.3-12 Children Aged Personality Structure Assessed Its Features Tracking Study

The studies on the construction and development of children personality are always the focus research field at home and abroad. At present, researchers in western countries explored the construction and development of children personality maturely, but studies'foundation in our country is relatively weak. Many studies used the paradigm of western for reference, or the revised personality questionnaires which were used in the western culture to assess children in our country directly. Researchers consider that personality is the psychological properties with culture attribute. If the study is conducted to explore the construction and development of children personality systematically, we should carry out it in the background of entire Chinese culture, which can ensure the study's conclusion reflecting the characteristic of Chinese children personality exactly.Above all, this paper contributes to the local research of construction and development of children personality in our country.First, we carried out qualitative research combining the teachers'free description and lexical analysis. Results showed a precise and completed descriptive personality construction of children. Second, on the basis of qualitative research, we made the teachers'rating questionnaires, which was used to investigate the children personality in the quantitative paradigm, and established the rating personality construction of our country children. Third, we adopted the longitudinal study with the cohort sequential design to explore the age and gender characteristic of children personality development. Considering differences of environments and age, the phase of 3～12 years was divided into preschool phase (from 3 to 6 years) primary phase (from 6 to 12 years), the descriptive and rating construction and developmental characteristics of preschool children and pupils personality were explored.Main conclusions are as follows:1. From the qualitative research, the descriptive personality construction of preschool children was made up of five categorizations (conscientiousness, pro-sociality, intelligence, extraversion, emotional stability), fifteen secondary categorizations (earnest/responsibility, aggressive/resistant, perseverant/contienent, sympathetic/altruism, gregariousness/polite, honest/guilt-ridden, intelligent, curosity/creativity, aesthetic, independent/enterprising, sociablity, vigorous, optimistic/active, impatence/stubborn, sensitivity/anxiety) and thirty-five attributes. The descriptive personality construction of pupils was made up of five categorizations which were similar to preschool children, but they had difference in the secondary categorizations. The aesthetic was dismissed in the pupil personality construction, the target orientated/orderliness categorization appeared, and the attributes were also similar to the preschool children.2. From the quantitative research, the personality construction of preschool children was made up of five dimensions and fifteen traits. The intelligence included intelligent, curosity/creativity, aesthetic, independent/enterprising; conscientiousness included earnest/responsibility, aggressive/resistant, perseverant/contienent; pro-sociality encompassed sympathetic/altruism, gregariousness/polite, honest/guilt-ridden; emotional stability encompassed impatence/stubborn, sensitivity/anxiety; extraversion included sociablity, vigorous, optimistic/active.The pupils personality construction also included the same five personality dimensions, but the fifteen traits were not identical. The change was same to the qualitative research.The reliability and validity indexes of the two questionnaires were fine, and they were effective instruments for investigating the personality development of Chinese children.3. Adopt the LGM (Latent Growth Curve Model) and HLM (Hierarchical Linear Model) to analyze the data of longitudinal measurements. Results showed that the personality of preschool children was developing dramatically between 3 and 6 years,and the critical period was 3-4 years, growing continued between 4 and 5 years, but the speed became slow and stable when reaching 5-6 years.Meantime, data from pupils suggested that the conscientiousness dimension developed dramatically with the linear trend, but the other four dimensions all developed quickly at first, then developed slowly, decreasing at last, and the critical period was 6-7 years. The intelligence and extraversion dimension and its traits had the same developing trajectory. Between 6 and 7 years, they developed at the fastest speed. Between7 and 9.5 years, they developed relative quick. The developing speed slow down after 9.5 years. Arriving at 10.5 years, they started decreasing trend(curosity/creativity started decreasing at 10 years, sociablity started decreasing at 11 years); The developing trend of pro-sociality dimension and its traits was similar to the intelligence and extraversion, but it started decreasing after 11 years. The emotional stability dimension and its traits developed at the fastest speed from 6 to 7 years, and developed relative quick from 7 to 8.5 years, but had no significantly difference from 8.5 to 10.5 years, it started decreasing after 10.5 years.Considering the gender distinction of children personality, the outcomes suggested that scores of conscientiousness and pro-sociality dimension of preschool girls were significantly higher than preschool boys at the age of 3, but the developing speed had no difference from 3 to 6 years. To explore the gender distinction of traits further, the developing level of independent/enterprising, earnest/responsibility, aggressive/resistant, perseverant/contienent, sympathetic/altruism, gregariousness/polite of girls were dramatically higher than boys at 3 years, while vigorous of boys were dramatically higher than girls at 3 years,the developing speed all had no gender difference.As pupils, the conscientiousness scores and the growth rate of girls were significantly higher than boys at the age of 6 years. Exploring the developing gender difference of traits,found that the earnest/responsibility and target orientated/orderliness had no gender difference at 6 years,but the growth rate of girls had significantly higher than boys from 6 to 12 years.meanwhile, aggressive/resistant and perseverant/contienent of girls higher than boys at 6 years,but the developing rate had no difference. The other dimensions and its traits had no gender difference in primary phases.