Personality in Gender

Student ID: 146129

Tutor Name:
Due: 22/09/2014
Page Limit: 4 + References + Abstract + Title

The aim of this study was to determine whether there is a correlation between personality
traits of women and men and if so, determine which traits are more prominent in each sex. It was
hypothesized that women and men would possess drastically different personality traits. Of the
five traits known as the big five (neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness and
conscientiousness), neuroticism and extraversion were predicted to be higher in women, while
conscientiousness was predicted to be higher in men. 263 participants (166 of which were
females) participated in a survey utilizing the Hexico inventory designed to rank a participants
personality trait to their sex. It was found that the participants of the survey responded as
expected to the survey questions with neuroticism but not the other traits the results may have
been influenced by the expectations of the social group.

It is theorized that there is a relationship between gender and personality fueled by

popular media emphasizing the sexs major roles in society, but is this true? Personality may be
defined as psychological qualities which contribute to an individuals distinct character,
including their patterns of feeling, thinking and behaving (Judge, T. A., Bono, J. E. 2000).
Costa and McCrae (1992) put forth a theory of personality that utilized five basic dimensions of
personality traits which were extraversion, neuroticism, openness, agreeableness and
conscientiousness (McCrae & John, 1991). These five traits of personality are labeled the big
five. Studies by Weisberg (2011) revealed notable differences between male and female results
when measuring the big five standards of personality. Results showed females scored
significantly higher than men in Neuroticism. Weisberg (2011) also found that subsets of
Extraversion, Openness, and Conscientiousness displayed little diversion, showing only small
differences in the scores compared to neuroticism which was higher in women (Weisberg, J. Y.,
DeYoung, C. G., Hirsh, J. B. 2011). The findings of Weisberg (2001) are disputed by Paul
(2001) who studied gender roles and resultant personalities across cultures. Pauls findings
suggested that peoples personality varied greatly across different cultures and supports the
theory that culture dictates personality. To highlight the dispute this theory places on gender
roles and the predicted outcome of the studies, Pauls initial line of enquiry found almost all
participants responded that they would be high in Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Warmth and
Openness to Feelings for women, or Assertiveness and Openness to Ideas for men (Paul T.,
Costa P. T. Jr., Terracciano, A., McCrae, R. R. 2001).
In some studies, a sixth factor is sometimes included (warmth) which acts to measure
how likable a person is in social terms and is used as a subset to extroversion. A similar study

made by Paul (2001) showed women to have a higher level of warmth to men in general despite
his initial findings of variety in personality traits across cultures.
Neuroticism, which scored high in females in most studies, is defined as the tendency to
be anxious, fearful, depressed and moody by Judge and Bono (2000). Extraversion, which did
not show diversion, is summarized to include warmth, assertiveness, gregariousness, excitementseeking, positive emotions and activity as its sub-sets by Laurie Buchanan (1998) (Buchanan, L.
B. 1998). Openness is described to reflect a persons imagination, intellect and creativity which is
defined as the ability to process complex information by Yanna (2001). Yanna (2001) also
describes agreeableness as the subjects relation to empathy and kindness, and conscientiousness
as the ability to organize and keep self-control especially in terms of self-discipline and
maintaining goals.
All subsets of the big fives factors can be measured independently or as a part of the
parent factor allowing more detailed analysis. In many cases such as with Paul (2001), these subfactors can be measured and evaluated to reveal a higher level of detail.
METHOD
Participants:
The sample consisted of 263 (166 Females) psychology-B students from the Hobart
campus of the University of Tasmania. All participants were between the ages of 17 and 64 years
old and were required to participate as a course requirement. The participants had a mean age of
24.23 years and a SD of 8.8 years.
Materials:

The state component of the Hexaco Personality Inventory (Hexaco-60) is used to measure
a participants personality and consisted of 60 questions measured on a five point Likert scale
ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). A release form was offered explaining
the privacy terms and agreements offered by the study.
Procedure:
The participants were informed of the general aim of the study and a release form was
required to be read and agreed to before continuing. The participants were asked a series of
questions about their personal feelings relating to the subject of the survey and were asked to rate
how strongly they agreed with the survey statements. The given answers were grouped and
marked according to the DASS and Hexaco model into relevant fields and the irrelevant answers
were ignored.
Results
See table 1 for the data gathered from the study including the mean, standard deviation
and correlation between the traits and sex. The results suggested a high positive correlation
between neuroticism and females, against men, r=1.12, and a non-significant correlation, for the
remaining four traits (extraversion, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness) and the
participants gender, r={-.24, .23, -.14, .01} respectively.
Discussion
The results support the hypothesis that neuroticism has a positive correlation with
females verses males, and is contrasted with the insignificant correlation the participants sex had
with the remaining four traits of personality. The lack of differences in extraversion, openness,
agreeableness and conscientiousness between men and women are contradictory to the predicted

results as strong personality differences were expected. Pauls (2001) studies into cultural norms
in personality reveal that such a result is plausible in cultures that idealize gender equality as
people conform to the belief that males and females hold the same role in society. A corollary to
this is that a standard personality test taken in two separate countries might yield different results
due to cultural differences. A study made by Weisberg (2001) was carried out on mostly
Canadian participants with a small portion originating from other rural areas and found similar
personality patterns to those found here. It is possible that Australian university students possess
the same cultural traits for their gender as Canadians due to similar social and cultural
expectations. A second possible reason that the expected result was achieved may be because a
person usually conforms to social norms. In a group, a person (man or woman) would adhere to
the groups decision and norms rather than their own. An example is in a common social
dilemma wherein, if a group of people surround an injured person, no one helps until someone in
the group tries to help. In the same way it is possible that the participants of the survey may have
conformed to social norms knowing others in the survey would do the same.

Buchanan, L. B. (1998). The Impact of Big Five Personality Charecteristics on Group

Cohesion and Creative Task Performance, Blacksburg, Virginia.
Costa, P. T. Jr., &McCrae, R. R. (1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PLR) and NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) professional manual. Odessa, PL
Farrar, C., Green. P. D., Green, J. E., Nickerson, D. W., Shewfelt, S. (2009). Does
Discussion Group Composition Affect Policy Preferences? Results from Three Randomized
Experiments. political psychology, 30, 4.
Judge, T. A., Bono, J. E. (2000). Five-Factor Model of Personality and Transformational
Leadership. Journal of Applied Psychology, 35, 5, 751-765.
McCrae, R. R., & John, O. P. (1992). An introduction to the five-factor model and its
applications. Journal of Personality. 2. 175-215.
Paul T., Costa P. T. Jr., Terracciano, A., McCrae, R. R. (2001) Gender Differences in
Personality Traits Across Cultures: Robust and Surprising Findings, Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 81, 2, 322-331.
Watson, D., Wiese, D., Vaidya, J., & Tellegan, A. (1999). The two general activation
systems of affect: Structural findings, evolutionary considerations, and psychological evidence.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76, 820-838.
Weisberg, Y. J., DeYoung, C. G., Hirsh, J. B. (2011) Gender differences in personality
across the ten aspects of the Big Five, Psychology, 2, 178.

Table 1
Correlation Between Gender and Personality
Measure

Neuroticism

d. value

1.12

Male (mean) 27.87

Female (mean)
Male (SD)

Extraversion openness
-.24
33.36

34.06

agreeableness conscientiousness

.23
31.13

31.85

-.14
34.07

32.45

.01
34.34

33.11

34.40

5.55

6.28

5.90

6.76

5.83

Female (SD) 5.47

6.46

5.41

6.76

5.73

Note: *p<.05