workshops.

This study aimed to explore the utilisation of conversational interfaces (CIs) by local care service providers (CSPs) and their potential applications in improving the quality of life for older adults. Two workshops were conducted with stakeholders to gather insights and requirements. Although currently not yet utilised by CSPs, stakeholders expressed their openness towards CIs and believed that older adults are very likely to appear receptive to them. Loneliness and isolation were identified as significant challenges, even among older adults living in care institutions. Key requirements for chatbots included complementarity to in-person interactions, user-friendliness, 24/7 availability, and seamless integration into daily life. Ethical considerations, data privacy, and security were emphasised, also highlighting the importance of transparency and limited data retention. Various use cases were discussed, such as assistance, self-management tools, and reminders. The financing issues remained inconclusive, but health insurances showed their potential interest in solutions targeting loneliness.

The effects of a personality intervention on satisfaction in 10 domains of life: Evidence for increases and correlated change with personality traits.

The desire to change one's personality traits has been shown to be stronger if people are dissatisfied with associated aspects of their life. While evidence for the effects of interventions on personality trait change is increasing, it is unclear whether these lead to subsequent improvements in the satisfaction with various domains of life. In this study, we examined the effects of a 3-month digital-coaching personality change intervention study on 10 domains of satisfaction. We focused on the three largest intervention groups of the study (N = 418), which included participants who wanted to increase their Emotional Stability, Conscientiousness, or Extraversion. Bivariate latent change score models were used to examine correlated change between the targeted personality traits and satisfaction domains. We found that global life satisfaction and satisfaction with oneself as a person increased in all three intervention groups. In addition, increases in specific satisfaction domains were reported for the Conscientiousness (e.g., work/school, health, friendships) and Emotional Stability (e.g., family, sexual relationships, emotions) group. Increases were stable up to the 3-month follow-up. In contrast, the waitlist control group did not report any changes in global or domain-specific life satisfaction. Changes in the satisfaction domains were positively correlated with self-reported personality trait change to a similar degree as the cross-sectional associations, but not to observer-reported personality trait change. The personality intervention thus seemed to have a positive effect on satisfaction with various domains of life, which was associated with the degree of self-reported personality trait change. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Effects of a digital self-control intervention to increase physical activity in middle-aged adults.

The goal of this study was to test the effects of a 7-week digital self-control intervention to increase physical activity using a two-arm randomized controlled trial. The self-control treatment group showed greater increases in self-reported physical activity (MET's) than the comparison group. Both groups significantly increased their daily steps and self-control. Participants with higher initial levels of conscientiousness were better able to increase their daily steps during the intervention and participants who increased more in self-control showed greater increases in MET's. These moderation effects were more pronounced in the self-control treatment group as compared to the comparison group. This study shows that the effects of physical activity interventions may depend on personality characteristics and outcomes may be improved when individual differences are considered and targeted.

The Effects of Health Care Chatbot Personas With Different Social Roles on the Client-Chatbot Bond and Usage Intentions: Development of a Design Codebook and Web-Based Study.

BACKGROUND: The working alliance refers to an important relationship quality between health professionals and clients that robustly links to treatment success. Recent research shows that clients can develop an affective bond with chatbots. However, few research studies have investigated whether this perceived relationship is affected by the social roles of differing closeness a chatbot can impersonate and by allowing users to choose the social role of a chatbot. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed at understanding how the social role of a chatbot can be expressed using a set of interpersonal closeness cues and examining how these social roles affect clients' experiences and the development of an affective bond with the chatbot, depending on clients' characteristics (ie, age and gender) and whether they can freely choose a chatbot's social role. METHODS: Informed by the social role theory and the social response theory, we developed a design codebook for chatbots with different social roles along an interpersonal closeness continuum. Based on this codebook, we manipulated a fictitious health care chatbot to impersonate one of four distinct social roles common in health care settings-institution, expert, peer, and dialogical self-and examined effects on perceived affective bond and usage intentions in a web-based lab study. The study included a total of 251 participants, whose mean age was 41.15 (SD 13.87) years; 57.0% (143/251) of the participants were female. Participants were either randomly assigned to one of the chatbot conditions (no choice: n=202, 80.5%) or could freely choose to interact with one of these chatbot personas (free choice: n=49, 19.5%). Separate multivariate analyses of variance were performed to analyze differences (1) between the chatbot personas within the no-choice group and (2) between the no-choice and the free-choice groups. RESULTS: While the main effect of the chatbot persona on affective bond and usage intentions was insignificant (P=.87), we found differences based on participants' demographic profiles: main effects for gender (P=.04, ηp2=0.115) and age (P<.001, ηp2=0.192) and a significant interaction effect of persona and age (P=.01, ηp2=0.102). Participants younger than 40 years reported higher scores for affective bond and usage intentions for the interpersonally more distant expert and institution chatbots; participants 40 years or older reported higher outcomes for the closer peer and dialogical-self chatbots. The option to freely choose a persona significantly benefited perceptions of the peer chatbot further (eg, free-choice group affective bond: mean 5.28, SD 0.89; no-choice group affective bond: mean 4.54, SD 1.10; P=.003, ηp2=0.117). CONCLUSIONS: Manipulating a chatbot's social role is a possible avenue for health care chatbot designers to tailor clients' chatbot experiences using user-specific demographic factors and to improve clients' perceptions and behavioral intentions toward the chatbot. Our results also emphasize the benefits of letting clients freely choose between chatbots.

Mindful of personality trait change: Are treatment effects on personality trait change ephemeral and attributable to changes in states?

OBJECTIVE: Are treatment effects on personality trait change ephemeral and attributable to change in clinical states? Data of an intervention study were used to examine if change in clinical states (e.g., stress or depression) accounts for change in personality traits and to test whether both changes in traits and clinical states were independently associated with substance use. METHOD: Seventy-nine substance use patients (Mage = 25.3, SD = 2.7; 35% female) took part at a 4-week intervention and completed a total of 15 bi-monthly assessments across 28 weeks to measure change in traits and states during and after treatment. RESULTS: The results suggest that participants showed large trait and state changes over time, which happened rapidly with the majority occurring during the first four weeks. Trait and state changes were highly correlated, but not perfectly redundant. Significant variance in personality trait change remained after controlling for change in clinical states. Moreover, both trait and state change independently predicted substance use. CONCLUSION: Personality trait change occurred relatively fast and was maintained until the last follow-up assessment six months after the end of the intervention. Also, the findings point to the notion that the conceptual distinction between traits and states may not be as important as originally thought.

Personality Change Profiles and Changes in Cognition Among Middle-Aged and Older Adults.

Research on the relationship between personality traits and cognitive abilities has primarily used cross-sectional designs and considered personality traits individually in relation to cognitive dimensions. This study (N = 2,652) examined the relationship between Big Five personality change profiles and change in cognitive factors, episodic memory and executive functioning. Latent profile analysis was used to capture patterns of change across the Big Five traits. Three profiles of personality change were defined: Decreasers, Maintainers, and Increasers. The Decreasers declined more in episodic memory compared to the Increasers and Maintainers. Also, the Decreasers declined more in executive functioning compared to the Increasers, but not the Maintainers. The findings advance our understanding of the links between patterns of personality change and cognitive aging.

Increases in Cognitive Activity Reduce Aging-Related Declines in Executive Functioning.

Declines in cognitive functioning are commonly experienced with aging, yet there is wide variation in the nature and extent of these changes. Previous research has shown associations between the frequency of engaging in stimulating cognitive activities and performance on cognitive tests. However, it is not known whether it is important to increase the amount of cognitive activity as one gets older in order to curtail cognitive declines. We examined cognitive activities and cognition in a national sample of 2,130 community-dwelling middle-aged and older adults from the Midlife in the United States longitudinal study. Participants completed cognitive assessments of episodic memory (EM) and executive functioning (EF) on two occasions, ~9 years apart. At the first assessment, participants ranged in age between 33 and 83 years (M = 55.76, SD = 11.09), with 56.1% women. Multilevel models were tested to examine educational level and change in cognitive activity as predictors of change in EM and EF, controlling for initial level of cognitive activity and key correlates of cognitive decline. Results indicated that increases in cognitive activity were important over and above earlier levels of cognitive activity for reducing declines in EF. Further analysis also showed differential results by educational level. Increased cognitive activity was not associated with changes in EF among individuals with a college degree. In contrast, individuals without a college degree who increased their cognitive activity showed significantly less decline in EF compared to those without a college degree who decreased or maintained their cognitive activity across the 9 years. Thus, the results suggest that increased engagement in cognitive activity makes more of a difference for EF declines among those without a college degree. The results have particular relevance given that aging-related changes in domains such as work status, health, or social relationships can lead to reductions in stimulating cognitive activities. The findings emphasize the importance of increasing cognitive activities especially among those with lower educational attainment.

Changing personality traits with the help of a digital personality change intervention.

Personality traits predict important life outcomes, such as success in love and work life, well-being, health, and longevity. Given these positive relations to important outcomes, economists, policy makers, and scientists have proposed intervening to change personality traits to promote positive life outcomes. However, nonclinical interventions to change personality traits are lacking so far in large-scale naturalistic populations. This study (n = 1,523) examined the effects of a 3-mo digital personality change intervention using a randomized controlled trial and the smartphone application PEACH (PErsonality coACH). Participants who received the intervention showed greater self-reported changes compared to participants in the waitlist control group who had to wait 1 mo before receiving the intervention. Self-reported changes aligned with intended goals for change and were significant for those desiring to increase on a trait (d = 0.52) and for those desiring to decrease on a trait (d = -0.58). Observers such as friends, family members, or intimate partners also detected significant personality changes in the desired direction for those desiring to increase on a trait (d = 0.35). Observer-reported changes for those desiring to decrease on a trait were not significant (d = -0.22). Moreover, self- and observer-reported changes persisted until 3 mo after the end of the intervention. This work provides the strongest evidence to date that normal personality traits can be changed through intervention in nonclinical samples.

Targeting self-control as a behavior change mechanism to increase physical activity: Study protocol of a randomized controlled trial.

Despite the highly publicized beneficial effects of physical activity, 51.1% of middle-aged US adults do not achieve the recommended minimum of aerobic physical activity needed to maintain health. A sedentary lifestyle can be attributed in part to a lack of self-control and there is some evidence that self-control strategies can be improved with targeted interventions. The overall aim of this study is to test self-control as a behavior change mechanism for physical activity and to investigate whether a smartphone-based self-control intervention can increase physical activity among sedentary middle-aged adults. This protocol describes the design of a randomized controlled trial with two experimental conditions: The self-control treatment group and the control group. Both groups track their daily physical activity using a Fitbit step counter for eight weeks. Additionally, the self-control intervention group receives a 7-week smartphone-based self-control intervention to learn strategies how to potentiate desirable impulses or weaken undesirable ones. It is expected that the self-control treatment group will show greater increases in physical activity and that changes last longer compared to the control group. All participants will be assessed at pretest (baseline), at the end of each week (weeks 1-7), at posttest (week 8), and at follow-up (week 12). If this self-control intervention proves effective, this digital approach would represent a low-threshold and cost-effective approach to increasing physical activity. Such an intervention could be delivered to a large number of people to improve their health outcomes in the long run. Trial Registration:ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT04522141.

MindHike, a Digital Coaching Application to Promote Self-Control: Rationale, Content, and Study Protocol.

This protocol describes a study that will test the effectiveness of a 7-week non-clinical digital coaching intervention to promote self-control. The goal of the coaching is to support and guide people who are willing and motivated to improve their self-control with the help of the smartphone application MindHike. The coaching is based on a process model of self-control and aims to target five groups of self-control strategies. The goal of the study is to examine the effectiveness of the digital coaching intervention. A single-arm study design with pre-test, post-test and 2-month follow-up assessments and process assessments will be used to evaluate the 7-week digital coaching intervention. The digital coaching includes 49 daily lessons that are organized along 7 weekly core themes. Study participants will be at least 150 adults aged 18 years and older who are willing and motivated to improve their self-control using the MindHike application. This is the first study testing the effectiveness of a digital coaching intervention to promote self-control. Given that this approach proves effective, it could be easily implemented in various non-clinical settings such as education, health, relationship, and work, and in clinical settings. Due to its digital low-threshold character, it could also reach large numbers of people.

The Relationship of Personality and Behavior Change in a Physical Activity Intervention: The Role of Conscientiousness and Healthy Neuroticism.

This study examined the role of personality traits in a 5-week physical activity intervention study for working adults. We tested whether personality traits predicted individual differences in change in daily steps over time. Fifty-two participants ages 35 to 69 (M age = 49.71, SD = 8.64) wore a Fitbit Zip step counter for 35 days and completed a personality questionnaire. Participants were randomly assigned to either an implementation intention group or a control group. Both groups wore a Fitbit and had the goal to increase their daily steps. For the present study, the sample was collapsed across groups. Higher conscientiousness was associated with greater increases in daily steps. Also, individuals with healthy neuroticism, the combination of higher neuroticism and higher conscientiousness, showed greater increases in daily steps. The findings highlight that the efficacy of physical activity interventions may depend on personality traits. Intervention outcomes may be improved if personality is taken into account when designing the programs.

Looking on the bright side of life: Gratitude and experiences of interpersonal transgressions in adulthood and daily life.

OBJECTIVE: Gratitude plays an important role in individual and social well-being. However, less is known about the link between gratitude and experiences of interpersonal stressors. The current research examined the associations between gratitude and interpersonal transgressions. METHOD: One cross-sectional study with a broad age range and two daily diary studies (total N = 2,348; total age range: 18-91) were used to test the associations on the between- and within-person level. RESULTS: A consistent result across all studies was that dispositionally grateful individuals tended to report fewer interpersonal transgressions than less grateful people. In turn, people who generally reported more interpersonal transgressions were less grateful in daily life. Moreover, higher gratitude on one specific day was associated with fewer reported transgressions on the same day. However, the results from the daily diary studies indicated differences between the samples. Whereas gratitude was consistently associated with interpersonal transgressions in one daily diary sample, the findings in the second daily diary sample were less consistent. CONCLUSION: The present findings suggest that grateful people tend to perceive their social exchanges differently and/or actually experience fewer interpersonal transgressions. Future work is needed to test the underlying mechanisms of this negative association.

PEACH, a smartphone- and conversational agent-based coaching intervention for intentional personality change: study protocol of a randomized, wait-list controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: This protocol describes a study that will test the effectiveness of a 10-week non-clinical psychological coaching intervention for intentional personality change using a smartphone application. The goal of the intervention is to coach individuals who are willing and motivated to change some aspects of their personality, i.e., the Big Five personality traits. The intervention is based on empirically derived general change mechanisms from psychotherapy process-outcome research. It uses the smartphone application PEACH (PErsonality coACH) to allow for a scalable assessment and tailored interventions in the everyday life of participants. A conversational agent will be used as a digital coach to support participants to achieve their personality change goals. The goal of the study is to examine the effectiveness of the intervention at post-test assessment and three-month follow-up. METHODS/DESIGN: A 2x2 factorial between-subject randomized, wait-list controlled trial with intensive longitudinal methods will be conducted to examine the effectiveness of the intervention. Participants will be randomized to one of four conditions. One experimental condition includes a conversational agent with high self-awareness to deliver the coaching program. The other experimental condition includes a conversational agent with low self-awareness. Two wait-list conditions refer to the same two experimental conditions, albeit with four weeks without intervention at the beginning of the study. The 10-week intervention includes different types of micro-interventions: (a) individualized implementation intentions, (b) psychoeducation, (c) behavioral activation tasks, (d) self-reflection, (e) resource activation, and (f) individualized progress feedback. Study participants will be at least 900 German-speaking adults (18 years and older) who install the PEACH application on their smartphones, give their informed consent, pass the screening assessment, take part in the pre-test assessment and are motivated to change or modify some aspects of their personality. DISCUSSION: This is the first study testing the effectiveness of a smartphone- and conversational agent-based coaching intervention for intended personality change. Given that this novel intervention approach proves effective, it could be implemented in various non-clinical settings and could reach large numbers of people due to its low-threshold character and technical scalability.