Neuroticism : A Measure Of Neuroticism Essay

Personality is a complex area of Psychology, which has been studied for many years, by many experts in the field. Each having their own ideas about how to understand, study and evaluate it. Here I will introduce personality briefly, looking at the theories behind it. Then explain the need for testing. As there are many test that are available to use, for the purpose of this essay I will look at The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) and discuss the reliability and validity of some studies around these tests.

They will often have strong reactions to even minor negative events and have a hard time handling stressful situations. Conversely, someone who is low on neuroticism will rarely experience strong negative states and will be much more stable emotionally. They will generally stay calm and handle stressful situations well. Choosing neuroticism as our second independent variable allows us to fill gaps in the previous research by examining the possibility of implicit egotism caused by negative self-associations and learning more about how personality traits affect implicit egotism.

The tendency to be emotionally reactive, anxious, susceptible to stress, hostile, and insecure would describe the traits of a person with neuroticism or neurotic tendencies, neuroticism is rated low on effectiveness according to the Factor Five Model. Goodall’s attempts to gain access to chimpanzee’s habit required hours of quiet reflection and meditation, she sat for weeks before the first chimp approached her. This kind of diligence and perseverance is not expected from a person with neurotic tendency. Nor do I see neurotic qualities in myself.

Depression is a serious mental illness that is more than just a sad feeling. It has proven to be much more complex and has associations with personality as well as its traits, specifically two out of the Big Five personality traits; neuroticism and conscientiousness (McCrae & Costa, 1999). The research conducted by Philip I. Chow and Brent E. Roberts of the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois, have conducted their own research to provide evidence that these static levels of personality can not only be associated with depression, but that personality and its traits can be predictors of depression as well.

Neuroticism is characterized by emotional instability, impulsivity, hostility, self-consciousness, and proneness towards stress (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Individuals who are high in hostility are more inclined to interpret ambiguous behaviour as provocative and react in a defensive, aggressive, or distrustful manner. This leads these individuals to experience

Among neurotic non-smokers however a family history of coronary heart disease was hypothesized to be related to a neurotic’s more withdrawn personality type (Eysenck & Fulker, 1983). The study has proposed that of all the factors on the EPQ test (neuroticism, extraversion, psychoticism and conformity) extraversion and neuroticism play the biggest role in the construction of a Type A personality, and thus propose a genetic relation between personality and coronary heart disease that can be altered by smoking habits. This study goes to show that Type A behavior is not clearly defined, as can be seen in the differences between extraversion and neuroticism. It is also clear that Type A behavior can be further magnified within the four factors (Tenseness, ambition, activity and unrepressed) within the categories neuroticism and

Whereas, others are more successful at keeping up with their health behaviour goals. This could be down to individual factors such as mood and personality. Current research demonstrates that personality is an important factor when understanding health benefits (e.g. Smith 2006). The big five trait (Costa & McCrae, 1985) is a model used regularly in understanding how health behaviours and personality relate to each other. Evidence supports the role of three personality factors in particular: agreeableness, conscientiousness and neuroticism. Agreeableness and conscientiousness have been associated with the practice of health promoting behaviours (Booth-Kewley & Vickers, 1994), whereas neuroticism has been linked to fewer health promoting behaviours (Ingledew & Brunning, 1999). However, proposed reasons regarding these relations have concentrated on the qualities linked to these traits rather than the self-regulation processes involved. Seeing the relationship between health behaviours and personality from a self-regulation point of view may provide a better understanding of why certain personalities may affect health-promoting

- Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised Short Scale was used in this study because it is “…used to measure the personality dimensions of extraversion, neuroticism, and psychoticism” (4).

The NEO-PI-R (Neuroticism Extraversion Openness Personality Inventory- Revised) was published in 1992 by Paul T. Costa Jr., PhD and Robert R. McCrae, PhD under the Psychological Assessment Resources (Costa & McCrae, 1992). This edition mimicked the 1978 edition of the NEO-PI (Piedmont, 2001). The NEO-PI-R is a personality inventory which uses the well-recognized five domains of personality and their thirty facets to increase the specificity and accuracy of the results (Costa & McCrae, 1992). The NEO-PI-R can be administered individually or in groups, and is a self-reported and observer reported test (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Originally the NEO-PI-R cost were $25.00 per pack of 10 for booklets and answer sheets, $21.00 per package of 25 for hand scoring sheets, $21.00 per pack of 25 for adult (Forms S and R) as well as the College Student Profile forms, $15.00 per 25 pack for the summary sheets

"Individuals are often confronted with situations in which they only have very little information about the persons they have to interact with; to handle such situations, have been shown to spontaneously form first impressions in an extremely fast manner" (Walker & Vetter, 2016, p. 609). Personality allows an individual to obtain a specific amount of information about the person as a whole. Within this paper, one will discuss each trait originated under the five factor model, extraversion, neuroticism, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. One will also discuss the traits that are possessed when scores from a personality test are revealed.

Neuroticism is the personality aspect that we are discussing as our moderator. According to 10 Aspects of the Big 5, it consists of factors such as irritability, anxiety, fearfulness, angry hostility, impulsiveness, depression and vulnerability. We refer to this personality trait to do with the 5 factor model of personality.

From the beginning of one’s life, people interact with one another, immediately creating new relationships. The type of relationships humans develop is determined by an individual’s personality. Based upon the Big Five Factor Model, there are five broad personality traits to describe humans (Costa, 1992). The Big Five traits are openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (Matthews, Deary, & Whiteman, 2003). This five-factor model has been the basis of many studies within the field of psychology. Previous research has examined gender differences in the Big Five personality traits in fifty-five nations (Schmidt, Realo, Voracek, & Allik, 2008). Schmidt, Realo, Voracek, and Allik (2008) found that across the fifty-five nations there was no significance in average. They found that women reported higher in average conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism than

Neuroticism is the tendency to experience frequent, intense negative emotions associated with a sense of uncontrollability in response to stress (Barlow et al. 2014). Those who have a neurotic temperament are not characterized by, but generally have negative emotions such as anxiety, fear, sadness, anger, and irritability, along with some physical problems (e.g. asthma, cardiovascular disease). A neurotic temperament can be problematic and develop into something serious. Better understanding neuroticism and applying the triple vulnerability theory will help with the treatment and prevention of mood and anxiety disorders.

Measuring personality through language is a well-developed area of psychological research, dominated by the lexical approach of tracking word usage. However, a more meaning-based approach is emerging in current research, using Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) to assess personality traits. Personality is described as stable and enduring characteristics, similarly, semantic content has been found to be consistent across changes in emotional well-being and situation (Campbell & Pennebaker, 2003). The purpose of the meaning-based approach is to discover personality in a more natural form and improve ecological validity (Chung & Pennebaker, 2008). In order to classify the findings in language-based measures, personality is often defined by the Big Five personality traits developed by McCrae and John (as cited in Kwantes, Derbentseva, Lam, Vartanian, & Marmurek, 2016). The Big Five traits consist of, neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness to new experience (openness) and extraversion (Kwantes et al. 2016).

In the discipline of personality psychology, it is crucial for researchers to conduct studies using universal terms and scales, so that they may effectively compare results and further their line of research. However, when it concerns personality traits, such a comprehensive catalogue has not always been available – in fact, it has taken until up until the late 20th century to develop a list of essential personality traits and create scales that measure these dimensions reliably (John, Naumann, & Soto, 2008). The current set of these widely used traits is called the “Big Five” personality traits, and encompasses five broad dimensions - Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Openness. Of the five, this paper will focus on Conscientiousness, a trait that describes individuals with impulse control who are highly organized, thorough, planful, efficient, responsible, reliable, and dependable, to name just a handful of characteristics associated with the trait (John, Naumann, & Soto, 2008). Those low in the trait, on the other hand, are more frequently careless and irresponsible (McShane & Steen, 2012). Although studies have shown Conscientiousness to be a predictor of various life outcomes such as health and longevity, this paper will focus on the findings that support Conscientiousness as a predictor of job performance and, when one is high in the trait, success in