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Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence: Relationship with Personality, Prosociality and Well-Being

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Abstract

Appreciation of beauty and excellence (ABE) is one of the least studied character strengths. Therefore, this study aims at advancing the knowledge in this area by (1) developing a scale that measures the three categories of appreciation (i.e., beauty, moral excellence, and non-moral excellence), (2) assessing many of its psychometric properties, and (3) examining the relationship of ABE with personality, prosociality, and well-being. In Study 1, we create and assess an initial set of items measuring ABE. In Study 2, we examine the dimensionality of ABE, and test the internal consistency and validity of the scale. Moreover, we assess the relationships between ABE and personality, prosociality and well-being. In Study 3, we test the temporal stability of the scale. Results revealed that a three-dimensional model of ABE showed the best fit to the data. The scale showed good validity (construct, factorial, incremental) and reliability (internal and temporal). Finally, ABE yielded positive associations with prosociality and well-being, and demonstrated to be more than a linear combination of the Big Five factors of personality.

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Notes

  1. Although the goal was to select fewer items for the final scale, we wanted to test again these 15 items in an independent sample before deciding which items to retain.

  2. Parallel analysis suggested retaining one factor. However, as we were especially driven by the theory and this study represents a first step, we did not want to exclude the possibility of the three-factor model, provided that Study 2 yielded good fit indices. Therefore, we decided to keep the theoretical three-dimensional model, and test the factor structure again with confirmatory factor analysis in a larger sample (Study 2).

  3. Instructions available upon request.

  4. Univariate and multivariate normality were fulfilled. A CFA with polychoric correlations yielded similar results.

  5. Both the Purpose in Life Test (Crumbaugh and Maholick 1964) and the Social Desirability Scale (Crowne and Marlowe 1960) were parceled following Little et al. (2002) recommendations to obtain an adequate number of observable variables in the CFA. After testing both constructs’ unidimensionality, three parcels were created in each measure using the item-to-construct-balance method.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Personality, Assessment and Clinical Psychology, Complutense University of Madrid, 28223, Pozuelo de Alarcón, Spain

    María Luisa Martínez-Martí & María Dolores Avia

  2. Department of Methodology of Behavioral Sciences, Complutense University of Madrid, 28223, Pozuelo de Alarcón, Spain

    María José Hernández-Lloreda

Authors
  1. María Luisa Martínez-Martí
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  2. María José Hernández-Lloreda
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  3. María Dolores Avia
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Correspondence to María Luisa Martínez-Martí.

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Martínez-Martí, M.L., Hernández-Lloreda, M.J. & Avia, M.D. Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence: Relationship with Personality, Prosociality and Well-Being. J Happiness Stud 17, 2613–2634 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-015-9709-6

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