Development of Personality: The Big 5 Personality Traits

“Personality is the integration of characteristics acquired or brought by birth which separate the individual from others”. (O. Ozdemir) From the moment that a child is able to perceive the actions of their surroundings, they begin to develop their own individual personality. While scientists debate how many personality traits exist to makeup one’s own personality, there are “two major models of personality – [the] Big Three and [the] Big Five”. While separate, both models share the same premise of explaining the key parts of every person’s personality by using broad and lower order traits. “The broad traits… represent the most general dimensions of individual differences in personality; at successively lower levels are more specific traits… that, in turn, are composed of more specific responses”. As a child evolves into being an adult, they develop five distinct broad personality traits: “extraversion/positive emotionality, neuroticism/negative emotionality, conscientiousness/constraint, agreeableness and openness-to-experience/intellect”.

One of the common broad order traits between the big three and the big five model is extraversion (or positive emotionality). Recent studies have pinpointed three main aspects of extraversion. Fleeson et al. (2002) identified the disposition to experience recurrent happiness, Lucas et al. (2000) identified the vulnerability to possible rewards, and Ashton et al. (2002) identified the proclivity to elicit and adore social attention. “Extraversion/Positive Emotionality (PEM) encompasses at least four lower-order traits: social inhibition or shyness, sociability, dominance, and energy/activity level“. In totality, extraversion is simply the dominant trait in outgoing and sociable people. It is shared between the big five and the big three model because it encompasses the sociability, as well as the positive emotions, of an individual. While other broad order traits can be combined into a single one, extraversion is simply its own individual trait and everyone has it (either in high or low levels).

The second common broad order trait between the big five and the big three model is neuroticism, or negative emotionality. “Children and adults who are high on Neuroticism/Negative Emotionality (NEM) are anxious, vulnerable to stress, guilt-prone, lacking in confidence, moody, angry, easily frustrated, and insecure in relationships; individuals low on this trait are emotionally stable and adaptable”. While scientists speculate why a person develops high levels of neuroticism, it is believed that it may be due to a person’s need to shield themselves from harmful situations. Therefore, adults tend to have higher levels of neuroticism than children due to their higher levels of exposure to outside sources. In terms of lower order traits, “neuroticism/NEM includes both anxious (or fearful) distress and irritable distress”. Depending on a person’s background, they may have higher levels of anxious/irritable distress. Overall though, the commonality of neuroticism, or negative emotionality, results in it being a heavily studied trait and allows it to be on multiple personality models.

The third common broad order trait between the big five and the big three model is conscientiousness/constraint. “Conscientious individuals are responsible, attentive, careful, persistent, orderly, and planful; those low on this trait are irresponsible, unreliable, careless, and distractible”. Similarly to extraversion and neuroticism, conscientiousness differs amongst children and adults. Since children are growing and learning individuals, their ability to have a good conscience is expected to be lower than an adult’s. Nonetheless, “conscientiousness/constraint includes at least six lower-order traits: self-control versus behavioral impulsivity, attention, achievement motivation, orderliness, responsibility, and conventionality”. Due to the fact that conscientiousness is a trait that simply isn’t like any other, it is on multiple broad order trait models.

The fourth trait on the big five personality model is agreeableness. “Agreeable individuals are cooperative, considerate, [empathetic], generous, polite, and kind. Disagreeable individuals are aggressive, rude, spiteful, stubborn, cynical, and manipulative”. The lower order traits that are associated with agreeableness are “antagonism and prosocial tendencies”. Similarly to the other broad order traits in the big five model, agreeableness is an evolutionary trait. Depending on one’s childhood, they may be more or less agreeable. Since “agreeableness is associated with both neuroticism and conscientiousness” though, it is left out of the big three model. Nonetheless, it is a prevalent personality trait amongst individuals and can determine what type of person they may evolve into.

The final trait in the big five model is openness-to-experience/intellect. “Openness-to-Experience/Intellect is the most debated and least understood of the Big Five traits, yet it includes a number of potentially important traits”. Due to it being such a mysterious yet obvious trait, there are no lower order traits. It is instead made up of two parts: openness-to-experience and intellect. “[It] does not appear in temperament models, despite the fact that parents often use words from this domain of individual differences to describe their children”. It is left out of the big three model due to the fact that it can be grouped with extraversion and agreeableness.

As an individual advances with age, they develop five distinct broad personality traits. From the big five model, “extraversion/positive emotionality, neuroticism/negative emotionality, conscientiousness/constraint, agreeableness and openness-to-experience/intellect” come together to form a personality. While only extraversion, neuroticism, and conscientiousness are on both the big three and big five models, all of the listed traits come together to form an individual’s personality. From buoyant ballerinas to sadistic serial killers, every person has such a diverse and individualistic personality. Scientists have discovered that the five listed broad order traits can evolve into more specific lower order traits, which come together to make a person who they are.

Works Cited

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