Half in U.S. don't use their strengths

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WASHINGTON, Sept. 13 (UPI) -- A majority of U.S. adults do not make full use of their strengths on a daily basis, suggesting a possible avenue for improvement, a survey indicates.

The Gallup Daily tracking poll of 5,049 U.S. adults, conducted Aug. 23-27, found 57 percent said they used their strengths for no more than 6 hours each day, but about 25 percent reported they used their strengths at least 10 hours a day.

Women use their strengths for more of the day than men do, with 26 percent saying they use their strengths at least 10 hours a day, compared with 23 percent of men. Overall, women said they used their strengths an average of 7.1 hours each day versus 6.6 hours for men, the study said.

Gallup defined strengths as activities for which one can consistently provide near-perfect performance. People who report they use their strengths to do what they do best have higher self-confidence, hope, altruism, well-being and productivity, Gallup officials said.

For more than a half-century, Gallup studied human strengths and about 7.8 million people have taken Gallup's Clifton Strengths Finder assessment -- which tests for 34 specific unique strengths -- since its inception in 1998.

Those who do not have a high school diploma are less likely than more educated Americans to report using their strengths during the day -- likely reflecting that the jobs available to them are less challenging, with little room for growth. Twenty-nine percent of U.S. adults with less than a high school diploma reported using their strengths for about 3 hours a day.

The poll has a margin of error of 1.2 percentage points.