TheRedArchive

~ archived since 2018 ~

What’s the single most important personality trait if you want to live a long life?

Eric Barker
June 4, 2012

Conscientiousness.

Via The Longevity Project: Surprising Discoveries for Health and Long Life from the Landmark Eight-Decade Study

Conscientiousness, which was the best predictor of longevity when measured in childhood, also turned out to be the best personality predictor of long life when measured in adulthood.

And:

By the end of the twentieth century, 70 percent of the Terman men and 51 percent of the Terman women had died. It was the unconscientious among them who had been dying in especially large numbers.

Truly fascinating: after a heart attack conscientious people were not only more likely to recover because they were better about taking their meds but conscientiousness was a better predictor of improvement than the medication itself.

Conscientious people who took placebo did better than the less conscientious who got the real medication:

Most interesting to us, however, was that the conscientious patients (the good adherers) were much more likely to survive whether they were on the Propranolol medication or on the placebo. Being conscientious enoughâ adherent enoughâ to fully cooperate with treatment, even if with a placebo, emerged as a more important predictor of mortality risk than the medication itself.

Interesting side note: Conscientiousness is also the trait most associated with long, happy marriages.

TheRedArchive is an archive of Red Pill content, including various subreddits and blogs. This post has been archived from the blog bakadesuyo.

bakadesuyo archive

Download the post

Want to save the post for offline use on your device? Choose one of the download options below:

Post Information
Title What’s the single most important personality trait if you want to live a long life?
Author Eric Barker
Date June 4, 2012 7:44 PM UTC (11 years ago)
Blog bakadesuyo
Archive Link https://theredarchive.com/blog/bakadesuyo/whats-the-single-most-important-personality-trait.14148
https://theredarchive.com/blog/14148
Original Link https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2012/06/whats-the-single-most-important-personality-t/
You can kill a man, but you can't kill an idea.

© TheRedArchive 2024. All rights reserved.
created by /u/dream-hunter