Impressions of personality in Parkinson’s disease: Can rehabilitation practitioners see beyond the symptoms?

Abstract

  1. Objective: To explore rehabilitation practitioners' use of observable cues of personality to form accurate impressions of persons with Parkinson's disease. Participants: Ninety-nine practitioners from disciplines of occupational, physical, and speech therapy and nursing and medicine. Procedure: Participants viewed excerpts of videotaped interviews of 6 men and 6 women with mild-to-moderate Parkinson's disease and formed impressions of the targets' personality. Main Outcome Measure: NEO Five Factor Inventory personality test. Analysis: Brunswik lens model correlational analysis of the associations between expressive behavior and personality judgments. Results: Practitioners were accurate in judging Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness but were unable to detect interparticipant differences in levels of Extraversion and Neuroticism. Conclusion: Accuracy in judging some traits suggests that future research may identify interventions, such as sensitizing practitioners to valid behavioral cues or modifying contextual features, to maximize a practitioner's ability to understand a client's personality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

Department

Psychology

Publication Date

11-2004

Journal Title

Rehabilitation Psychology

Publisher

American Psychological Association

Document Type

Article

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