Eysenck's Personality Factors Research Articles

The Eysenck personality factors: Psychometric structure, reliability, heritability and phenotypic and genetic correlations with psychological distress in an isolated Croatian population

We report the psychometric structure of a Croatian translation of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised (short-form), its correlations with psychological distress (General Health Questionnaire-30), its heritability, and personality–psychological distress genetic correlations. The setting is a large (≈1000), family-based sample of men and women from an isolated Croatian island. The neuroticism and extraversion traits and the lie scale showed good psychometric characteristics. The translated psychoticism scale was unsatisfactory in this sample. It had a very low internal consistency, probably due in part to heavily biased item responses. There were significant additive genetic contributions to variation in neuroticism, extraversion, and psychological distress. Psychological distress had a very high genetic correlation with neuroticism, and a moderate genetic correlation with extraversion.

A higher-order model of ecological values and its relationship to personality

Questionnaire batteries attempting to quantify ecological attitudes measure first-order factors, each investigator employing his own battery and each battery yielding factors specific to itself. The history of factor-analytic studies of personality demonstrates the severe limitations of this approach and the advantages of higher-order factors. We present a theory encapsulating ecological attitude-sets in two orthogonal higher-order factors: Utilisation (UT) and Preservation (PRE); and relate these to Eysenck's personality factors of Psychoticism (P), Extraversion (E) and Neuroticism (N) and to the associated “fake good” (L) Scale quantifying social desirability response set. Results (corrected for social desirability) are as expected: high P-scorers tend to favour an anthropocentric approach to the environment, high N-scorers a biocentric one. E is unrelated to the ecology factors. The “fake good” (L) component of PRE is strikingly high, while UT is essentially uncontaminated. L permeates responses to varying degrees throughout the questionnaire, demonstrating the necessity of including a measure of social desirability response set in ecological questionnaire batteries. Relationships with Attitude Theory are discussed.

The relationship between Eysenck's personality factors and attitude towards substance use among 13–15-year-olds

A sample of 20,968 13–15-year-old secondary school pupils completed a scale of attitude towards substance use, alongside the short form of the Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. The data demonstrate that rejection of substance use among this age group is associated with tendermindedness, introversion, stability and social conformity.

The relationship between eysenck's personality factors and attitude towards truancy among 13–15 year olds in England and wales

A sample of 12,616 year nine and year ten pupils completed the Short Form Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire together with a question to assess their personal attitude towards truancy. The data demonstrate that 17.1% of the respondents consider truancy to be a perfectly acceptable form of behaviour. The view that there is nothing wrong in truancy is positively correlated with psychoticism scores, positively correlated to a lesser extent with extraversion scores and neuroticism scores, and negatively correlated with Lie scale scores.

The relationship between Eysenck's personality factors and fear of bullying among 13–15 year olds in England and Wales

Abstract A sample of 11,535 Year Nine and Year Ten pupils completed the Short Form Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire together with a question to assess their fear of being bullied at school. Precisely 25% of the respondents admitted to fear of being bullied. Fear of bullying was positively correlated with neuroticism scores and lie scale scores and negatively correlated with psychoticism scores and extraversion scores.

The relationship of Eysenck's personality factors and self-esteem to bully-victim behaviour in Australian schoolboys

In the present study we examined the relevance of selected personality variables, namely Eysenck's factors of extraversion, psychoticism and neuroticism, and the psychological well being factor of self-esteem to the tendency to bully and to be victimized. Male primary school children ( n = 87) with a mean age of 10.9 years completed the Junior Eysenck Personality Inventory and the Coopersmith Self Esteem Inventory. Children's tendency to bully and to be victimized was assessed by means of questionnaire and teacher nomination. As predicted the tendency to bully was found to be significantly associated with psychoticism while the tendency to be victimized was significantly associated with introversion and low self-esteem. The expected association between being victimized and neuroticism was not confirmed.

Eysenck's personality factors and orientation toward authority among schoolchildren

The relationship between Eysenck's personality factors, E (Extraversion), N (Neuroticism), P (Psychoticism) and L (Lie Scale) and general orientation toward authority was examined with 250 secondary school students; orientation was assessed by measures of attitudes towards institutional authorities and self-reported pro-authority behaviour. Significant negative correlations were found between P and the pro-authority measures, whilst nonsignificant correlations were found with E. N was negatively and significantly correlated with pro-authority behaviour, but not with pro-authority attitudes. Relatively high scores on the L scale were associated with pro-authority responses generally. Regression analyses showed that attitude to authority, P, N, and L, each made independent contributions (as indicated by significant beta coefficients) in predicting pro-authority behaviour, and together accounted for 54% of the variance. In general, these results suggest that orientation toward authority is partially explicable in terms of Eysenck's theory of criminality rather than in accordance with his views on the personality bases of either authoritarianism or conservatism.

MMPI derived scales of Eysenck's factors and their relationship to anger and aggression.

This study tested the validity of three recently developed MMPI scales of Eysenck's personality factors, psychoticism, neuroticism, and extraversion. Based on Eysenck's descriptions of subjects who are at the extreme on these factors positive correlations were expected for the three derived scales and measures of anger and aggressive acting out. The expected relationships were found for the psychoticism and neuroticism factors but not for extraversion. Possible reasons for the failure of the extraversion scale to correlate positively with the anger and aggression measures were discussed.

Cattell, Comrey, and Eysenck personality factors compared: More evidence for the five robust factors?

Cattell, Comrey, and Eysenck personality factors compared: More evidence for the five robust factors?

Relationships between the Eysenck personality questionnaire, Strelau temperament inventory and Freiburger beschwerdenliste gesamtform

A correlational and factor analysis was carried out on test scores for the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, Strelau Temperament Inventory and Freiburger Beschwerdenliste Gesamtform. Results suggest a convergence between Eysenck's personality factors and Strelau's questionnaire-based measures of neo-Pavlovian nervous system properties, and provide further evidence of a correspondence between these measures and psychosomatic disease.

MMPI Scales for measuring Eysenck's Personality Factors

Four new MMPI Scales were constructed to identify Eysenck's personality factors of psychoticism, extraversion, and neuroticism as well as a lie score. The scales showed good construct validities against the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire and the Friedman Overlap Scales developed from items in the MMPI. The study also supported the construct validity of the Friedman overlap scales.

Personality, social skills, anomie and delinquency: a self-report study of a group of normal non-delinquent adolescents.

A group of over 200 'normal' adolescents were administered self-report measures of personality (extraversion, neuroticism and psychoticism), social skills, anomie and delinquency in order to establish which of three theories best predicted delinquency. Eysenck's personality factors, particularly psychoticism, correlated most highly with delinquency, while there was no correlation at all between self-reported social skills and delinquency. Overall the males tended to have lower neuroticism but higher psychoticism and anomie scores. The results are discussed in terms of the various psychological theories of delinquency, and the implications of these results for treatment are noted. It was pointed out that because this study was restricted to well-educated, middle class, above-average sixth-form college students the findings may not generalize to a group of convicted or institutionalized offenders. The limitations inherent in self-report measures and in studies of this sort are also considered.

The Factorial Structure of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Among Egyptian Students

Summary The 80-item Eysenck Personality Questionnaire was given to 248 University students at Cairo University in order to study the factorial structure of this scale in Egypt. Principal factor analysis and varimax rotations of the 80 items and total scores of Psychoticism, Extraversion and Neuroticism yielded 10 factors, out of which eight are meaningful. These are: cultural responses, neuroticism, psychoticism, extraversion, physical complaints, paranoid hostility, adjustment, and manifest anxiety-tension. The general trend of the results indicates that Eysenck's personality factors are obtainable in spite of the fact that certain items deviate from the pattern found in the original scale.