The Nonlinear Interaction of Person and Situation (Nips) Model: Theory and Empirical Evidence

Abstract

Despite the broad consensus in psychology that human behaviour is influenced by the interaction between characteristics of the person and characteristics of the situation, not much is known about the precise shape of this person–situation (P × S) interaction. To address this issue, we introduce and test the nonlinear interaction of person and situation (NIPS) model. The NIPS model can be applied to explain contradictory research results, offers a more accurate prediction of behaviour, and can be applied to any trait. In three studies and with three different analytical approaches, we test the NIPS model and its implications. In the pre–study, we test whether variability in participants’ behaviour is smaller in extreme aggression–provoking and jealousy–inducing situations than in moderate situations, suggesting the effect of ‘strong’ situations at the extremes of the situation continuum. In Studies 1 and 2, we test the nonlinear relation between person and situation variables in predicting behaviour in within–subject designs and provide support for the predictions of the NIPS model. Future lines of research with the NIPS model are discussed. Copyright © 2018 European Association of Personality Psychology

Keywords

person × situation interaction jealousy aggression nonlinear interaction of person and situation model (NIPS)nonlinear

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

American Psychiatric Association., A. P. A. D.–5. T. F. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM–5. Washington, D.C: American Psychiatric Association, https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.

Anderson

C. A.

(1997). Effects of violent movies and trait hostility on hostile feelings and aggressive thoughts. Aggressive Behavior, 23, 161–178. https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1098-2337(1997)23:3%3C161::AID-AB2%3E3.0.CO;2-P

Anderson

C. A.

, & Bushman

B. J.

(2002). Human aggression. Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 27–51. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.53.100901.135231.

Anderson

N. H.

(1974). Algebraic models in perception. In Carterette

E. C.

, & Friedman

M. P.

(Eds.), Handbook of perception (pp. 215–298). New York, London: Academic Press.

Aquino

, Freeman

, Reed

, Lim

V. K. G.

, & Felps

(2009). Testing a social–cognitive model of moral behavior: The interactive influence of situations and moral identity centrality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 97, 123–141. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0015406.

Asendorpf

J. B.

(2017). Personality as a situation: A target–centered perspective on social situations. In Funder

D. C.

, Rauthmann

J. F.

, & Sherman

R. A.

(Eds.), The Oxford handbook of psychological situations. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

Baayen

R. H.

, Davidson

D. J.

, & Bates

D. M.

(2008). Mixed–effects modeling with crossed random effects for subjects and items. Journal of Memory and Language, 59, 390–412. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2007.12.005.

Back

M. D.

, Baumert

, Denissen

J. J. A.

, Hartung

F.–M.

, Penke

, Schmukle

S. C.

, Schönbrodt

F. D.

, … Wrzus

(2011). PERSOC: A unified framework for understanding the dynamic interplay of personality and social relationships. European Journal of Personality, 25, 90–107. https://doi.org/10.1002/per.811.

Bates

, Maechler

, Bolker

, & Walker

(2017). lme4: Linear mixed–effects models using ‘Eigen’ and S4 (R package version 1.1–13). Retrieved from https://cran.r–project.org/web/packages/lme4/

10.

Baumert

, Schmitt

, Perugini

, Johnson

, Blum

, Borkenau

, et al. (2017). Integrating personality structure, personality process, and personality development. European Journal of Personality, 31, 503–528. https://doi.org/10.1002/per.2115.

11.

Blum

, & Schmitt

(2017). The nonlinear interaction of person and situation (NIPS) model and its values for a psychology of situations. In Rauthmann

J. F.

, Funder

D. C.

, & Sherman

(Eds.), The Oxford handbook of psychological situations (pp. 1–17). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

12.

Blum

G. S.

(2017, July 21). The nonlinear interaction of person and situation (NIPS) model: Theory and empirical evidence. Retrieved from osf.io/r7286

13.

Bowers

K. S.

(1973). Situationism in psychology: An analysis and a critique. Psychological Review, 80, 307–336. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0035592.

14.

Breining

(2009). Eifersucht: Theorien, methoden, neue erkenntnisse [jealousy: Theories, methods and new insights]. Saarbrücken: VDM Verlag.

15.

Brunswik

(1956). Perception and the representative design of psychological experiments. Berkeley: University of California Press.

16.

Buss

A. H.

, & Perry

(1992). The Aggression Questionnaire. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 452–459. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022–3514.63.3.452.

17.

Buss

D. M.

(2005). The handbook of evolutionary psychology. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

18.

Cattell

R. B.

(Ed) (1966). Handbook of multivariate experimental psychology. Chicago: Rand McNally.

19.

Cooper

W. H.

, & Withey

M. J.

(2009). The strong situation hypothesis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 13, 62–72. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868308329378.

20.

Cronbach

L. J.

(1975). Beyond the two disciplines of scientific psychology. American Psychologist, 30, 116–127. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0076829.

21.

Dalal

R. S.

, Meyer

R. D.

, Bradshaw

R. P.

, Green

J. P.

, Kelly

E. D.

, & Zhu

(2014). Personality strength and situational influences on behavior: A conceptual review and research agenda. Journal of Management, 41, 261–287. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206314557524.

22.

Donnellan

M. B.

, Lucas

R. E.

, & Fleeson

(2009). Introduction to personality and assessment at age 40: Reflections on the legacy of the person–situation debate and the future of person–situation integration. Journal of Research in Psychology, 43, 117–119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2009.02.010.

23.

Ekehammar

(1974). Interactionism in personality from a historical perspective. Psychological Bulletin, 81, 1026–1048. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0037457.

24.

Endler

N. S.

(1975). A person–situation interaction model for anxiety. In Spielberger

C. D.

, & Sarason

(Eds.), Stress and anxiety (1st ed., pp. 145–164). Washington, DC: Hemisphere Publishing Corporation.

25.

Endler

N. S.

(1982). Interactionism comes of age. In Zanna

, Higgins

E. T.

, & Herman

C. P.

(Eds.), Consistency in social behavior (pp. 209–249). Hillsdale, N.J: Erlbaum.

26.

Endler

N. S.

, & Hunt

J. M.

(1966). Sources of behavioral variance as measured by the S–R inventory of anxiousness. Psychological Bulletin, 65, 336–346. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0023309.

27.

Endler

N. S.

, & Magnusson

(1976). Toward an interactional psychology of personality. Psychological Bulletin, 83, 956–974. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033–2909.83.5.956.

28.

European Parliament and the Council. (2016). Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council: General Data Protection Regulation. Retrieved from http://eur–lex.europa.eu/legal–content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32016R0679&from=EN

29.

Fleeson

, & Jayawickreme

(2015). Whole trait theory. Journal of Research in Personality, 56, 82–92. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2014.10.009.

30.

Fleeson

, & Noftle

(2008). The end of the person–situation debate: An emerging synthesis in the answer to the consistency question. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2, 1667–1684. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751–9004.2008.00122.x.

31.

Fleeson

, & Noftle

E. E.

(2012). Personality research. In Mehl

M. R.

, & Conner

T. S.

(Eds.), Handbook of research methods for studying daily life (pp. 525–538). New York: Guilford.

32.

Fox

(2008). Applied regression analysis and generalized linear models (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

33.

Funder

D. C.

(2006). Towards a resolution of the personality triad: Persons, situations, and behaviors. Journal of Research in Personality, 40, 21–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2005.08.003.

34.

Funder

D. C.

(2009). Persons, behaviors and situations: An agenda for personality psychology in the postwar era. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 120–126. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2008.12.041.

35.

Funder

D. C.

, & Ozer

D. J.

(1983). Behavior as a function of the situation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 107–112. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022–3514.44.1.107.

36.

Golding

S. L.

(1975). Flies in the ointment: Methodological problems in the analysis of the percentage of variance due to persons and situations. Psychological Bulletin, 82, 278–288. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0076375.

37.

Graziano

W. G.

, Habashi

M. M.

, Sheese

B. E.

, & Tobin

R. M.

(2007). Agreeableness, empathy, and helping: A person × situation perspective. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 583–599. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022–3514.93.4.583.

38.

Horstmann

K. T.

, Rauthmann

J. F.

, & Sherman

R. A.

(2017). The measurement of situational influences. In Zeigler–Hill

, & Shackelford

T. K.

(Eds.), The SAGE handbook of personality and individual differences.

39.

Kenrick

D. T.

, & Funder

D. C.

(1988). Profiting from controversy: Lessons from the person–situation debate. American Psychologist, 43, 23–34. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003–066X.43.1.23.

40.

Kuznetsova

, Brockhoff

P. B.

, & Christensen

R. H. B.

(2016). lmerTest: Tests in linear mixed effects models (R–package version 2.0–33). Retrieved from https://cran.r–project.org/web/packages/lmerTest/

41.

Leising

, & Müller–Plath

(2009). Person–situation integration in research on personality problems. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 218–227. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2009.01.017.

42.

Lewin

(1951). Field theory in social science: Selected theoretical papers. New York: Harper & Row.

43.

Lindsay

J. J.

, & Anderson

C. A.

(2000). From antecedent conditions to violent actions: A general affective aggression model. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 26, 533–547. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167200267002.

44.

Magnusson

(1981). Toward a psychology of situations: An interactional perspective. Hillsdale, N.J: Erlbaum.

45.

Marshall

M. A.

, & Brown

J. D.

(2006). Trait aggressiveness and situational provocation: A test of the traits as situational sensitivities (TASS) model. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 32, 1100–1113. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167206288488.

46.

Mestdagh

, Pe

, Pestman

, Verdonck

, Kuppens

, & Tuerlinckx (in press). Sidelining the mean: The relative variability index as a generic mean–corrected variability measure for bounded variables. Psychological Methods.

47.

Mischel

(1968). Personality and assessment. Mahwah, NJ: L. Erlbaum Associates.

48.

Mischel

(1973). Toward a cognitive social learning reconceptualization of personality. Psychological Review, 80, 252–283. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0035002.

49.

Möller

(2006). Mediengewalt und aggression: Eine längsschnittliche betrachtung des zusammenhangs am beispiel des konsums gewalthaltiger bildschirmspiele [media violence and aggression: A longitudinal observation of their link using the example of the consumption of violent screen–based games]. Retrieved from http://opus.kobv.de/ubp/volltexte/2006/773/pdf/moeller_diss.pdf

50.

Muthén

L. K.

, & Muthén

B. O.

(2012). Mplus user's guide (7th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: Muthén & Muthén.

51.

Parks

C. D.

, Henager

R. F.

, & Scamahorn

S. D.

(1996). Trust and reactions to messages of intent in social dilemmas. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 40, 134–151. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022002796040001007.

52.

Paunonen

S. V.

, & Jackson

D. N.

(1985). Idiographic measurement strategies for personality and prediction: Some unredeemed promissory notes. Psychological Review, 92, 486–511. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033–295X.92.4.486.

53.

Pfeiffer

S. M.

, & Wong

P. T. P.

(1989). Multidimensional jealousy. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 6, 181–196. https://doi.org/10.1177/026540758900600203.

54.

Pytlik Zillig

L. M.

, Hemenover

S. H.

, & Dienstbier

R. A.

(2002). What do we assess when we assess a Big 5 trait?: A content analysis of the affective, behavioral, and cognitive processes represented in big 5 personality inventories. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 847–858. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167202289013.

55.

R Core Team (2015). R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. URL http://www.r-project.org/

56.

Rauchfleisch

(1979). Handbuch zum Rosenzweig picture frustration test (PFT) [handbook for the Rosenzweig picture frustration test (PFT)]. Bern: Huber.

57.

Rauthmann

J. F.

, Gallardo–Pujol

, Guillaume

E. M.

, Todd

, Nave

C. S.

, Sherman

R. A.

, … Funder

D. C.

(2014). The situational eight DIAMONDS: A taxonomy of major dimensions of situation characteristics. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 107, 677–718. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037250.

58.

Rauthmann

J. F.

, & Sherman

R. A.

(2016). Situation change: Stability and change of situation variables between and within persons. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 1938. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01938.

59.

Rauthmann

J. F.

, Sherman

R. A.

, & Funder

D. C.

(2015). Principles of situation research: Towards a better understanding of psychological situations. Target Article. European Journal of Personality, 29, 363–381. https://doi.org/10.1002/per.1994.

60.

Richard

F. D.

, Bond

C. F.

, & Stokes–Zoota

J. J.

(2003). One hundred years of social psychology quantitatively described. Review of General Psychology, 7, 331–363. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089–2680.7.4.331.

61.

Rosenberg

M. J.

, & Hovland

(1960). Cognitive, affective cognitive, affective and behavioral components of attitudes. In Rosenberg

M. J.

(Ed.), Attitude organization and change; an analysis of consistency among attitude components (pp. 1–14). New Haven: Yale University Press.

62.

Rosenzweig

(1978). Aggressive behavior and the Rosenzweig picture–frustration study. New York: Praeger.

63.

Schmitt

, Eid

, & Maes

(2003). Synergistic person × situation interaction in distributive justice behavior. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 29, 141–147. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167202238379.

64.

Schmitt

, Gollwitzer

, Baumert

, Blum

, Gschwendner

, Hofmann

, & Rothmund

(2013). Proposal of a nonlinear interaction of person and situation (NIPS) model. Frontiers in Psychology, 4. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00499.

65.

Schmitt

Montada

, & Falkenau

(1994). Modellierung der generalisierten und bereichsspezifischen Eifersuchtsneigung mittels Strukturgleichungen. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11780/327

66.

Sherman

R. A.

, Rauthmann

J. F.

, Brown

N. A.

, Serfass

D. G.

, & Jones

A. B.

(2015). The independent effects of personality and situations on real–time expressions of behavior and emotion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 109, 872–888. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000036.

67.

Shiner

R. L.

(2009). Persons and situations act together to shape the course of human lives. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 270–271. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2008.12.023.

68.

Snijders

T. A. B.

, & Bosker

R. J.

(2012). Multilevel analysis: An introduction to basic and advanced multilevel modeling. London: Sage.

69.

Snyder

, & Ickes

(1985). Personality and social behavior. In Lindzey

, & Aronson

(Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (3rd ed., pp. 883–948). New York: Random House.

70.

Spielberger

C. D.

(1972). Anxiety: Current trends in theory and research 1. New York: Acad. Press.

71.

Vasquez

E. A.

, Bartsch

V. O.

, Pedersen

W. C.

, & Miller

(2007). The impact of aggressive priming, rumination, and frustration on prison sentencing. Aggressive Behavior, 33, 477–485. https://doi.org/10.1002/ab.20203.

72.

Webster

G. D.

(2009). The person–situation interaction is increasingly outpacing the person–situation debate in the scientific literature: A 30–year analysis of publication trends, 1978–2007. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 278–279. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2008.12.030.

73.

Wrzus

, & Roberts

B. W.

(2016). Processes of personality development in adulthood: The TESSERA framework. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 21, 253–277. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868316652279.

74.

Yang

, Read

S. J.

, & Miller

L. C.

(2009). The concept of situations. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 3, 1018–1037. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751–9004.2009.00236.x.

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

2.67 MB

0.00 MB