Can personality traits be reliably assessed

with short measures?An Italian study on the shortened version of the

Big Five Inventory-44

Carlo Chiorri, PhD 1, Alessandro Ubbiali, PhD 2,

Deborah Donati. MD, PhD 2

1 Department of Anthropological Sciences – Psychology Unit, Genoa University, Italy

2 Department of Clinical Neurosciences - San Raffaele Turro, Milan, Italy

Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, School of Psychology, Milan, Italy

Chiorri, C., Ubbiali, A., & Donati, D. (2008). Can personality traits be reliably assessed with short measures? An Italian study on the shortened

version of the Big Five Inventory-44. Talk given at the 39th International Meeting of the Society for Research in Psychotherapy, Barcelona, Spain,

18-21 June.

Importance of personality

assessment

Personality often moderates treatment response

Personality traits are an important add-on in clinical

assessment

The use of personality measures in clinical practice is

often limited by the long administration time (e.g.,

NEO-PI-R)

Generally found across cultures (Hofstee et al., 1997)

Has strong predictive validity (Ozer & Benet-Martinez,

2006; Paunonen, 2003)

Good interrater agreement (McCrae & Costa, 1987)

Hereditability (Bouchard et al., 1996)

Children as early as in middle childhood can be

characterized by them (Asendorpf & van Aken, 2003)

The Big Five Model

Big Five Measures

1-item dimensions (Gosling et al. 2003)

2-item dimensions (TIPI, Gosling et al. 2003; BFI-10,

Rammstedt & John, 2007)

7/9-item dimensions (BFI-44, John et al., 1991;

BFMM, Saucier, 1994)

2-facet/12-item dimensions (BFQ, Caprara et al.,

1993)

20-item dimensions (FFPI, Hendriks et al., 1999)

6-facet/8-item dimensions (NEO-PI-R, Costa &

McCrae, 1992)

Ideas

Openness to experienceNEO-PI-R

Fantasy Aestethics ActionsFeelings Values

Big Five Inventory (BFI-44)John et al., 1991

Freely available and widely used in Internet assessment

(e.g., Srivastava et al., 2003)

Aims at measuring the Big Five dimensions using as

few items as possible while achieving adequate levels of

reliability

Good internal consistency (M α = .83)Good convergent validity with corresponding scales of

Goldberg’s (1992) adjectives and Costa and McCrae’s

(1992) NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO–FFI)

Already adapted into Spanish (Benet-Martinez & John,

1998), German (Lang et al., 2001) and Dutch (Denissen

et al., 2008)

Method

Translation and back-translation procedure

821 participants

%F = 57.6

age M = 34.48±15.05 yrs (range 18 – 90)education M = 14.59±3.38 yrs (range 3 – 27)

Overview of analyses

Descriptives

Item analysis

Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Effects of gender, age and educational level modeled

by SEM

Correspondence between factor structure of the

Italian translation with the other versions

Construct validity

BFI-10 reliability and validity

A glance at the future

Descriptives

All item means fell in the 2 to 4 range, except:

Item 3: Does a thorough job (C)

Item 7: Is helpful and unselfish with others (A)

Item 10: Is curious about many different things (O)*

Item 12: Starts quarrels with others (A)

Item 13: Is a reliable worker (C)*

Few other items a little bit kurtotic (max -1.24)

SD range was 0.84 – 1.37 → restriction of range was not a problem

* Same as in Dutch validation (Denissen et al., 2008)

Item analysis

-0.48

-0.01

-0.37

-0.37

-0.18

SK

0.66

0.78

0.76

0.56

0.74

SD

3.64

3.11

3.60

3.75

3.30

M

5.00

5.00

5.00

5.00

5.00

Max

1.00

1.00

1.44

1.89

1.00

Min

10

8

9

9

8

No.

.79

.80

.84

.66

.80

α

0.20

-0.39

-0.35

-0.12

-0.42

KU

.31

(.06 - .49)

.48

(.19 - .59)

.29

(.03 - .59)O

.31

(.16 - .42)

.51

(.39 - .62)

.33

(.21 - .57)N

.42

(.22 - .51)

.57

(.46 - .64)

.39

(.22 - .61)C

.18

(.10 - .31)

.35

(.26 - .43)

.19

(.05 - .50)A

.38

(.19 - .51)

.53

(.35 - .68)

.34

(.06 - .66)E

SMC

r item-

corrected

total

r inter-

itemScale

54321

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

54321

400

350

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

54321

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

54321

300

200

100

0

54321

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

E A C N O

Exploratory Factor Analysis

Dimensionality assessment

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Component

Eigenvalue

Observed

99th percentile

Parallel AnalysisMAP statisticComponent

.0104711

.0095210

.009149

.008208

.007887

.007856

.007995

.009474

.012553

.016252

.020301

.030670

KMO = .85 (Univariate MSA: M = .84, range .69 -.91)

Initial h2: M = .39, range .11 - .57

% of variance accounted for by the 5-factor solution: 43.19

All FLs on the expected factor ≥ .30

Extraction h2: M = .36, range .06 - .64

Estimated from PAF/PromaxRaw

1.00.00.28.09.391.00-.03.14.07.28O

1.00-.25.04-.101.00-.23-.11-.16N

1.00.17.271.00.15.21C

1.00.081.00.10A

1.001.00E

ONCAEONCAE

Correlations

% of variance accounted for by the 6-factor solution: 46.70

All FLs on at least factor ≥ .30

Extraction h2: M = .38, range .06 - .63

ItemItem no.

Is outgoing, sociable36

Is sometimes shy, inhibited31

Has an assertive personality26

Tends to be quiet21

Generates a lot of enthusiasm16

Is full of energy11

Is reserved6

Is talkative1

1.00.02.14.12.39.20O

1.00-.25.04-.06-.08N

1.00.19.33.07C

1.00.10.08A

1.00.22E2

1.00E1

ONCAE2E1

E1 E2

E N

Confirmatory Factor Analyses

A C O

Five Uncorrelated Factors

SB χ2/df = 5.23, TLI*= .79, CFI* = .80, RMSEA = .074, SRMR = .105

E NA C O

Five Correlated Factors

SB χ2/df = 4.97, TLI*= .81, CFI* = .82, RMSEA = .072, SRMR = .083

C

O

E

A

O

O

N

O

C

E

Decrease

in X2Items

72.4BFI28BFI38

76.0BFI30BFI41

76.4BFI01BFI21

84.8BFI07BFI32

109.0BFI40BFI25

110.0BFI41BFI44

126.4BFI19BFI39

148.1BFI30BFI44

210.7BFI08BFI43

253.9BFI11BFI26

N

N

E

E

E

E

A

E

E

E

Original

Factor

Decrease

in X2

Suggested

FactorItem

33.3ABFI39

33.5EBFI04

36.4OBFI16

37.1NBFI11

40.2OBFI26

49.8NBFI31

52.6EBFI42

60.4CBFI06

84.2CBFI26

85.2CBFI11

Top 10 Modification Indices

Path Coefficients Error Covariances

Five Correlated Factors + Social Desirability

SB χ2/df = 3.73, TLI*= .87, CFI* = .88, RMSEA = .059, SRMR = .061

Social Desirability

E NA C O

O

N

C

A

E

Age

Education

Gender

Effects of Gender, Age and EducationSB χ χ χ χ2/df = 4.98, TLI*= .79, CFI* = .80, RMSEA = .072, SRMR = .100

.11-.08.04O

-.09-.19-.29N

.14.29-.13C

-.02.17-.17A

-.01.02-.04E

EducationAgeGenderScale

Standardized coefficients; F=0, M=1

Correspondence between factor structure of the

Italian translation with the other versions

.95-.08.16.07.26O

-.01.94-.23-.14-.24N

.17-.24.95.18.22CDutch

.08-.06.14.93.04A

.24-.24.20.15.92E

.80-.11.07-.05.16O

-.16.95-.20-.26-.27N

.00-.19.95.13.19CUS

-.06-.13.14.90.05A

.20-.18.14.10.92E

.81-.16.13.04.22O

-.16.94-.23-.17-.18N

.11-.23.93.15.16CSpanish

.00-.11.15.94.07A

.30-.13.11.01.94E

ONCAE

Congruence coefficients of Varimax Rotated Principal Components Loadings

BFI-44 Construct validity

5.66

(.65)

−4.75(.57)

5.40

(.63)

5.56

(.64)

5.26

(.64)Zcontrast BFQ facets (r)

4.78

(.57)

−4.11(.51)

4.43

(.57)

4.75

(.57)

4.50

(.54)Zcontrast BFQ domains (r)

-.03.11.23-.13.05BFQ - Lie

.49-.10-.12-.09.03BFQ - O2 - Openness to Experiences

.48-.01-.05.01.13BFQ - O1 - Openness to Culture

.56-.06-.10-.04.09BFQ - Openness

.09-.54.10.15-.07BFQ - ES2 - Impulse Control

-.19-.52.07.00-.26BFQ - ES1 - Emotion Control

-.06-.60.10.08-.19BFQ - Emotional Stability

-.10-.16.53.01-.03BFQ - C2 - Scrupulousness

-.17-.07.52.07.07BFQ - C1 - Perseverance

-.15-.13.60.04.02BFQ - Conscientiousness

-.14-.19.17.51.05BFQ - F2 - Politeness

-.08-.13.02.51-.06BFQ - F1 - Cooperativeness

-.13-.18.11.58.00BFQ - Friendliness

.27-.14-.12-.12.49BFQ - E2 - Dominance

.04-.24.08.12.50BFQ - E1 - Dynamism

.18-.21-.03.00.56BFQ - Energy

ONCAE

.24

.37

.33

.27

.33

r

-0.96

0.34

-0.93

-1.03

-1.24

0.50

0.28

-1.05

-0.34

-0.58

KU

-0.43

-0.92

-0.25

-0.01

-0.02

-0.98

-0.67

-0.03

-0.67

0.60

SK

1.303.54BFI41.31.37 (.43)

1.033.98BFI20O

1.223.26BFI39.43.53 (.50)

1.233.09BFI09N

1.373.04BFI23.42.47 (.54)

0.974.06BFI03C

0.913.91BFI22.29.43 (.30)

1.183.20BFI02A

1.113.78BFI36.40.50 (.50)

1.202.37BFI06E

rSF-FSα (exp)SDM

BFI-10 Item Analysis

Rammstedt & John, 2007

Part-whole correlationsScale

.78O

.85N

.80C

.65A

.79E

SFSF

SFSF

FSFS

FSFSFSSF rn

rn

rn

rnr Corrected

)1(1)1(1 −+×

×−+

×=−

FIML Estimation

Invariance of the factor structure based on responses to all 44 items in the BFI in

one random subsample (S1) with that based on the 10 items in the BFI-10 for the

other random subsample (S2)

Responses to the remaining 34 unselected items were considered as missing in S2

Invariance constraints were tested for the10 FLs and 10 uniquenesses for items

common to both the BFI-44 and the BFI-10 and for the entire factor variance–

covariance matrix

The 34 factor loadings and 34 uniquenesses for unselected items that only appear

in BFI-44 were freely estimated

.03318822681.52FLs+FVs+FCors + Uniquessess

invariant (total invariance)

.03418382666.48FLs+FVs+FCors invariant

.03418282632.53FLs+FVs invariant

.03418232623.22FLs invariant

.03517842620.02Unconstrained

RMSEAdfFIML χ2Model

.26-.37.10.15.30Lie Scale

.46-.22.31.40.49

Openness to

Experiences

.38-.31.50.39.39

Openness to

Culture

.48-.30.47.46.51Openness

.06-.42-.01.54.20Impulse Control

-.03-.71.13.33.30Emotion Control

.01-.66.08.48.29Emotional stability

-.03-.08.47-.07.00Perseverance

-.12-.09.20-.45-.13Scrupulousness

-.09-.10.37-.35-.09Conscientiousness

.25-.34-.06.72.33Politeness

.04-.24.29.28.16Cooperativeness

.17-.33.12.58.28Friendliness

.11-.25.28.09.30Dominance

.62-.25.62.28.68Dynamism

.49-.31.59.25.64Energy

ONCAEBFQ

BFI-44

BFI-10 Construct validity

Conclusions

Italian BFI-44 showed adequate levels of internal consistency,

factorial and external validity, consistent with the psychometric

properties of the English original

High levels of cross-cultural applicability

When the 10 items of the BFI-10 are considered, psychometric

properties appear to be acceptable, even if there were

substantial losses in comparison to the full-scale BFI-44

Future studies

test–retest reliability

agreement between self-reports and peer reports

BFI-10 independent administration

A glance at the future – 1

-1

-0,8

-0,6

-0,4

-0,2

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

Resilient Overcontrolled Non-desirable Undercontrolled

z scores N

E

O

A

C

-1

-0,8

-0,6

-0,4

-0,2

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

Resilient Overcontrolled Undercontrolled

z scores N

E

O

A

C

Barbaranelli, 2001

A glance at the future – 2

2

2,5

3

3,5

4

E A C N O

Scale

Mean Score *

General Population (n = 821)

PD (n = 32)

* Adjusted for Gender, Age and Education

Thank you for your attention

carlo.chiorri@unige.it