Agreeableness
Agreeableness is one of the five personality traits of the Big Five personality theory; it looks at how an individual interacts with other people. A person with high scores on the Agreeableness scale is trustworthy, generous, honest and open. They are drawn to other people and are constantly prepared to help them and be there for them. As a rule is honest and direct in their communication, and does not withhold or distort information, not even when it means that they may encounter negative reactions. They put other people first, even if in the short term this is at their own expense. Some may regard the person as unnecessarily obvious and open and perhaps even a little “blunt”.
A person with low scores on the Agreeableness scale may be regarded as somewhat vigilant and on guard. They do not automatically trust other people but are on their guard vis-à-vis other people and their intentions, this results in them rarely being duped or deceived. They find it easy to adapt their communications with the aim of avoiding negative reactions and as a result of their manner of communicating with the people around they may be regarded by other people as both pleasant and socially well-adapted. Someone with low scores often has a limited need for closeness to other people and usually regards his or her emotional independence as a strength.
The Agreeableness scale can be hard to define, thus making investigating the 5 subscales that make up Agreeableness an important task.
What is Agreeableness?
Simply put, Agreeableness defines an individual’s outlook and interactions with others, including: the desire to help others, to be there for others and trust others. Agreeableness is perceived as a “likeability”, this is because it contains 5 subscales that are characteristics often looked for in people that the average person would assess before befriending.
The five subscales are as follows:
Trust
The Trust subscale showcases the confidence an individual has in other people, therefore showing how easy it for them to trust others. This is not always around a particular person or scenario, but more so their outlook on humankind and their intentions. The results of this subscale will show if an individual sees people positively or if they are more sceptical and take time to build trust.
Communication
This subscale reflects the communication style and whether adapting the content is likely to be a method with other people. A person who scores low on the communication subscale will tend to “cushion” their opinions, and prioritize a flexible and agreeable way of communicating. An individual may communicate this way to avoid conflict and appeal to others. On the other end of the scale, a person with a high score is often seen as blunt and to the point with their opinions and goals, whilst this is often seen as straight forward, it displays a strong level of honesty and goal orientation.
Altruism
The Altruism subscale depicts a person’s need to exist for the benefit of others, i.e. helping and teaching others. A person who scores highly in Altruism is incredibly likely to help and support others, often going out of their own way in order to do so. Whilst this is unselfish, it can also lead to self-neglect and forgetting their own well-being. A low score in Altruism shows a person who is focused on their own goals and prioritizes their focus on their own motives.
Compassion
Compassion reflects the degree of sympathy that one has for other people. The most common method of judging compassion is observing how affected an individual is by other’s problems and needs, and to what extent one tends to become emotionally involved in them. A highly compassionate person regularly becomes emotionally involved with their friends and family, but also strangers and potentially charitable donations. An individual who scores low on the compassion subscale is more withdrawn with their emotions, this is not to say that they are not sympathetic, but it may take more for them to display their feelings and act upon them.
Affection
Affection depicts an individual’s need to adopt love, tenderness, and friendship into their relationships with family, friends, and colleagues. A person who is highly affectionate will tend to build friendships through warmth and love with various people in their life. A low scoring individual may reserve that treatment for select people and rather build formal relationships.
Why is Agreeableness Important?
As mentioned above, people who score highly across a variety of the subscales and therefore are considered a highly agreeable person, are likely to be humble.
Agreeableness is a fantastic trait to assess for in job roles. A high level of agreeableness can be a brilliant asset to have in a project-based team where people need to work together, often fulfilling various roles to complete their goals. On the other hand, a low level of agreeableness is also a valuable trait in the right job environment, a role such as sales can involve a degree of bluntness and honesty, therefore individuals with low agreeableness can thrive in this type of role. This specific scale is also quite important when defining a leadership style; is the candidate a humble leader or a strict/transactional leader?
Assessment
Agreeableness can be hard to gauge through traditional recruitment methods, even in an interview it will be difficult to get a true picture of this trait among candidates.
At Inpsyght Consultancy we believe that the best way to test for Agreeableness is through the use of a personality assessment. We provide our clients access to MAP, our personality assessment based on the Five Factor Model. We find when combined with a structured interview we can target and observe the various sub-scales among candidates and existing employees. The insight could be used for decision-making in recruitment but also in existing personnel to shape a suitable coaching program if necessary. With this insight our clients use this information not only for decision-making when recruiting, but also among existing personnel to shape a suitable development program.
To learn more about the psychometric tests we provide, use the following link: https://www.inpsyght.co.uk/solutions/
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