From Kate McLean:
Julie asked some daunting questions of us at the Presidential roundtable, but questions that are important and fun to think about. One of my main emphases concerned the training of graduate students. Maintaining and encouraging programs that foster research and critical thinking about personality is vital for the field. My concern with this issue rests on the importance of students thinking about theory, measurement, new questions, relations between personality and other fields (e.g. Developmental Psychology), and viewing personality as a field that has something to offer Psychology and the world at large, not a field that is tacked on to areas. Further and relatedly, while I think it is important and positive that so many personality psychologists relate to other fields, it is also important to maintain the identity of personality psychologists. ARP is obviously the best context for this, and our meetings (perhaps also retreats—Mexico?) can cultivate a sense of belongingness and identity for personality psychologists. Finally, many of us discussed how personality should be presented to the world at large (e.g., the media). Whether or not we want to have a unified presence in the world outside of psychology is not a question I have an answer to, but one that we should consider as a group. Thanks to Julie, the other panel members, and the rest of the ARP group for fun questions and conversation!
|
From Jack Mayer: