The Big Five

The Big Five personality survey we all took can be found at this link. I found this test interesting, and so I had my girlfriend try it out when she came to visit after lecture last week. I knew beforehand she was an emotional person, and I was not; what I wanted to know was the kind of results this difference would produce on the Big Five scale.

Openness to Experience: We both scored very similar scores on this portion, and both scored roughly the same as our class average. Could this be a sign of compatibility?

Conscientiousness: We varied significantly more in this section; I scored one standard deviation higher than the average, leaving me to be more into planning on thinking before acting. She, on the other hand, was slightly below average, thus showing her to be a bit more carefree. Do opposites really attract?

Neuroticism: I scored very high on this, leaving me to be very calm and cool even in tense situations; she was found to be very nervous and skittish. I was roughly one and a half standard deviations above the mean, whereas she was almost two full standard deviations underneath the middle line. Do nervous women find themselves attracted to sound and secure men?

These are all questions that I pondered after receiving our results. I knew how I was before I took the survey, and scored very closely to where I estimated I would land. She found similar results to what she saw in herself, but was surprised by how similar we were in most aspects (she's a believer in the old phrase "opposite attract"). I encourage everyone to take these tests and use the feature that allows you to compare your scores to somebody else's (there's a rather large list to choose from). I believe the Big Five to be accurate and simple to complete; it grants plenty of insight into your own personality, often giving words to somewhat abstract concepts you may have of yourself.