Cool may seem a subjective phenomenon, a thing that tends to change according to age, place or subculture. However, a huge cross-cultural study established that individuals in most diverse nations are likely to use the identical pattern of personality when they describe a personality as cool.
Another misunderstanding that is also demystified by the work is that coolness is not goodness. It was found that participants were reliable in drawing the distinction between social appeal and status and moral approval even in cases where certain traits were similar.
1. Extroverted energy
Cool people were always seen as being more extraverted across countries. Practically, such perception is projected onto visibility: being socially aggressive, interacting with others quite effortlessly, and occupying space in a manner that signifies being self-assured, not timid. This is important since cool tends to be a shortcut to the status communication, and extroversion can bring such communication nearer to attention. This research design was based on perceptions- the subjects were rated on real individuals in their lives hence the result represents the manner in which ordinary observers encode social behavior into a coolness category.
2. Hedonic, self-focused pleasure
The very fact that coolness was more hedonistic and partly because this is not necessarily a virtue. The study differentiates this with being good which respondents associated with being steady and responsible. Socially, hedonism might manifest itself by being fun-loving, novelty-seeking, and enjoyment-seeking, and seem to be indifferent to normative demands. The outcome aids in understanding why one person may be so popular due to their magnetism and the way of life and at the same time may be perceived as less reliable and/or morally harder to classify.
3. Power and presence
People who were cool were seen as a stronger person. Power in this case is not a title, it is the perceived influence, ability and influence on a room. It is interesting to note that other reports of the study related cool to status signs including: dominance, visibility, attention, through remarks by an APA psychologist, Mitch Prinstein in an interview on popularity and status.
The same framing applies to the larger implication of the study, which is that coolness can influence social hierarchies since it leads to those who appear capable of leading, influencing, or dictating direction, even informally.
4. Adventurous risk tolerance
Coolness was also associated with being more adventurous by the participants. This characteristic is an indicator of readiness to experiment, travel, take social risks, which others do not have. It may be interpreted as bold, however, it may be interpreted as disruptive, and here is one reason why coolness can be said to be a little polarizing, which is how co-lead researcher Todd Pezzuti has referred to in more general discussion regarding the work. This uniform cross-country trend indicates that risk-taking has become a very legible indicator of cultural momentum: the first mover, the first actor, and the first one to withstand uncertainty.
5. Openness to new experiences
Coolness trailed behind the more openness, consistency with curiosity, innovativeness, and comfort with new ideas. Participants in the study painted a clear picture between coolness and the qualities which they applied to good which are that they are more traditional and being a conformist. This difference is important in contemporary social life since openness tends to make visible what is new, that is, new music, new aesthetics, new ways of speaking, and visibility nourishes coolness. This trend also lends credence to the argument presented by the researchers that the coolness is associated with cultural change and not likability.
6. Autonomy and self-direction
Cool individuals were seen as more independent: more self-governing, less group-dependent, and more comfortable to take their own direction. In its experiments, which were carried out between 2018 and 2022, 5 943 respondents in 13 Countries indicated that autonomy remained a steady indicator, implying that there is a uniform international concept of what independence is, which is socially compelling. The authors of the work also observe that global fashion, music, and film have contributed to the fact that coolness has become crystallized into familiar cues across borders, which was summarized in the course of the research. Autonomy can be one of the simplest signals to export since it is an easy to read: the individual who appears to report to himself/ herself.
All these characteristics define a social group constructed around influence, newness, and self-driven velocity not coziness, caution, or conformity. The identical study established that agreeable, conscientious, calm, traditional and secure were more apt to be attributed to good people. That division aids in understanding a well-known social conflict: the individual whom people feel to be most attractive is not necessarily the one whom people can trust the most. Coolness and goodness may coincide, but the data show they remain significant distinct in the way in which they are recognized by people.
