2/28/2025
Personality and Life Outcomes
• How does personality “matter” in life? Today we’ll • Music preferences
consider several outcomes… • Pet preferences
• Competitive sports
• Longevity • Job performance
• Substance use • Academic performance & ability
• Marital satisfaction
• “Ideal partner” personality
• Adolescent peer relationships
• Criminal arrest
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Personality and Longevity
• But are some personality traits related to the
likelihood of living a longer life (or alternatively,
• Obviously, how long a person lives will depend on to how long people live on average)?
many factors that are unrelated to their personality:
• Maybe some traits are associated with healthier
• Fatal illnesses and fatal injuries happen to people habits (or more adaptive attitudes, or better
regardless of their personalities. social support)…
• which could in turn improve the odds of living a
long life (?)
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• Many researchers have assessed people’s • Jokela et al. (2020): combined results from 10
personality trait levels and then kept track… previous studies, with total of 130K people…
• of whether (and at what age) those people died • (of whom about 8.4K died within the years of follow-
within the following years. up research)…
• Recently, some reviews (“meta-analyses”) have • In each study, researchers had assessed those
combined the results of many such studies, to find people with self-reports on the Big Five factors.
out whether personality relates to longevity.
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• Main finding: people who were very low (bottom 5%) • (However, people who were higher than average in C
in Conscientiousness (C) tended not to live as long… didn’t live any longer than did people who were
average.)
• as did people who were average or high in C.
• Why is low C associated with earlier death, on
• About 6 years shorter life expectancy (or, about 1.5
average?
times more likely to die during study duration)
• Smaller difference, in same direction, for people who
were fairly low (but not very low) in C.
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• Maybe the low-C persons are more likely… • So, apparently the effects of low C are more complex
→ maybe very many (un)healthy behaviours are
• to smoke? to drink too much? to weigh too little or involved.
too much? to be physically inactive?
• Some of the studies measured those variables too. • Advice for low-C people?
• Jokela et al. found that together they were partly
responsible for the shorter lifespans of low-C people… • Try to develop healthy habits (easy ones)—and
maybe find someone who’ll help enforce them (?)
• But only partly (about one-quarter of it).
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Personality and Substance Abuse
• Many studies find that substance use (smoking, • Elkins et al. (2006): obtained anonymous self-reports
drinking, drug use) is related to… of personality and substance use from about 1000 17-
year-olds, and followed up 3 years later.
• lower Conscientiousness and lower Big Five
Emotional Stability (i.e., higher Neuroticism). • Participants who had substance use disorders
(tobacco, alcohol, other drugs) averaged about two-
thirds of an SD unit lower in C than those who didn’t.
• Presumably, higher C → better self-control, and (Also lower in ES, but not as much.)
higher ES (lower N) → less need to use substances
• (Personality at 17 actually predicted substance use
problems at 20, although not strongly.)
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• Costa & Terracciano (2004) obtained personality self- • Cannabis use is apparently related to the same traits
reports from 1600 elderly Americans…
as alcohol and tobacco [nicotine] use are, but maybe
• Those who had never smoked (about half) were higher in C to a lesser extent…
and in ES than those who were still smokers (about 7%) →
more than one-half on SD difference…
• Also, cannabis use is associated with slightly higher
• Those who had quit smoking were about halfway in Openness (Dash et al., 2019; Rash, 2018).
between.
• Suggests that higher C and higher ES helps in avoiding • [See also textbook for gambling disorder and
getting started and also in quitting. personality.]
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Personality and Marital Satisfaction
• But first: Are spouses similar or opposite in
• How does a person’s marital satisfaction relate to… personality? For most characteristics, neither…
• his or her spouse’s personality? • In two recent large-sample studies (Humbad et al.,
2010; McCrae et al., 2008)…
• his or her own personality?
• spouse correlations tended to be positive but very
small: between .00 and .25.
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• Recent research on the HEXACO factors in about 300 • How does personality relate to marital satisfaction?
married couples (Kandler et al., 2019):
• Review of previous studies (Malouff et al., 2010),
• Correlations between spouses’ levels were about .25 based on 19 samples and nearly 4000 people:
for each of Honesty-Humility and Openness, but…
• Close to zero for the other four factors.
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• People tended to be higher in marital satisfaction • Also found by Malouff et al.:
when their spouses had higher (self-report) levels
of… • People tended to be higher in marital satisfaction
when they themselves had higher self-reports of…
• Big Five Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and
Emotional Stability (i.e., low Neuroticism). • Big Five Agreeableness, Extraversion,
Conscientiousness, and Emotional Stability (i.e., low
• Correlations were very small (.10s and .20s), but Neuroticism) →
would be somewhat higher with better
measurement (reliability/validity). • but correlations again weak (around .20 or below).
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• Findings suggest that one’s marital satisfaction partly • One more question: Does similarity (or
depends on being an “easy to please” person… dissimilarity?) of spouses’ personalities predict a
happier marriage?
• And partly also depends on having a spouse who is
actually easy to get along with… • Probably not:
• But personality is only a fairly small part of marital • Malouff et al. found that the difference between
satisfaction → probably depends on lots of other spouses’ levels of a personality trait was unrelated to
variables, including chance circumstances. their marital satisfaction.
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“Ideal Partner” Personality
• (1) On average, do people want their ideal partner
• What personality characteristics do single people to have high or low levels of a given trait?
want in a hypothetical ideal romantic partner?
• E.g., does the typical person want a partner who is
• Liu et al. (2018) examined this question, dividing it high (or average, or low) in Extraversion? In
into two parts… Conscientiousness? etc.
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• (2) Do people’s preferences for an ideal partner’s • Liu et al. (2018) obtained data from single persons
level of a personality trait depend on their OWN (over 200 men and nearly 400 women) in four
levels of that trait? countries…
• (E.g., maybe the higher your level of a trait, the • Asked each participant to provide self-reports on the
HIGHER the level you want in a partner… HEXACO-PI-R and also to provide reports for their
hypothetical ideal romantic partner.
• OR maybe the higher your level of a trait, the LOWER
the level you want in a partner) • Results…
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• (1) On average, people rated their hypothetical ideal • (2) Across all participants, people’s ratings for a
romantic partner as… hypothetical idea partner were positively
correlated with their own self-reports on the
same trait:
• High in Extraversion
• High in Agreeableness • Very high correlations (about .70) for Honesty-
• High in Honesty-Humility Humility and Openness
• Low in Emotionality (mainly anxious aspects)
• Moderately high correlations (about .30 to .50)
for the other four factors
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Personality and Adolescent
Peer Relationships
• Summary: Some traits tend to be desired in a
partner by most people (higher X, higher A, • Researchers who study peer relationships among
higher A, lower in some parts of E)…
adolescents…
• But the people who most want a partner with
• Often obtain ratings of which students are liked (or
high levels of a given trait tend to be those who
disliked) and considered popular (or unpopular) by
themselves have high levels…
their peers.
• Especially for H and for O.
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• How do adolescents’ personalities relate to their • Each adolescent listed (confidentially) each
being considered likeable or popular by their classmate whom they…
peers?
• De Vries et al. (2020): Studied over 500 • liked, disliked, perceived as popular, and perceived
adolescents (about half boys, half girls) aged 12 as unpopular.
to 14 years from two schools (nearly 30
classrooms) in the Netherlands.
• (Could list a given person as both liked [or disliked]
and popular [or unpopular].)
• Each adolescent did a HEXACO-PI-R self-report
and…
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• The typical adolescent was rated… • (Overall likeability score correlated only about .10
with overall popularity score → being liked and
• as “liked” by about one-quarter, being popular are different (though not opposite).)
• as “disliked” by a few percent,
• as “popular” by about one-tenth, • How did adolescents’ personalities relate to how
• as “unpopular” by about one-tenth “likeable” and how “popular” they were?
• For each adolescent, De Vries et al. calculated an
overall likeability score (likes minus dislikes) and an
overall popularity score (populars minus unpopulars).
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• Likeability correlated with higher Agreeableness • Popularity correlated with higher Extraversion (about
(about +.20) and with higher Emotionality (about +.20), lower Honesty-Humility, lower Agreeableness,
+.20)… lower Openness (around -.20 with each)…
• (so, being gentle and sensitive were associated • Some of the most relevant narrow “facet” traits were
with being more liked than disliked). higher social boldness, lower gentleness, lower greed-
avoidance (being more materialistic, status-seeking)…
• (Girls were rated a bit higher than boys on
average in likeability, and also averaged higher in • Which suggests that popular adolescents had rather
Emotionality.) “dominant” personalities.
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Personality and Criminal Arrest
• (Similar to popularity in adulthood? Or different?
Harder to study but would be interesting to
know…) • Samuels et al. (2004): compared current personality
trait levels of…
• Note that personality wasn’t so strongly related
to likeability and popularity: • USA adults previously arrested (N = 79) and…
• A lot of other things matter too (non-personality • USA adults not previously arrested (N = 532).
characteristics, specific social and classroom
dynamics, etc.).
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Personality and Music Preferences
• Compared with non-arrested persons, those arrested • Rentfrow and Gosling (2003) examined the factor
were… structure of people’s music preferences…
• Less compliant, less even-tempered (lower A) • And the personality correlates of the music
• Less careful, more impulsive (lower C) preference factors.
• Less sincere, less modest (lower H)
• Asked 1700 university students to indicate how
• (Differences medium-sized, ≈ 0.5 SD units.) much (on a 1-to-7 scale) they like each of 14 kinds of
music:
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• alternative • rap/hip-hop
• blues • jazz
• classical • pop
• country • religious
• electronica/dance • rock
• folk • soul/funk
• heavy metal • sound tracks
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• Found four factors of music preferences…
• “Upbeat and Conventional”
• “Reflective and Complex” (country, sound tracks, religious, pop)
(blues, jazz, classical, folk)
• “Rhythmic and Energetic”
• “Intense and Rebellious” (rap/hip-hop, soul/funk, electronica/dance, [pop])
(rock, alternative, heavy metal)
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• Also obtained self-reports on Big Five personality • “Reflective and Complex”:
factors from participants (original 1700 plus another • > +.40 with Openness to Experience
sample of 1300).
• Intense and Rebellious:
• Correlations between personality and music • > +.15 with Openness to Experience
preference factors…
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• “Upbeat and Conventional”: • So, some clear links between personality and music
• > +.20 with Agreeableness preferences…
• ≈ +.20 with Extraversion
• > +.15 with Conscientiousness • But personality factors can explain only a fairly small
• ≈ —.10 with Openness to Experience part of music preferences.
• “Rhythmic and Energetic”: • Other sources…?
• ≈ +.20 with Extraversion
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Personality and Pet Preferences:
“dog people” and “cat people”
• (about 46% dog people, about 12% cat people, about
• Gosling et al. (2010): how does personality differ 28% both, about 15% neither)
according to liking of cats and/or of dogs as pets?
• On average, cat people (compared with dog people)
were somewhat…
• Obtained Big Five personality self-reports from over
4500 people (online sample), along with those • higher in Openness and Neuroticism, and
persons’ self-ratings as…
• lower in Extraversion, Agreeableness, and
• cat person, dog person, both, or neither Conscientiousness
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Personality in Competitive
(Varsity) Athletes
• But only modest differences (between one-quarter
and one-half of a standard deviation unit) • Do high-level competitive athletes have different
personality trait levels, on average, from those of
• Differences were found among men and among people in general?
women, so not due to any sex differences in
likelihood of being a cat person or dog person.
• My former Honours thesis student, Tess Palmateer,
• (For most of the traits, the “both” and the “neither” investigated this question in a previous year…
people were in between the cat people and dog
people.)
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• Obtained self-reports on HEXACO-PI-R from 69 male • Results: On average, athletes were…
and 42 female Brock varsity athletes (swimming,
soccer, rugby, hockey, rowing). • Almost 0.5 SD lower in Emotionality
• About 0.25 SD higher in Extraversion
• Compared average scores with those from very large • Almost 0.5 SD higher in Conscientiousness
sample of Brock students in general (mainly non-
athletes) → compared men with men, and women • More than 0.5 SD lower in Openness
with women.
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Personality and Job Performance
• Not enough data to look at differences between • Hurtz and Donovan (2000): meta-analysis of
sports. (Any ideas?) relations between personality and job performance…
• Why do differences emerge? • (Job performance measured by supervisor ratings or
objective records.)
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• Across job categories, Big Five Conscientiousness • “Integrity tests”: Self-report questionnaires used by
predicts job performance (r ≈ .20). some employers for selecting employees…
• (Results for other Big Five depend on type of job or • Some contain questions assessing traits relevant to
aspect of performance → see textbook.) Conscientiousness, Honesty-Humility, etc.
• Some contain questions about previous thefts,
delinquent acts, etc., and attitudes about those acts.
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• Research studies suggest that “integrity tests” • Apparently, integrity tests have some validity, even
predict job performance → though there is considerable “faking” on these tests.
• recent findings indicate modest relation: r ≈.15 in • (Many people “fake good” on the tests, but
Van Iddekinge et al. (2011)… differences in people’s scores still partly reflect real
differences in “integrity”.)
• lower than previous studies had suggested! • Validity for integrity tests (and personality self-
reports generally) would be higher if faking could be
reduced… but not easy to do so.
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Personality and
Academic Outcomes
• Noftle et al. (2006):
• Does personality predict…
• Obtained GPA data (university and high school) from
• academic performance (i.e., GPA)? >450 university students…
• academic skills (i.e., general verbal or math ability) • Along with SAT scores (verbal and math), and
HEXACO-PI scores (all six factors).
• Results:
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• GPA was predicted by Conscientiousness (r = .20 • SAT Verbal was predicted by Openness (r = .26)…
univ, r = .26 HS)…
• but not by other factors (even Conscientiousness).
• but not by other factors (even Openness).
• Apparently, being curious and creative contributes to
• Apparently, being thorough and self-disciplined word knowledge and comprehension…
contributes to school success…
• But being thorough and self-disciplined doesn’t.
• But being curious and creative doesn’t.
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• SAT Math not predicted by any personality factors →
• apparently, personality doesn’t influence aptitude
for math reasoning.
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