Paul T. Costa, Jr. & Robert R. McCrae
Biography
Robert R. McCrae (1949 - ?)
Paul T. Costa, Jr. (1942 - ?)
Founding Parents of
The Five-Factor
Model
Pre-"Big Five"
Early Life
- Graduating psychology in Boston University
- Adoring Cattell's psychometric technique
- Had to work on factor-analysis alone. His former Professor was a clinician psychologist with no interest on trait theory
- Moreover, throughout 60's-70's, Trait Theory was not American's ortgeist (see: Rotter & Mischel)
- Published a book on humanistic personality theory with Maddi (1972)
- Teaching in Harvard for two years, and University of Massachusetts from 1973-1978
- Hired McCrae as his project director and co-principal investigatior for his Smoking & Personality Grant in 1976
- Born September 16, 1942 in New Hampshire
- Undergraduating psychology in Clark University, 1964
- Both graduating his master (1964) and Ph.D (1968) degree in University of Chicago
- Interested in individual differences & nature of personality
- Born April 28, 1949 in Missouri
- Youngest out of 3 children
- Showing early interest on math & science
- Undergraduating philosophy on MSU, yet disappointed by the open-end & non-empirical studies under the departement
A Fruitful Marriage:
"Big Five" Destiny
- Working with McCrae in National Institute on Aging's Gerontology Research Center in Baltimore
- The large, well-established datasets of adults made it ideal for Costa & McCrae to investigate the structure of personality
- Achieving his Ph.D in 1975
- Worked as James Fozard's research assistant at the Normative Aging Study at the Veterans Administration Outpatient Clinic in Boston
- Fozard referred McCrae to Paul T. Costa, Jr., a personality psychologist from University of Massachusetts, Boston
For almost 40 years, there has been more than 200 research articles, chapters, & books with Costa & McCrae featured:
- Emerging Lives, Enduring Disposition (1984)
- Revised NEO Personality Inventory (1992)
- The Five-Factor Model of Personality Across Cultures (2002)
- Personality in Adulthood: A Five-Factor Theory Perspective, 2nd ed. (2003)
- etc.