Personality Development Collaborative

The Berkeley Longitudinal Study (BLS) is a 23-year longitudinal study of 508 undergraduate students who entered the University of California at Berkeley in 1992. Participants were assessed six times while attending college: during their first week on campus, at the end of the first semester, and then at the end of Years 1, 2, 3, and 4. The sample was subsequently assessed for a seventh time approximately 20 years later (around 2015), when the participants were about 41 years old (N = 248). The BLS focuses on the achievement-related experiences, evaluations, attributions, interests, goals, and motives, with an emphasis on factors that contribute to the development of personality and self-esteem. The 20-year follow-up includes a wider range of variables, including measures of work and family experiences and outcomes. Most of the data are self-report, but there are a number of variables (e.g., SAT scores, high school GPA, cumulative college GPA, attrition) obtained from university records as well as peer ratings of behavior and performance in a group interaction task. The NEO-FFI was administered at the very beginning of college, at the end of the fourth year, and again in the 20-year follow-up, spanning approximately 23 years.

Principal Investigator(s): Dr. Richard W. Robins and Dr. Brent W. Roberts