Personality types and self-reported aggressiveness

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Abstract

Applying a person-centered approach, three personality types based on the NEO-FFI scales were identified in a sample of N = 141 participants by means of clustering methods. They were described as a resilient (low N, high E), a non-desirable (high N, low E, A, and C), and a reserved overcontrolled prototype (low E and O, high A and C). The prototypes were related to the level of aggressiveness, assessed by the Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire (AQ). Results indicate that the three clusters differ mainly in their levels of hostility, verbal aggressiveness, and with respect to anger. With respect to total aggressiveness, the non-desirable prototype displayed the highest and the reserved prototype the lowest AQ scores. The results are discussed in relation to studies based on a variable-centered approach. Possible implications for treatment and research are addressed.

Section snippets

Personality and self-reported aggressiveness

Aggression continues to play a prominent role in clinical disorders, in conjunction with maladjusted and socially inappropriate behavior, in the case of criminal offenders, or even in conflicts at school or in a partnership. Among the self-report inventories that have been developed to measure aggressiveness, the Aggression Questionnaire (AQ; Buss & Perry, 1992) is a widely used instrument, and its validity has been established in numerous investigations (Felsten and Hill, 1999, Gallo and

Participants

The sample consisted of 141 participants aged 18–55 years (M = 22.8, SD = 5.75) from a student population attending introductory lectures in Psychology. About 84% were between 18 and 25 years old. The students were enrolled in different classes (Psychology, Sociology and Education) at the University of Leipzig. 116 of them were female and 25 were male. They were asked for participation on a voluntary basis and were given course credit for participation. Data collection took place in an individual

Description of personality types

A three-cluster solution will be presented because it is the most commonly accepted in the literature on personality types and the other solutions considered (four and five clusters) did not add further information or were not interpretable. We will first characterize the three personality types found here by describing their cluster centers (means) on each of the Big Five dimensions and will then search for concomitant patterns in aggressiveness. The values are given in standardized z-scores

Discussion

Based on the Big Five Factor Model of personality, we have identified three personality prototypes in this investigation: a resilient type with low Neuroticism and high Extraversion with about average aggression scores slightly below the group mean, a reserved overcontrolled type low in Extraversion and Openness but high in Agreeableness and Conscientiousness with the lowest aggression scores, and a non-desirable one high in Neuroticism and low in Extraversion, Agreeableness and

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Marcus Roth for his helpful comments on an earlier version of this article.

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    Now at the Department of Special Education, Goethe-University Frankfurt am Main.

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