Quick: which one of the above women is more Agreeable?
It probably didn’t take too long for the woman on the left to fit the bill.
Of course, that judgment doesn’t make much “sense.”
All we have are two fleeting images of made up people.
But yet, whether it makes sense or not, most of us would pick the fake woman on the left as more Agreeable than the fake one on the right.
How come?
Our Elephant is executing rapid-fire-evolution-based evaluations using whatever information it has available to make judgments about other people. We all do it every day. It’s automatic, unconscious. It’s contributed to our survival as a species. It often makes us uncomfortable.
Let’s back up a bit.
We’ve been working our way through understanding the Five Factor Model of Personality, also known as the Big Five. The Big Five is the most widely recognized system for evaluating and understanding personality traits. It depicts ranges of ways that we are in the world, and in which we vary from one another on five traits. Using the acronym, OCEAN those traits are:
Openness to experience (inventive/curious vs. consistent/cautious)
Conscientiousness (efficient/organized vs. extravagant/careless)
Extraversion (outgoing/energetic vs. solitary/reserved)
Agreeableness (friendly/compassionate vs. critical/blunt)
Neuroticism (sensitive/nervous vs. resilient/confident)
Previously, we’ve looked at Openness, Conscientiousness and Extraversion. We’re exploring Agreeableness in this essay.
We’ve been leaning on Jonathan Haidt’s metaphor of The Elephant and The Rider as a model for understanding the ways we perceive other people. This metaphor was, in turn, inspired by the ancient Indian texts, the Upanishads.
The Elephant refers to that part of our perceptual/emotional/cognitive system that constantly processes the roughly 11 million bits/second of information about our current environment; all the sounds, textures, temperatures, etc. our lived-body “perceives-without-awareness” every moment. The Elephant is that part of our presence-in-the-world that “smells smoke” before The Rider (the conscious/rational part of the system, processing about 40 bits/second) thinks, “hmm…there might be a fire around here.” The Elephant’s job is to simplify our environment and prioritize actions that enable our survival and reproduction.
The Rider beliefs they are in control when perched atop The Elephant, but in fact The Elephant’s power is much greater in determining the direction a journey will take.
OK, back to those pictures. They were produced by Midjourney using the following image generation prompts, which in turn were created by ChatGPT-4. I gave ChatGPT the first 16 words of each prompt and it wrote the rest.
First, for the image on the left…:
Design a photorealistic image of a woman who scores very high on Big Five Agreeableness trait, radiating warmth and approachability. This individual should be portrayed with a genuine, inviting smile and open, welcoming body language. The setting should be cozy and inviting, perhaps a friendly gathering or a tranquil outdoor scene. Emphasize the person's kind eyes and relaxed demeanor, capturing the essence of their approachable and endearing personality.
Then, for the one on the right…:
Design a photorealistic image of a woman who scores very low on Big Five Agreeableness trait, exuding an aura of coldness or hostility. This individual should be portrayed with a stern or scowling expression and closed, unwelcoming body language. The setting should be stark or foreboding, perhaps a dimly lit room or an isolated space. Highlight the person's piercing gaze and rigid posture, capturing the essence of their unapproachable and off-putting demeanor.
Looking at the images, it’s not too hard to tell which is which, is it? If only it were that easy to determine in everyday life.
Or, is it?
Here are images from a psychological study on facial communication of personality traits.
Here’s the reference for these images. The one on the left of each pair represents a high level of the trait; the one on the right, a low level. It turns out we’re pretty good at distinguishing faces that express traits.
What is Agreeableness? Why is it important to us?
As the quick scale above indicates, people who are high on Agreeableness are described as some variation on “friendly,” or “compassionate.” Low Agreeableness individuals: “critical,” or “blunt.”
Cooperation and collaboration have been our species’ “superpowers” throughout our evolutionary history. Over time, we “learned” to perceive (and express) those traits in others (and ourselves) that would signal the ability to work together and foster group efforts; “learned” in the same way we “learned” to avoid dark places and off-putting odors. High levels of Agreeableness is one of those signals.
We’ve also learned to unlearn some of our behaviors. This is the “when/when not” quality of a trait that we discussed in the Extraversion essay. None of us is ever one thing, all the time, in all circumstances. This means that even the most polite, Agreeable person will behave confrontationally in some situations. This makes them an important part of a successful group effort. After all, being surrounded by only highly Agreeable people is often the prelude to a disaster (see, space shuttle Challenger launch).
As is so often the case, too much of “a good thing,” is a “bad thing.” Think of the challenge as “unlearning the unlearned.”
I did not learn to be mostly Agreeable. I just am. Genetic literature tells us that anywhere from 40% to 60% of the variance between high and low scores on Big Five traits, including Agreeableness, is heritable.
That means that we all would benefit from appreciating our starting “set point” on, for example, the Agreeableness trait scale. Those of us given to “naturally” being Agreeable would do well to recognize our vulnerability to excessively reflexive loyalty, unending patience, and blind trust. Conversely, if naturally low on Agreeableness, we could focus on reining in our skepticism, looking for opportunities to diminish conflict, and expressing empathy and gratitude more often.
Learning about the Big Five can be a fruitful way to better understand ourselves and others and to improve our chances of strengthening our most important human superpower: enhancing our ability to work together with others to achieve common productive goals.