The Questionnaire Big Six in 26 Nations: Developing Cross–Culturally Applicable Big Six, Big Five and Big Two Inventories

Abstract

The Big Five is a useful model of attributes now commonly used in cross–cultural research, but without the support of strong measurement invariance (MI) evidence. The Big Six has been proposed as a cross–culturally informed update, and the broader Big Two (Social Self–Regulation and Dynamism) draws on even more cross–cultural evidence. However, neither has been rigorously tested for cross–cultural MI. Here a Big Six inventory (36QB6) and measures of the Big Five and Big Two derived from it were tested and refined for cross–cultural usability in samples from 26 nations, divided into three subsets. Confirmatory factor analysis of the models in the first subset of nations demonstrated fit as strong in translation as typical personality measures achieve in their nation of origin (although poor per standard benchmarks). Items that performed inconsistently across cultures were removed, and alternates considered in a second subset of nations. Fit and invariance were improved for refined 30–item QB6, 25–item Big Five and 14–item Big Two measures in the third subset of nations. For all models, decrease in comparative fit index between MI levels was larger than .01, indicating lack of support for higher levels. Configural and factorial invariance were relatively stronger, compared to scalar and full. Copyright © 2014 European Association of Personality Psychology