PERSONALITY PROCESSES AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES Goal Orientation and Planfulness: Action Styles as Personality Concepts

We performed nine studies with partly overlapping samples from the United States and Germany to establish the reliability, validity; and usefulness of the concept of action style—a person-specific approach to action. Two principal-components-analyses factors are dealt with in more detail: goal orientation and planfulness. Both show high consistencies and have tcst-rctcst correlations of r = .47 and .48, respectively, across 8 months. In one validity study, the correlations between self-ratings and peer ratings are .36 for goal orientation and .54 for planfulness. In a second validity study, a quasi experiment, with thinking-aloud protocols on planning a day in a strange city, showed rather weak correlations between raters and subjects, but these correlations improved when we included only those subjects who were easy to observe. A third validity study on the correlations with impulsivity showed that goal orientation is little related but that planfulness is to a higher degree. There are small but consistent and significant relations with depression and with coronary-prone 'lype A behavior, and there are correlations with work-related constructs of stress and resources at work as well as with performance in college. Most individuals set goals and develop some plans during the course of a day. Whether one prefers to plan a course of action while taking a shower or before going to bed, it would be crippling to most people to have this process of goal refinement and planful behavior prevented completely. Actions are determined and guided by goals, plans, and feedback (Anderson, 1985; Frese & Sabini, 1985; Miller, Galanter, & Pribram, 1960). The goals determine the course of the plan, and the feedback from the environment redirects the plans, providing the basis for an assessment of whether a plan will serve a given goal and whether the desired goal has been achieved. Goals and plans are organized hierarchically (at least to a certain degree) and include

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