PUB - Publikationen an der Universität Bielefeld

The controversial construct post-traumatic growth as positive personality change comes along with numerous conceptual and methodological problems, which have vividly been outlined in the target article by Jayawickreme and Blackie. As we point out here, existing empirical results also contradict the paradoxical hypothesis of an interrelation between negative life events and positive personality change. Given the oppressive evidence against this paradox, we propose some adjustments of the concept and suggest three areas of personality research in which traumatic experiences might show great promise for positive personality changes. Copyright (C) 2014 European Association of Personality Psychology