Individual Psychosocial Competence: a Personality Configuration

Abstract

Two investigations of students entering college ( Ns = 84 and 262), and one of the students completing high school (N = 147) explored the presence of a psychological competence configuration as a component of personality-functioning. That configuration was hypothesized to consist of self-attitudes (Rotter I-E), world attitudes (Rotter Trust), and behavioral attributes (Tyler, Behavioral Attributes of Psychosocial Competence). The configuration held across all 3 samples, with the self-attitudes-behavioral attributes relation strongest. Configural measures were independent of aptitude and grade point measures, but somewhat related to social desirability (Crowne-Marlowe). In the high school study, the BAPC significantly differentiated students selected by counselors as exemplary ("getting their lives and school together well" ) in contrast to those selected as marginal. The differentiating power of the BAPC proved to be completely independent of social desirability and aptitude effects and partially independent of grade point average. Thus these studies establish the presence of a functionally relevant behavioral attributes component of effectiveness.