Results of Psychological Research by International Team from Chile and the United States
A study has found that people considered "cool" around the world share common characteristics. Cool people tend to be extroverted, pleasure-seeking, tough, adventurous, open-minded, and autonomous.
According to CNN on July 4 (local time), these findings were recently published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. An international research team, consisting of scholars from Adolfo Ibanez University in Chile, the University of Arizona, and the University of Georgia in the United States, conducted psychological research from 2018 to 2022 on 6,000 people in 12 countries: Australia, Chile, China, Germany, India, Mexico, Nigeria, Spain, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, and the United States.
Participants were asked to recall people in their lives whom they considered "cool," "uncool," "good," or "not good." They then evaluated these individuals' personalities using the Big Five personality scale and the Schwartz value scale, which are models for categorizing personality traits.
The results showed that people who possessed six characteristics?extroversion, pleasure-seeking, toughness, adventurousness, openness, and autonomy?were classified as "cool people" regardless of country, age, gender, or education level. In contrast, "good people" shared traits such as calmness, conscientiousness, universality, conformity, gentleness, stability, traditionalism, and compliance. This indicates that "good people" and "cool people" are different concepts.
Caleb Warren, an assistant professor at the University of Arizona and one of the lead authors of the paper, said, "To be considered cool, a person usually needs to be somewhat likable or admirable, which is similar to being a good person. However, cool people often possess other traits that are not necessarily considered 'good' in a moral sense, such as being pleasure-seeking or tough."
Todd Pezutti, another lead author and assistant professor at Adolfo Ibanez University, noted that, reflecting these research findings, among celebrities, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, could be classified as a representative "cool person."
He stated, "Musk is a controversial figure, but he possesses all six characteristics." He assessed that Musk is undoubtedly strong and autonomous, and appears extroverted because he frequently appears on social media platforms and in the media. In particular, he explained that Musk's actions, such as smoking marijuana on a podcast or envisioning a 'Mars colony,' demonstrate his pleasure-seeking nature, openness, and adventurousness.
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