Richard Florida is a researcher and author whose column, Where Do All the Neurotics Live?, appears in today’s Boston Globe. The article offers some interesting insights into the potential “psychogeography” of the United States.
Psychologists have shown that human personalities can be classified along five key dimensions: agreeableness, conscientiousness, extroversion, neuroticism, and openness to experience. And each of these dimensions has been found to affect key life outcomes from life expectancy and divorce to political ideology, job choices and performance, and innovation and creativity.
These are referred to as the “Big Five” personality factors by psychologists and can generally be measured by a test called the NEO-FFI, NEO PI-R, or something along those lines (here’s an online version, but it takes forever to complete). Wikipedia’s description of each of these traits is succinct:
The Big Five factors and their constituent traits can be summarized as follows:
Openness - appreciation for art, emotion, adventure, unusual ideas, imagination, curiosity, and variety of experience.
Conscientiousness - a tendency to show self-discipline, act dutifully, and aim for achievement; planned rather than spontaneous behaviour.
Extraversion - energy, positive emotions, surgency, and the tendency to seek stimulation and the company of others.
Agreeableness - a tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others.
Neuroticism - a tendency to experience unpleasant emotions easily, such as anger, anxiety, depression, or vulnerability; sometimes called emotional instability.
Florida’s findings?
Interestingly, America’s psychogeography lines up reasonably well with its economic geography. Greater Chicago is a center for extroverts and also a leading center for sales professionals. The Midwest, long a center for the manufacturing industry, has a prevalence of conscientious types who work well in a structured, rule-driven environment. The South, and particularly the I-75 corridor, where so much Japanese and German car manufacturing is located, is dominated by agreeable and conscientious types who are both dutiful and work well in teams.
Is this a self-fulfilling prophecy? Do people move to a specific area because it’s full of people like themselves, or are these areas simply full of these kinds of people due to age-old immigration patterns? The research can’t really say, but Florida does make some educated guesses.
The Northeast corridor, including Greater Boston, as well as San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Austin, are home to concentrations of open-to-experience types who are drawn to creative endeavor, innovation, and entrepreneurial start-up companies. While it is hard to identify which came first — was it an initial concentration of personality types that drew industry, or the industry which attracted the personalities? — the overlay is clear.
One of the things interesting to me, and not mentioned in the article, is that the entire West coast is completely absent from representation on the maps. This must be due to lack of data or something, because it’s hard to imagine that California doesn’t have a specific concentration of a certain type of person.
You can view all five maps of the USA’s psychogeography here (PDF).
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5 Responses to “The Psychogeography of the USA” (Pingbacks/trackbacks not shown below)
wordmeister at 12:01 pm on
May 5th, 2008
I’ve always pondered the ‘chicken or the egg’ question in various situations - are people drawn to, or shaped by, their jobs, schools, geographic areas, etc. This doesn’t quite answer the question, but it’s neat to know where to look for a home if I decide to move. 
//The ‘open to experience’ map at the site is different and - as expected - shows huge concentrations in California and New York.//
I find it very interesting that the most “open to experience” seem to concentrate in places I consider as offering fewer varied experiences — farm states like Oklahoma and Nebraska.
These tests are self-rating, which means they are subject to the assumptions of the test-taker. If a person’s “new experience” needs are not being met because they are isolated in a small town, might they rate this higher on the personality assessment? It’s counter-intuitive but it seems like it could work.
By the way, the website Freedom From Fear has designated this week National Depression and Anxiety Awareness Week. I’m posting all week in my blog (with some links to Psych Central) on mood and anxiety disorders. The link is under my name above. I have no affiliation with Freedom From Fear — I found it because I specifically went searching for a “depression awareness week”, since I was interested in doing this series.
Flips at 11:45 am on
May 7th, 2008
Another instance of finding out via Grohol what’s being researched & published by the academics I work for! Thank you for the continued current awareness feed.
Wendy Aron at 1:52 pm on
May 19th, 2008
It would make sense that the most neurotic people would live in big cities where Americans live in close proximity to one another. There’s nothing that sparks anxiety and depression more than knowing you can’t “escape” from your fellow man.
Wendy Aron, author of Hide & Seek:How I Laughed at Depression, Conquered My Fears and Found Happiness
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I’ve always pondered the ‘chicken or the egg’ question in various situations - are people drawn to, or shaped by, their jobs, schools, geographic areas, etc. This doesn’t quite answer the question, but it’s neat to know where to look for a home if I decide to move.
//The ‘open to experience’ map at the site is different and - as expected - shows huge concentrations in California and New York.//
I find it very interesting that the most “open to experience” seem to concentrate in places I consider as offering fewer varied experiences — farm states like Oklahoma and Nebraska.
These tests are self-rating, which means they are subject to the assumptions of the test-taker. If a person’s “new experience” needs are not being met because they are isolated in a small town, might they rate this higher on the personality assessment? It’s counter-intuitive but it seems like it could work.
By the way, the website Freedom From Fear has designated this week National Depression and Anxiety Awareness Week. I’m posting all week in my blog (with some links to Psych Central) on mood and anxiety disorders. The link is under my name above. I have no affiliation with Freedom From Fear — I found it because I specifically went searching for a “depression awareness week”, since I was interested in doing this series.
Another instance of finding out via Grohol what’s being researched & published by the academics I work for! Thank you for the continued current awareness feed.
It would make sense that the most neurotic people would live in big cities where Americans live in close proximity to one another. There’s nothing that sparks anxiety and depression more than knowing you can’t “escape” from your fellow man.
Wendy Aron, author of Hide & Seek:How I Laughed at Depression, Conquered My Fears and Found Happiness
