Evidence for a behaviourally measurable perseverance trait

Abstract

The aim of this exploratory study was to create a behavioural measure for trait(s) that reflect the ability and motivation to continue an unpleasant behaviour, i.e. perseverance or persistence, and to measure its correlates to several variables. We utilised six different tasks with 54 subjects to measure the perseverance-trait: cold pressor task, hand grip endurance task, impossible anagram task, impossible verbal reasoning task, thread and needle task and boring video task. According to our results, the task performances formed two perseverance factors that could be roughly described as "physical" and "mental" perseverance. Together, the two-factor solution is responsible for the common variance constituting 37.3 % of the total variance in the performances i.e. performance times. Excluding the impossible anagram task, the performance in any given task was better explained by performances in the other tasks (i.e. "trait", {eta}2 range = 0.131-0.253) than by rank order variable ("depletion", i.e. getting tired from the previous tasks, {eta}2 range = 0-0.096). HighlightsO_LIBehavioural perseverance of individuals can be measured behaviourally C_LIO_LIBehavioural perseverance forms a two-factor structure C_LIO_LIPerseverance trait is better predictor of performance than depletion of individuals personal resources in a task C_LI