The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality.
BACKGROUND: Sex differences in personality are believed to be comparatively small. However, research in this area has suffered from significant methodological limitations. We advance a set of guidelines for overcoming those limitations: (a) measure personality with a higher resolution than that affo...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2012-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS ONE |
| Online Access: | http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC3251566?pdf=render |
| _version_ | 1818096157331554304 |
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| author | Marco Del Giudice Tom Booth Paul Irwing |
| author_facet | Marco Del Giudice Tom Booth Paul Irwing |
| author_sort | Marco Del Giudice |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | BACKGROUND: Sex differences in personality are believed to be comparatively small. However, research in this area has suffered from significant methodological limitations. We advance a set of guidelines for overcoming those limitations: (a) measure personality with a higher resolution than that afforded by the Big Five; (b) estimate sex differences on latent factors; and (c) assess global sex differences with multivariate effect sizes. We then apply these guidelines to a large, representative adult sample, and obtain what is presently the best estimate of global sex differences in personality. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Personality measures were obtained from a large US sample (N = 10,261) with the 16PF Questionnaire. Multigroup latent variable modeling was used to estimate sex differences on individual personality dimensions, which were then aggregated to yield a multivariate effect size (Mahalanobis D). We found a global effect size D = 2.71, corresponding to an overlap of only 10% between the male and female distributions. Even excluding the factor showing the largest univariate ES, the global effect size was D = 1.71 (24% overlap). These are extremely large differences by psychological standards. SIGNIFICANCE: The idea that there are only minor differences between the personality profiles of males and females should be rejected as based on inadequate methodology. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-10T23:00:09Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-d443531a5d864f2387c45f275616d52d |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1932-6203 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-10T23:00:09Z |
| publishDate | 2012-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS ONE |
| spelling | doaj.art-d443531a5d864f2387c45f275616d52d2022-12-22T01:30:10ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032012-01-0171e2926510.1371/journal.pone.0029265The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality.Marco Del GiudiceTom BoothPaul IrwingBACKGROUND: Sex differences in personality are believed to be comparatively small. However, research in this area has suffered from significant methodological limitations. We advance a set of guidelines for overcoming those limitations: (a) measure personality with a higher resolution than that afforded by the Big Five; (b) estimate sex differences on latent factors; and (c) assess global sex differences with multivariate effect sizes. We then apply these guidelines to a large, representative adult sample, and obtain what is presently the best estimate of global sex differences in personality. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Personality measures were obtained from a large US sample (N = 10,261) with the 16PF Questionnaire. Multigroup latent variable modeling was used to estimate sex differences on individual personality dimensions, which were then aggregated to yield a multivariate effect size (Mahalanobis D). We found a global effect size D = 2.71, corresponding to an overlap of only 10% between the male and female distributions. Even excluding the factor showing the largest univariate ES, the global effect size was D = 1.71 (24% overlap). These are extremely large differences by psychological standards. SIGNIFICANCE: The idea that there are only minor differences between the personality profiles of males and females should be rejected as based on inadequate methodology.http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC3251566?pdf=render |
| spellingShingle | Marco Del Giudice Tom Booth Paul Irwing The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. PLoS ONE |
| title | The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. |
| title_full | The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. |
| title_fullStr | The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. |
| title_full_unstemmed | The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. |
| title_short | The distance between Mars and Venus: measuring global sex differences in personality. |
| title_sort | distance between mars and venus measuring global sex differences in personality |
| url | http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC3251566?pdf=render |
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