The study & findings

To test their hypothesis, the researchers performed five studies. In the first three studies, participants were presented with various stimuli and asked to report on their thoughts and feelings (e.g. interest and/or confusion) in response to each stimulus.

Following this, participants completed a personality test which required them to rate 60 items on a 5-point scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree. This test assessed the five big personality traits. According to the five-factor model, these traits are: openness, conscientiousness (diligent and hard-working), extraversion (talkative and gregarious), agreeableness (cooperative and easy-going) and neuroticism (anxious and impulsive).

The stimuli used in the first study consisted of visual art on a computer screen. In the second study, participants were presented with stimuli in the form of philosophical quotations, science stories and visual art images. For the third study, researchers recruited university students enrolled in a psychology course. The stimuli used in this study were the psychology lectures.

The results of the three studies provided support for the hypothesis. They found that openness was linked to a positive relationship between interest and confusion. That is, individuals who scored higher in openness were able to experience interest and confusion at the same time.

In the fourth study, participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions. In the first condition, participants were instructed to read a poem called The Life of Haifisch and rate the poem based on their level of interest and confusion. Participants in the second condition were instructed to perform the same task. However, they were informed that all the poems were about killer sharks, while participants in the first condition were not told this information (i.e., likely leading to confusion). The poem included lines such as:



such daring against men

with a throat so big

separated by a hundred years

full of misfortune: the bloody

flux. taken by a fit of madness

Participants who weren’t given background information about the poem reported higher levels of confusion. However, these participants weren’t significantly more confused than the participants who knew the poem was about killer sharks. The researchers came to the conclusion that the confusion manipulation wasn’t strong enough. As a result, this experiment failed to confirm the original hypothesis.

The final study required participants to complete a microworld simulation task. In this task, participants were put in charge of keeping the population of species on an island at a certain level. Participants were told that the population needed to be kept at 100 species for the ecosystem to function optimally. They were also told that the ecosystem was unstable and would likely change throughout the course of this experiment. These changes could be countered by introducing new species to the island or relocating them.

There were 61 trials in total and each participant reported their interest and confusion after every third trial. This study utilized the same personality measures used in the previous studies. The results of this study supported the hypothesis. A more positive interest/confusion relationship was linked to the openness domain.

Results applied: engage in new situations with ease



If you perceive yourself to be low in openness, you may find these findings discouraging. After all, personality is a fixed trait and there isn’t much you can do to change it, right? Well, not exactly. A recent study measured personality changes in participants over the span of 50 years. They found that while personality has a stable component, it’s malleable. For example, on average, people become more conscientious and emotionally stable as they get older.

Another study found that life events can affect one’s openness. According to this study, people tend to experience increases in openness after significant life changes, such as going off to college or getting a divorce. In addition, a review of 207 previous studies found that seeing a therapist can also produce personality changes.

Knowing that there’s room to change, there are some things we can do to boost levels of openness.

Be open to new experiences

A person with a high level of openness tends to reside outside of their comfort zone. They enjoy trying new things and can be described as creative and innovative. These individuals are quite flexible, which allows them to thrive in dynamic environments. As described in the study above, openness is a key factor in your ability to understand and remain engaged when learning something new. Try the following tips to improve your level of openness: