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Prologue the study of psychology
An essay on human psychology
Prologue the study of psychology
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Personality and the Five Factor Model Zubair Shabbir November 28, 2017 Fordham University Foundations of Psychology: Nestor Personality is massive part of an individual’s identity. Our personalities dictate our patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting. An individual’s personality exposes them to predispositions and habits that influence their actions and lives. Early on, personality assessments consisted of physical features ranging from head shape and facial characteristics to body type. In today’s world, personality assessments are mainly based around traits. Traits are simply descriptions of one’s habitual patterns of behavior, thought and emotion. The most popular personality assessment is the Five-Factor Model, also known as The Big Five. This model allows us to describe people based on the five main traits/dimensions. These traits are extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. Each of these five traits measures a different aspect of one’s personality. Extraversion is based on one’s level of engagement with the world, …show more content…
(1997). McRae et al. (1997) attempted to find if the Five-Factor Model was a universal constant in all cultures. They also attempted to see if cultural views would change how the five traits were viewed. The researchers collected data from 6 different translations of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory, this inventory looks for universal trait dimensions in a variety of languages. These 6 translations were then compared to the American counterpart. It was found that while some cultures did differ slightly in their view of the five traits found in the Five-Factor Model in comparison to Americans, the traits were still universal. All six translations found the big five traits of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and opens to experience to be
The “Big Five” factors are today one of the most-used scales for measuring personality; these factors are conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness, and extraversion. However, despite the widespread use of this scale, it is still debated whether or not it, or any personality test, can truly offer a complete picture of a person. To test this, I will use one of my best friends, Amanda, as an example.
To begin, the Big-Five traits of the Five Factor Model of Personality are each unique in their own way and offer hints or clues into an individual’s personality. The Big-Five traits can be easily remembered by using the acronym O.C.E.A.N. O represents the trait openness, C represents conscientiousness, E represents extraversion, A represents agreeableness, and last, but not least, N represents neuroticism. Openness is a trait that is characterized by a multitude of positive components. For example, individuals who score high in the trait openness often tend to be imaginative, creative, intelligent, broad-minded, and curious. They are likely to be more motivated, and they enjoy pursuing diverse and new experiences. Individuals high in openness are also more likely to be proactive meaning they actively seek more challenging and complex opportunities (Choi, Colbert, & Oh, 2015). Low scorers of openness are more practical, conventional, narrow-minded, and tend to avoid new experiences. The next trait, Conscientiousness, is a trait which is characterized by more efficient elements. For instance, individuals who score high in
The Big Five is currently the most accepted personality model in the scientific community. The Big Five emerged from the work of multiple independent scientists/researchers starting in the 1950s who using different techniques obtained similar results. Those results were that there are five distinct personality traits/dimensions. Here are your results on each dimension:
Personality is defined as a person's differences to another in regards to their patterns of behavior, thinking, and emotional responses (American Psychological Association). The Big Five Personality Traits are Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism, or OCEAN for short. Openness is essentially correlated to exploring new things. The people that have high levels of this trait are generally more apt to do things like try different types of food, be more creative, and have the ability to tackle challenging problems. People who are low on this trait generally have a dislike for change, tend to not enjoy trying new things, and are generally more traditional in a sense..
These scales are commonly alternatively represented by the OCEAN acronym Openness to experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion/Introversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism. The Big Five structure captures, at a broad level of abstraction, commonalities among most of the existing systems of personality description, and provides an integrative descriptive model for personality research. (Oliver& Sanjay 1999)
five factor theory is a fairly recent proposal and has its basis in earlier work,
Brunner explains, the Big Five personality dimensions are: 1) Neuroticism—level of stability versus instability, 2) Extraversion—tendency to be assertive, sociable, and energetic 3) Openness—disposition to be curious, open to new situations, and imaginative, 4) Agreeableness—disposition to be cooperative, supportive, trusting and 5) Conscientiousness—disposition toward purposeful, determined, and goal-directed behavior. These factors are dimensions, not types, so people vary continuously on them with most people falling in between the extremes. McRae and John claim that the Big Five is not a complete theory of personality...too few factors. Many have argued that five factors are insufficient to summarize all that we know about individual differences in
Personality Theories The Big Five Approach plays a major role in the process of understanding and analyzing a child’s outcome, as well as any adjustment issues that may occur during a child’s development. Along with these accomplishments, the Big Five approach has proven to be able to cover children, adolescents, and adults under one spectrum (Van den Akker et al., 2013). The article, “The development of personality extremity from childhood to adolescence: relations to internalizing and externalizing problems” provides an intense amount of information on personality theories and goes into depth about how personalities develop and how to distinguish between them as well. This study not only incorporated the study of personality extremity throughout childhood and adolescence, but the issues between personality extremities and personality adjustments as well (Van den Akker et al., 2013).
Later research attempted to reduce Cattell’s sixteen “source traits” to five universal personality dimensions resulting in what is now known as “The Big Five Personality Factors.” (Costa & McCrae, 2006; Noftle & Fleeson, 2010)
McCrae, R. R., & Allik, I. U. (2002). The five-factor model of personality across cultures. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.
The five-factor model includes five broad domains or dimensions of personality that are used to describe human personality. The five factors are openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. While these five traits should be sufficient on their own to describe all facets of a personality, there also should be no correlation between the main factors. The Five Factor Model is now perhaps the most widely use trait theory of personality and has achieved the closest thing to a consensus in personality research. The advantage of this theory is that there have been multiple research studies conducted on this theory. Results suggest that this theory is effective in describing and determining personality. However, this theory is very categorical and does not allow for much flexibility. It also looks at the person personality at that time and now how it developed.
The second major theory is called the trait or five-factor model. Often referred to as the "Big 5". The five personality traits described by the theory are extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness and neuroticism. Beneath each proposed global factor, a number of correlated and more specific primary factors are claimed. One strength of the trait perspectives is their ability to categorize observable behaviors. In other words, observing the behaviors of an individual over time and in varying circumstances provides evidence for the personality traits categorized in trait theories. Another strength is that trait theories use
The five traits that make up the Big Five Theory are Extraversion, Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness to Experience. Extraversion is linked to the habit of experiencing positive emotions. The category of extraversion includes assertiveness, talkativeness and sociability. Neuroticism is linked to the habit of experiencing negative emotions. Extraversion includes feelings of anxiety, self-consciousness, and irritability. Having low self-esteem would give you a high score in Extraversion in a personality test. Agreeableness is one’s care towards another, their concern for their needs, wishes, and rights. If a person is high in Agreeableness they would be polite and compassionate, if they are low in Agreeableness they would be unsympathetic and possibly aggressive. If a person is Agreeable, they cherish a good understanding of others emotions and what people seek out to do in their lives. Conscientiousness is the ability to conform to rules and self-efficiency. Conscientious people are self-disciplined, keep things in order, and don’t get distracted and keep themselves on track with their goals. Openness includes traits such as imagination, intellectual engagement, and aesthetic interest (Deyoung, 2010). Open people are appreciative of adventure, emotion, curiosity, unusual ideas, art and
McCrae RR, Costa PT., Jr . Toward a new generation of personality theories: Theoretical contexts for the five-factor model. In: Wiggins JS, editor. The five-factor model of personality. New York: Guilford; 1996. pp. 51–87.
The Five-Factor Model of Personality is a system used in order to describe an individual’s personality traits. By requiring said individual to answer a series of questions, this test is able to decipher the traits that are most likely evident within their life. The Five-Factor Model of Personality test gives the test subject a series of situational options. Using the subject’s responses, psychologist match the answers to the personality in which best relates. A highly accurate description of ones’ personality can be easily configured by using the Five-Factor Model of Personality by testing either high or low in the following areas; openness to experience, extraversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and neuroticism.