Research Feed

Among 121 Gen Z participants in Surabaya, emotional regulation negatively predicted impulsive buying (higher regulation, lower impulsivity), while social presence positively predicted it (more social influence, more impulsive purchases). Together, both variables significantly explained impulsive buying behavior. Findings suggest that strengthening emotional regulation and moderating social media exposure may reduce impulsive purchasing tendencies in this digitally native generation.

In 36-minute interactions among 240 strangers in three-person groups, higher extraversion significantly predicted greater perceived physical attractiveness, independently of speaking time. More talkative individuals were also rated as more attractive. Contrary to prior zero-acquaintance research, Duchenne smiling was non-significant. Findings suggest extraversion (and verbal behavior more broadly) shape attractiveness perceptions beyond physical appearance in live social contexts.

Using latent profile analysis across 3,600+ men from 103 countries, this study challenges the prototype of the extraverted, confrontational ally. "Well-Adjusted" men (high on all Big Five traits, low neuroticism) rated both committed and relationship-building allyship strategies as best-fitting. Character strengths (especially bravery, kindness, and social intelligence) explained additional variance beyond Big Five traits, suggesting allyship training should leverage diverse personalities and strengths.

Using PLS-SEM with 530 Chinese participants, this study models how Big Five traits shape adoption of AI-powered financial robo-advisors via perceived intelligence and anthropomorphism. Conscientiousness, extraversion, and agreeableness positively influenced both AI perceptions and adoption directly; neuroticism negatively affected perceptions, impacting adoption indirectly through anthropomorphism. Surprisingly, openness had no significant effect, suggesting financial decision-making contexts prioritize reliability over novelty-seeking tendencies.

This cross-sectional study of 291 Chinese dental students examined how Big Five traits relate to empathy, with resilience as a mediator. Extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness positively predicted empathic concern and perspective-taking, while neuroticism was associated with personal distress. Resilience fully mediated links between empathy and agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness, and partially mediated its relationships with extraversion and neuroticism, suggesting resilience-building as a lever for empathy training.

A 2026 French longitudinal study (n=94, 10 weeks) tracked how exercise becomes more "second nature" (requiring less conscious effort and willpower) over time. More conscientious people developed automatic exercise habits faster; higher neuroticism made it harder to feel in control early on. Practically, building consistent routines matters more than choosing a specific activity type.

Using Big Five personality traits and Latent Profile Analysis, this study segments South Korean robotic café customers into two profiles: "Mindful Consumers" (higher neuroticism, lower openness) and "Future-Forward Consumers" (higher openness, extraversion, agreeableness). The latter reported stronger emotional engagement and word-of-mouth intentions, especially in fully automated settings. The study demonstrates how trait configurations can predict real-world consumer behavior and inform differentiated service design strategies.

This paper explores whether you can change an AI's "personality" by directly tweaking its internal math rather than just asking it nicely via prompts. Testing across 14 language models, the researchers found that injecting personality signals directly into the model's computations (targeting the Big Five traits) works better than prompting alone, and combining both methods works best. However, the traits don't behave quite the way human personality theory predicts they should.

This CHI 2026 paper tests whether Big Five (OCEAN) traits can be embedded in AI coding agents. Researchers created three profiles (a no-personality Baseline, a Cautious Guardian (thorough, risk-focused), and a Decision Builder (confident, exploratory)) and had 14 developers use all three on refactoring tasks. Personalities were reliably detectable without hurting task completion, but preferences diverged sharply, suggesting adaptive personality customization may outperform any single universal style.

This correlational study of 80 Filipino public school employees examined how Big Five traits relate to workplace relationship quality. Employees scored high on agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and extraversion, with moderate neuroticism. All four high-scoring traits positively and significantly correlated with communication, trust, job performance, and perceived leadership style. Neuroticism showed no significant relationship with any of these factors, suggesting it is a poor predictor of workplace relationship quality.

This 23-year longitudinal study of 306 Belgian participants found that low conscientiousness was the only Big Five trait serving as a necessary condition for problematic alcohol use across all developmental stages, from childhood through adulthood. High conscientiousness acted as a near-complete protective factor: individuals scoring above certain thresholds were virtually immune to developing problematic alcohol use regardless of other traits or life stage.

This opinion piece argues that personality traits function as compressed social information, allowing humans to efficiently evaluate cooperative partners. The Big Five personality framework is reframed not merely as a psychometric taxonomy, but as a cognitive shortcut that condenses complex behavioral observations into low-dimensional, easily communicable representations. The author highlights Agreeableness as especially central to cooperative partner selection, signaling reliability through both stable cost structures and heightened sensitivity to social norms.

This meta-analysis of over 65,000 participants confirms that Big Five traits significantly shape our nocturnal experiences. Neuroticism is the primary predictor of nightmare frequency and emotional distress, while Openness correlates with high dream recall, vividness, and lucid dreaming. Extraversion mainly influences the social sharing of dreams. These findings support 'continuity models,' suggesting that our waking affective vulnerabilities and cognitive styles directly extend into our dream lives.

This study highlights that core personality traits are powerful predictors of baseline fitness and the specific exercise intensities individuals enjoy. Notably, participants scoring high in Neuroticism experienced the most significant stress-reduction benefits from aerobic training, suggesting a targeted emotional utility for exercise. Across the spectrum, Openness, Conscientiousness, and Extraversion further dictate these behavioral patterns, providing a scientific basis for how stable traits influence physical health. By understanding these links, interventions can be better tailored to leverage an individual's personality for improved well-being and long-term fitness adherence.

Hilbig and Moshagen identify four problems with Big Five Agreeableness (B5A): it fails to adequately predict prosocial and ethical behavior despite emphasizing both in its definitions; the HEXACO model's Honesty-Humility dimension covers these gaps more effectively; the dark factor of personality (D), a single broad trait, also outperforms B5A on these outcomes; and different B5A scales measure inconsistent constructs, meaning researchers using different tools are effectively measuring different things while calling it the same trait.

Using German panel data and a job search and bargaining model, this study finds that Big Five personality traits shape wages and employment through multiple channels. Higher conscientiousness and emotional stability raise earnings and shorten unemployment for both sexes, while agreeableness reduces wages and bargaining power. Women's tendency toward higher agreeableness and lower emotional stability accounts for roughly as much of the gender wage gap as differences in work experience do.

This large-scale meta-analysis of over 150,000 participants explores how the Big Five traits influence dietary habits. Researchers found that lower Neuroticism and higher levels of Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, and Agreeableness consistently predict a healthier diet. These traits affect everything from fruit intake to emotional eating patterns. Interestingly, the positive link between Agreeableness and healthy eating becomes even stronger as people get older.

Using Last.fm listening data from 541 users, this study examined how Big Five traits relate to naturally occurring music preferences, analyzing genre tags, emotion tags, and their co-occurrence. Extraversion correlated with high-energy genres like hip-hop, rap, and techno, as well as nostalgic hip-hop and jazz. Openness linked to jazz subgenres. Neuroticism predicted preference for mellow, atmospheric genres like shoegaze and dream-pop, co-occurring with low-arousal emotions like sadness and tenderness, while negatively correlating with high-arousal trance and world music.

This systematic review of 58,812 participants demonstrates that Big Five personality traits significantly influence sleep. High Neuroticism consistently correlates with poor sleep quality and disturbances, while Conscientiousness is a strong predictor of 'morningness' and better sleep hygiene. These findings suggest that personality-driven behaviors shape our nocturnal routines, highlighting the potential for personalized clinical interventions that account for individual psychological profiles to improve long-term sleep health.

This meta-analysis of 148 studies confirms a consistent negative correlation (r = -0.238) between neuroticism and relationship quality. Interestingly, factors like race, sexual orientation, and the use of longitudinal versus cross-sectional data did not change this fundamental link. However, the researchers identified that age, relationship length, and geographical region do moderate the strength of this association. To help practitioners, the study proposes a model showing how neuroticism damages relationships through specific emotional patterns and behaviors.