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Christopher Soto

@cjsotomatic.bsky.social
731 followers 94 following 17 posts

Personality psychologist at Colby College. I study the structure, assessment, development, and outcomes of personality traits and socio-emotional skills.

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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
2/2. Link to the full paper: osf.io/preprints/ps... @madisonsewell.bsky.social @tommasoferaco.bsky.social @bwroberts.bsky.social ts.bsky.social @apajournals.bsky.social
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
1/2. New paper in press in American Psychologist! Our Cumulative Practice Model proposes a pathway to intentional personality change: developing social, emotional, and behavioral skills through cycles of deliberate practice and feedback, without necessarily changing basic traits.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
Thanks, Jin!
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 09/05/2025
Why must you always taunt us, Brent. Why?!
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
5/5 The full paper is freely available here: osf.io/preprints/os...
osf.io
OSF
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
4/5 Key finding #3: Kids whose skills increased over time also experienced positive life outcomes, including better academic engagement, friendship quality, and well-being. So skill changes matter for adolescents' success.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
3/5 Key finding #2: Most Big Five personality traits did *not* show mean-level change or individual differences in change. So it seems easier for skills to change than traits.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
2/5 Key finding #1: There were significant individual differences in change for all five skill domains: self-management, social engagement, cooperation, emotional resilience, and innovation skills. So some kids increased over time, while others decreased.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
1/5 New paper! How do adolescents' personality traits and skills change across a school year? And how are these changes linked with academics, social relationships, and well-being? New paper led by Christopher Napolitano in press at EJP. Brief highlights in the thread below...
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Reposted by Christopher Soto
Michael Inzlicht @handle.invalid · 18/12/2024
Stereotype threat: a once-dominant idea in social psychology that shaped how we think about identity and performance. But what happens when the evidence crumbles? A deep dive into the failed replications, the myths, and what it all means. Read my latest essay: open.substack.com/pub/michaeli...
open.substack.com
Revisiting Stereotype Threat
A Reckoning for Social Psychology
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Reposted by Christopher Soto
Whitney Ringwald @whitneyringwald.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
So excited to share our new paper! We wondered whether misalignment between how youth think they are capable of acting (social, emotional, behavioral skills) and how they typically act (personality traits) matters for life outcomes. If you’re curious too, check out the preprint!
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
4/ Bottom line: Success in adolescence isn't just about sticking to your personality. Social, emotional, and behavioral skills can help kids adapt and thrive, even when stepping out of their comfort zone. Want to know more? Check out the full paper! osf.io/d2z5b/downlo...
osf.io
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
3/ A couple examples: * High cooperation and emotional resilience skills helped counteract low trait agreeableness and emotional stability in managing friendships. * High innovation skills (like creativity and cultural competence) outweighed trait open-mindedness in predicting multiple outcomes.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
2/ Traits = what you *tend to do* on average. Skills = what you *can do* when needed. They're not always perfectly aligned, and mismatches matter. Adolescents with higher skills than traits--who can "rise to the occasion"--fared better across academic, social, and emotional domains.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
1/ New paper! How do personality traits (like the Big Five) and skills (like social engagement and emotional resilience) shape success? What happens when traits and skills don't match up with each other? Led by @whitneyringwald.bsky.social, accepted at the European Journal of Personality.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
At what sample size do correlations stabilize?
Sample correlations converge to the population value with increasing sample size, but the estimates are often inaccurate in small samples. In this rep…
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Yeah, one helpful outcome of all the replication work is a clearer understanding of how much data you need to get robust estimates.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Individual correlations stabilize around 250 participants. For multivariate stuff like factor analysis, you’d want an extra buffer, so I’d recommend 400 to 500.
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Christopher Soto @cjsotomatic.bsky.social · 04/04/2024
How are the Big Five personality traits like skills? How are they different? The slides from my keynote address at the 2024 World Conference on Personality are available at osf.io/tyez7/
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Reposted by Christopher Soto
Julia M. Rohrer @dingdingpeng.the100.ci · 10/01/2024
New blog post in which I discuss measurement invariance from a causal perspective. Come for the amateurish featured image (who needs photoshop anyway), stay for fancy Pooh as figure label. Bonus: You'll finally understand the different levels of invariance (I hope). www.the100.ci/2024/01/10/a...
the100.ci
A casual but causal take on measurement invariance
Testing for measurement invariance is one of those things where researchers roughly fall into two categories. Either they consider it an incomprehensible and arcane practice that only nerds could ever...
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