ASSESSING BEHAVIOR AND PERSONALITY OF CENTENARIANS THROUGH OBSERVATIONAL CODING: A PILOT PROJECT

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ASSESSING BEHAVIOR AND PERSONALITY OF CENTENARIANS THROUGH OBSERVATIONAL CODING: A PILOT PROJECT

G. daRosa ¹ , M. Heinz ² , P. Martin ³ , L. Poon ⁴ , 1. Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia, 2. Upper Iowa University, Fayette, Iowa, 3. Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, 4. University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia

Observational coding has been used in gerontology, but not with centenarians. The purpose of this study was to observe behavior and personality characteristics of recorded interviews with Georgia and Iowa centenarians and to assess inter-rater reliability among coders. We piloted an observational coding system between 20 centenarians from the Georgia and Iowa Centenarian Studies. Two researchers assessed portions of the life event sections and observed behavioral characteristics of the Big 5 personality traits as well as other behaviors (e.g., humor, positive mood, assertiveness, communication, criticism, isolation, sadness, etc.). A paired-samples t -test was conducted to compare agreement between raters on centenarian behaviors and personality. Results suggest consistency between the raters for many of the observational ratings of the centenarians’ behavior and personality characteristics. However, there were significant differences in observational scores on assertiveness between rater 1 ( M =2.70. SD = 1.17) and rater 2 ( M  = 3.00, SD  = 1.34); t (19)=-2.35, p =0.03, suggesting that rater 2 was more likely to report that centenarians had higher scores on assertiveness. It is possible that given the different cultural backgrounds of the raters that they interpreted assertiveness differently. An interrater reliability analysis using the Kappa statistic was performed to determine consistency among raters on the Big Five Personality Traits and substantial agreement was found between raters for Openness (Kappa = 0. 70, p  = 0.001). Additionally, most of the ratings were significantly correlated, except ratings for criticism, Neuroticism, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness. This suggests that raters significantly agreed on several of the behavioral and personality trait assessments.