The birth-control pill is a widely used form of contraception among young women. However, using oral contraception (OC) comes with a number of reported side effects, one being significant mood...Show moreThe birth-control pill is a widely used form of contraception among young women. However, using oral contraception (OC) comes with a number of reported side effects, one being significant mood deterioration and depressive symptoms. Research is divided concerning the question of whether such a relationship between OC and depressive symptoms actually exists and points to contradictory research results when investigating said relationship. One explanation for these differing study results is the existence of a moderator. It has been suggested that personality might act as such a moderator. The present study aims to investigate further whether personality indeed moderates the relationship between OC and depressive symptoms. Personality was split into the Big-Five personality factors Neuroticism, Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, and Agreeableness. Participants were 515 females aged 18-29 and were divided into two groups. One that stated to take OC and one that only uses physical contraception. They received the Big-Five Inventory-10 (BFI-10) and the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) to assess their personality and their depressive symptomatology, respectively. Results showed no relation between OC and depressive symptoms and no moderation effect of any personality factor on said relationship. Therefore, the present study shows no signs of personality influencing the relationship between OC and depressive symptoms. However, it has been found that Neuroticism and Conscientiousness were both significantly related to depressive symptoms. Limitations, study implications, and directions for future research are discussed.Show less
Background: The personality factors neuroticism, conscientiousness, and extraversion, as well as threat-related attentional bias are significantly associated with anxiety disorders,...Show moreBackground: The personality factors neuroticism, conscientiousness, and extraversion, as well as threat-related attentional bias are significantly associated with anxiety disorders, transdiagnostically. Hypothesis: These personality constructs are correlated with attentional bias, and it might be through this that they create vulnerability for anxiety. Methods: The cross-sectional experimental study (N = 40) administered a dual-probe-task with neutral, mildly-threatening, and highly-threatening images. Results: Significant negative associations with big effect sizes were found between conscientiousness and attending towards threat. More conscientious individuals automatically attended away from mild-threats. Conclusion and Implications: A pathway through which conscientiousness may be acting to create vulnerability for anxiety was proposed. The goal engagement system, as hypothesized in the cognitive- motivational model by Mogg & Bradley, keeps the attention automatically on goal-related stimuli in the absence of a perceived true threat in the environment. The current study adds a new layer to this model, illustrating how intact one’s goal engagement system, even in the absence of pathologic anxiety, is on a spectrum, and can be operationalized by one’s conscientiousness level. Individuals with lower levels of conscientiousness would not have a strong goal engagement system, not resulting in an automatic avoidance of mild-threats, leading overtime to an accumulation of evidence for negative cues, making it easier to form cognitive distortions, predisposing one to anxiety. Increasing conscientiousness might be a promising psychotherapeutic target. Crucial for the anxiety-related attentional bias research field, exploratory analyses showed conscientiousness to be a more important predictor of attentional bias, compared to attentional control. Future attentional bias studies should assess conscientiousness.Show less
Background: With the recent emergence of online dating as a way of initiating and establishing romantic relationships, online dating has become an important strategy for couples to meet. However,...Show moreBackground: With the recent emergence of online dating as a way of initiating and establishing romantic relationships, online dating has become an important strategy for couples to meet. However, no previous studies have thoroughly investigated the possible mediation effect of partner-perceived attractiveness between personality traits and online dating success. In this thesis, I will test whether personality traits influence partner-perceived attractiveness, and whether this assumed relationship affects online dating success. Methods: Through the use of a mediation analysis, this present study will investigate how the personality dimensions of extraversion and neuroticism are linked to attractiveness and whether a specific trait contributes to more online dating success. Results: It cannot be concluded that there is a mediating relationship between personality traits and online dating outcomes. A significant relationship was found between partner perceived attractiveness and dating success when running a linear regression, without controlling for the relationship between personality traits and online dating outcomes. Conclusion: More research needs to be done in order to differentiate between the different personality traits, and whether possessing one trait makes you a more successful online dater. Future studies can add a new dimension to the variable of partner-perceived attractiveness and look into the possible role played by self-esteem.Show less
What causes attraction? This question has occupied the human mind for ages. In the present day, online dating companies try to find an answer to this question while creating algorithms that provide...Show moreWhat causes attraction? This question has occupied the human mind for ages. In the present day, online dating companies try to find an answer to this question while creating algorithms that provide people with better matches than their competitors. Knowing what makes people like another person is of vital importance for thriving in the world of online dating. The aim of this thesis is to add to this search by looking at the impact of similarity in personality versus perceived similarity on the probability that one considers their match a suitable partner. Participants (N= 568) were matched to a blind date and had to fill in a questionnaire concerning their perception of their match. In this study no significant effect was found between similarity in personality (X2 (1) = 3.49, p = .062) and how suitable they perceived their partner to be, but a significant relationship was found between perceived similarity and how suitable they perceived their partner to be (X2 (1) = 7.51, p = .006, OR = 1.799; X2 (1) = 10.48, p = .001, OR = 1.978). If future research can determine if this effect is a causal relationship, this could be used for improving dating applications, but also couples counselors could create new interventions for struggling couples based on increasing perceived similarity.Show less
