Lawrence J. Walker’s research while affiliated with University of British Columbia and other places

A crisis we face is that moral character seems to be declining in significance in everyday life and is not particularly relevant in evaluations of current political leaders. A case for character, however, can be mounted through the study of moral exemplars; in demonstrating that character is a viable construct and not an artifact of situational factors, that it explains more of moral functioning than cognition alone, and that it is causally operative in moral action. Aspects of the character of exemplary moral character can be found, for example, in the integrated motivation of agency and communion, the positive framing of life events, an expanded worldview, and beneficial early-life experiences. This better-grounded understanding of character can serve to expand the moral domain, enhance intervention efforts, and promote a more civil and caring society.

There is considerable interest in finding ways to screen for dark personality traits (maladaptive interpersonal and personality tendencies) in personnel selection assessments given their pernicious effects on job performance and leadership behavior. This has proved challenging because of socially desirable response biases and ethical restrictions regulating the use of psychiatric measures. Recent advances in the understanding of the dimensional nature of personality suggest that measures of bright personality can be used to predict dark personality traits. The current research extends this research to the California Psychological Inventory (CPI) and employs multiple regression analyses to examine the bright–dark trait relationships in two samples of managers who underwent employment testing. Study 1 found that CPI scales significantly predicted each of the self-reported Hogan Development Survey dark traits. Study 2 extended this research to supervisor ratings and found that CPI scales significantly predicted 6 out of 11 dark traits as rated by supervisors. These studies further our understanding of the relationship between bright and dark personality traits and provide support for another method to screen for, and address the lack of observer assessments of, dark personality traits in workplace contexts.

In two studies, we examined the implications psychosocial constructions of parenting hold for an understanding of well-being. In studies 1 (N = 504) and 2 (N = 98) participants provided a list of personal goals and narratives about the experience of becoming parents, respectively. In both studies, measures of well-being were also completed. Goals were categorized on the basis of whether they contained reference to parenting as well as agentic and communal motivation, whereas stories were coded for themes of exploration and resolution. In Study 1, the proportion of parenting goals related positively with well-being, although this effect was rendered non-significant after accounting for the communal motivation of parenting goals. In Study 2, themes of exploration and resolution in parents’ narratives positively predicted well-being. Collectively, these results provide intimation of parenting’s “meaningfulness” within the current socio-cultural context.

How does moral motivation develop across the life span? Previous research has indicated that moral exemplars have integrated the typically oppositional motives of agency and communion. The present research maps developmental trajectories in these motives that may lead to this end-point integration. Participants were 140 Canadians comprising four age groups (childhood, adolescence, emerging adulthood, and mid-adulthood). Agentic and communal motivation was assessed in an interview that asked participants about aspects of their lives and prompted for the instrumental–terminal framing of their motives. Results indicated that agency was the dominant instrumental motive for all ages. In terms of terminal values, agency was the dominant motive early in development; however, the effect progressively weakened and, by mid-adulthood, had dissipated. The pattern of instrumental agency for communal goals increased across the age groups, implying that replacing agency with communion as the characteristic terminal motive represents an important goal for moral development.

Previous research has shown that (a) when individuals are pressed to justify their persistence through time (i.e., their self-continuity), they do so by constructing autobiographical life stories or by recognizing temporally stable personal attributes and (b) the prevalence in the endorsement of these strategies varies across cultural groups. Here we prompted for both life stories and temporally stable personal attributes among immigrant Asian Canadians and nonimmigrant Euro-Canadians. Life stories were coded for autobiographical reasoning processes and the frequency of stable personal attributes was noted. Immigrant Asian Canadians exhibited a heightened complexity of autobiographical reasoning, whereas nonimmigrant Euro-Canadians proffered more temporally stable attributes. These results inform understanding regarding self-continuity warranting strategies; the ways in which individuals use language to justify their sense of self through time vary culturally.

Trauma exposure has been associated with a host of negative outcomes (e.g., diminished social functioning). Recently, however, trauma has been found to correspond with a small number of positive outcomes, including an increase in prosocial behavior. In this article, we consider how this heightened prosociality is maintained following the initial trauma. We argue that a redemptive narrative, wherein the tragedy experienced is framed as leading to the prosocial behavior in question, is necessary to sustain this prosocial shift. Constructing such a narrative infuses the resulting behavioral pattern with a sense of meaning and purpose. This process is illustrated through examination of a life narrative generated by a highly prosocial individual who, earlier in her life, had suffered the death of her daughter. Discussion concerns the social and personal antecedents of the redemptive story, the applicability of this story to various types of traumas, and the relation between the construction of this story and well being.

In contemporary culture, socially deviant behaviour is increasingly being conceptualised as the result of a disease; most salient perhaps, in regards to addiction. This chronic disease model of alcoholism has its roots in early assumptions that have recently been discredited or at least challenged. This study employs an experimental method to examine whether telling individuals with a mild to moderate alcohol addiction that they have a chronic brain disease influences their perceptions of addiction-related agency as well as their feelings of shame and stigma. Participants, recruited online, were randomly assigned to internalise statements promoting (a) a disease model of addiction, (b) a psychosocial model or (c) a neutral control condition; they then completed several indices of agency in relation to drinking, as well as measures of stigma and shame. Participants who internalised the disease model of addiction tended to have weaker perceptions of drinking self-efficacy, whereas internalising psychosocial model beliefs tended to induce a stronger internal locus of control and weaker entitisation of addiction. Both the disease and the psychosocial conditions increased, in comparable amounts, feelings of stigma and shame relative to the control condition. This study provides empirical support to the notion that framing addiction within a biological conceptualisation, as opposed to a psychological and social framework, weakens perceptions of agency in relation to drinking. Likewise, no evidence was found to support the common assertion that the disease model reduces feelings of stigma and shame.

The self-concept is constituted by a series of context-specific self-aspects. Researchers have considered the manner in which personality traits vary across these self-aspects. Here, we examined self-aspects corresponding to professional and relational contexts at the goal and narrative levels of personality. In each of two studies, participants provided lists of goals and recounted self-defining narratives, corresponding to the aforementioned contexts. Goals and narratives were coded for themes of agency and communion. At both descriptive levels, agency more characterized the professional self-aspect and communion, the relational self-aspect. A consideration of context-specific goals and narratives informs understanding regarding the nature of the self in its multifaceted form.

What fundamentally motivates moral behavior? What is the nature and source of moral motivation? The argument developed in this chapter is that moral action is not merely other-regarding; it also can, and should be, self-regarding. When there is something significant for the self in the moral enterprise, it can legitimately be self-enhancing and, thus, powerfully motivating. The empirical warrant for this argument is found in the study of the psychological functioning of moral exemplars. The research reviewed here indicates that moral exemplars do synergistically integrate their self-promoting agentic motivation in service to their other-promoting communal values. Therein is the powerful motivational impetus for doing good and living rightly. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

What accounts for the actions of people who exhibit exceptional bravery, voluntarily risking their lives to save others? Previous research on this topic has been restricted to the variable approach. Here, we examine this phenomenon via the person approach, by deriving a personality profile distinctive of exceptional bravery. A cluster analysis, based on a broadband assessment of 11 personality variables, revealed that awardees for bravery were distinguished from comparison participants on the basis of their personality composition, challenging a situational explanation for their actions. The cluster corresponding with exceptional bravery embodied an expanded worldview (epistemic development, early advantage), positivity (redemption), and efficacy (dominance and agency). These findings inform understanding regarding the psychological factors underlying brave action.