Robert Winston - Personality

The Importance of personality, IQ and learning approaches

Predicting academic performance

Pia RosanderLund University

Robert Winston - Personality

The research considers to what extent…

• …personality traits (stable dispositions that predispose an individual to behave or act in a specific manner) and;

• …approaches to learning (the way someone studies and makes sense of a particular school subject)

…contribute to academic performance – after controlling for the fact that general intelligence accounts for a large part of the variance

Understanding what factors influence academic performance has important practical implications for learning and education. This knowledge can, for example, help identify students unlikely to maximise their potential in scholastic settings.

Measures of intelligence are effective predictors of academic performance across educational settings, and the development of IQ measures was prompted by the desire to predict individual differences in school performance.

However, several researchers have emphasised the need to include variables other than intelligence in the prediction of academic performance, suggesting that such performance involves factors separate from intellectual ability…

…and in addition – it is of course – useful to remember that testing IQ…

… is not generally considered by mainstream modern psychology as an accurate indicator of intelligence. In fact, that lack of a satisfactory definition of "intelligence" still bedevils the discipline. Modern thought on what constitutes "intelligence" (Gardner et al.) has impacted pedagogy significantly.

Personality & Behaviours

The five-factor model of personality:• Openness to experience: (broad-

mindedness, imagination)

• Conscientiousness: (will to achieve, orderliness)

• Extraversion: (activity, sociability)

• Neuroticism: (levels of emotional stability)• Agreeableness: (friendliness, pro-social

behaviours)

And these are behaviours that could be expected to influence academic performance - for example…• attending school/classes• doing homework• getting on with teachers and other pupils• taking part in discussions…

The general idea is that personality makes these behaviours more or less likely. Individual differences in personality may therefore play an important role in academic performance…

The research context is Sweden.

What is interesting about Sweden, is that it uses criterion-based grades that are set by the teacher. The grades serve as important selection criteria as entry to HE in Sweden. The teacher therefore, (and not-least, by their response to and interaction with, the behaviour of the pupil) is hugely influential in the outcomes for the young person.

If we think of our own context – although the grading system is less teacher-influenced in the way described above – nevertheless – possible parallels can be considered in the way a child/young person and their behaviour ‘fits’ in the educational setting – and the impact this will have on success/failure.

How did we get ‘The Big Five’ - (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Neuroticism, Agreeableness)?

• Gordon Allport (1897-1967)went through the English dictionary and recorded all of the words that could be used to describe a person.

• He came up with 17,953 words, and through various processes of reduction and refinement (through the work of Raymond Cattell and others), in 1963 Norman suggested that the ‘Big Five’ constituted an adequate taxonomy of personality traits.

Primary facets of the ‘Big Five’

• Openness: fantasy, aesthetics, feelings, actions, ideas, values

• Conscientiousness: competence, order, dutifulness, achievement striving, self-discipline, deliberation

• Extraversion: warmth, gregariousness, assertiveness, activity, excitement-seeking, positive emotions

• Neuroticism: anxiety, angry hostility, depression, self-consciousness, impulsiveness and vulnerability

• Agreeableness: trust, straightforwardness, altruism, compliance, modesty, tender-mindedness

Some points to note about the ‘Big Five’

• Personality traits – once thought to be set in childhood and adolescence, and then fully developed by the age of 30, this view has been supplanted by research that shows personality traits continue to change during adulthood.

• Environmental factors play a larger role in personality trait change in adulthood than do genetic factors – from this perspective, people may be viewed as ‘open systems’; they exhibit both continuity and change in personality throughout life.

• ‘Big Five’ are often used to describe differences in younger age groups

Some Criticism of the Big Five:

• From the original lexical analysis, traits that are universally found in different languages and cultures have been regarded as more important than those lacking such cross-cultural universality.

• Does it provide a comprehensive description of Personality?

• Do the descriptors capture underlying personality processes, e.g. for neuroticism – feeling guilty, worrying etc.

• Saucier even argued for the use of ‘personality-descriptive nouns’ rather than adjectives, to extend the Big Five, e.g. ‘Joker’, ‘Jock’, ‘Philosopher’, ……………..‘Babe’…

Links between the Big Five and Intelligence• Almost all traits have cognitive attributes – although some are more

prominent than others – Openness ranks highest, and Extraversion and Neuroticism lowest.

• Personality may influence performance on Intelligence tests – by affecting attention and memory function – e.g. anxiety distracting attention from the task in hand etc.

• Openness to experience and Intelligence have been shown to have a significant correlation – but is this Openness a cause or a consequence of intelligence?

• Neuroticism may impair mental functioning in a variety of contexts…

• Conscientiousness and Intelligence are the best predictors of performance – both in work and in academic settings – increasing one might compensate for a deficiency in the other

Personality traits and academic performance

• In contrast to the field of Intelligence, most measures of Personality were not explicitly designed to predict academic performance

• However, it follows that the Big Five will influence behaviours and outcomes in all areas of life that are considered to be important

• Clearly there is a high value placed on educational outcomes, and it is inevitable that the interaction of the Big Five with the process of teaching and learning will be significant…

The role of facets of the traits….• What research says is that academic performance is not solely a measure

of intelligence. Different personality types will be more or less likely to experience academic success/failure

• This stems from their own personality-related attitudes and behaviours – but also – and most importantly – the way we respond to certain personality types and equate these with the ability to succeed

• Our own personality type can also affect the way we positively or negatively respond to and engage with a student

• It is also important to examine how emphasis on certain trait facets can improve the prediction of academic performance – rather than just use the super-traits as the point of reference

• In responding to the learning needs of different personality types, the conditions/environment/pedagogy are of supreme importance

Conscientiousness:• The strongest personality predictor of academic success

• Traits: organisational ability; perseverance; hard work; motivation; dutifulness; achievement–striving

• Performs better in academic settings

• Conscientiousness and Intelligence have similar magnitude of correlation to academic performance

Openness to Experience:• Mixed results for correlation

• Low correlation might be explained by people low on Openness being characterised as more ‘down-to-earth’; more practical – qualities which frequently fit with the nature of academic settings

• However, given its association with being intelligent, resourceful and foresighted De Raad stated that the qualities reflect the ideal student

• May be associated with higher intelligence, but not directly with academic performance

• Mixed results might be due to unknown moderating variance in the facets

Agreeableness• Not a factor commonly related to overall academic performance

• Declining correlation as students proceed through their academic career has been discussed – with pupil-teacher relationships changing in nature

• Pupils in primary have a much closer relationship with their teachers than they do in secondary school

• Because of the closer relationship in primary, Agreeableness may carry more weight in negotiating those relationships

• It may therefore be a greater predictor of academic performance in primary

Extraversion• Mixed results for correlation

• Several studies have reported negative associations – most report none

• The facets – ‘activity’ and ‘gregariousness’ have been negatively related to grades – supporting the assumption that ‘introverts’ spend more time studying

• Extraversion has predicted higher grades in primary school, and lower grades in secondary

• De Raad postulated that pupils high on Extraversion will perform better academically because of high energy levels and positive attitude (leading to a desire to learn)

• Eysenck postulated that these students would also be more likely to socialise and engage in activities other than studying – which could explain the age-related correlation

• One study showed that Extraversion was a significant negative predictor for all compulsory tests, and suggested that extraverts are more successful when they are more interested in their studies, or feel a sense of greater autonomy and freedom

Neuroticism

• Often shows negative correlation with academic performance, which is explained by the association with anxiety

• This trait has a tendency to focus on their emotional state, which may interfere with attention to academic tasks, thereby reducing performance

• Correlation between emotional stability (opposite to Neuroticism) and academic performance becomes more positive in older primary pupils

• Pupils low on emotional stability perform worse in stressful tests of intelligence

• Students with higher intelligence have more capacity for managing their emotional responses – possible due to a capacity to rationalise that they would expect to do well

What did the research show?• The research examined the hypothesis that personality traits

predict academic performance, after controlling for intelligence

• It was found that personality traits do have a role in predicting academic performance

• Facet-level analysis was also able to give more precise predictor-criterion information

• Although general intelligence, and of the personality traits, Conscientiousness in particular, were shown to be the strongest predictors of academic performance – level of intelligence was not found to be predictive of whether an individual is likely to perform – leading back into the discussion of the importance of personality

The research also:• confirmed the negative association at secondary level between

Extraversion and academic performance

• did not generally support a relationship between Openness to experience and academic performance, although one study did reveal a positive relation between Openness and practical topics

• showed no relationship between Agreeableness and academic performance at the super-trait level – however, at the facet level, there was evidence that teachers’ perceptions of the degree of altruism they see in their students may influence grades positively – ‘nice students get somewhat better grades’

• contrary to expectation, showed a positive relationship between Neuroticism and academic performance in two of the studies. As these studies were in secondary contexts – with grades contributing to college-entry criteria – it may be that ‘fear of failure’ was a facet that produced these results

…and Gender differences?

• Females score higher on Neuroticism, Agreeableness and openness to feelings (a facet of Openness)

• Males score higher on the facet of achievement-striving, while females score higher on self-control (both facets of Conscientiousness)

• In this study, Conscientiousness had a positive correlation with IQ among girls, but a negative correlation among boys – it appeared that the boys with higher intellectual capacity did not like to see themselves as Conscientious

What can schools do?• Developing those facets of personality traits that can best support learning

may override a general trait tendency that does not largely support academic performance

• Personality traits and their facets can be taken into account when developing study-support for pupils

• In the long term ‘fear of failure’ responses have a negative effect on well-being – and so although this facet of Neuroticism may ‘produce results’ – it is more positive to support students in highly effective preparation – rather than focusing on the outcomes

• Develop pedagogy to take traits and facets into account – e.g. the evidence of a positive relationship between Openness and practical/ constructivist approaches

Some general conclusions from the research:• The research shows interesting relationships to academic

performance at the facet level for all five traits, after controlling for general intelligence

• Of these – Conscientiousness would appear to be the most relevant in terms of helpful personality traits

• If educators and schools have knowledge of what factors predict academic performance, they are in a better position to offer the right support to those students whose personality may negatively affect their performance

• Maximising the academic success of young people is of paramount importance for both the individual student, and for society.