Situations usually override individual personality differences in behavior.

Evidence

Let me catch myself before I go off the deep end. I do believe that in many situations it matters a great deal who the people are. Different patterns of genes make a difference. So do different patterns of socialization. After all, Milgram’s subjects were in a strange environment (to put it mildly), interacting with strangers trained to say their lines whatever the subject did. Whereas we usually act in familiar settings with familiar people whose behavior we can affect. But the great lesson of social psychology has been how easily situations trump individual differences. Milgram’s experiment shows us that, and a great deal else very frightening. — Bob Altemeyer, The Authoritarian Specter, 116

Categorization

• DEFINE: Nails the situationist claim that Altemeyer must then carve out space against as he defends the RWA individual-difference construct, which he names in the very next sentence.