This assignment started out by taking the five factor personality test, and then the big five personality test. Next we had to read two articles that were associated with these tests, and watch a TED talk about the power of introverts. After this, we read to articles on the difference between “affect” and “effect”, and had to take a quiz on it. Finally, we had to make a discussion board post, listing the Big Five Personality dimensions, why these tests are more reliable than other online personality tests, what my results were on both of the tests, if they were similar to one another, if they match my own conception of my personality, what I thought about Susan Cain’s suggestion that society should better appreciate persons who are introverted, and if I think there are benefits to the ‘low’ side of any of the other four factors/dimensions of the Big Five Personality Dimensions/Factors.
The first article just explained what the 5 personality dimensions are, which I will mention later. The second article described what these tests are like and why they are the best type of personality test, which I will also touch on later.
The TED talk discussed the power of introverts. The speaker described how she was an introvert, and when she went to summer camp once, when she read her book alone, people thought something was wrong with her and that she has to have more spirit. She emphasized that modern society is so obsessed with extroverts, and is trying to force everyone to be one through school group assignments and seating arrangements. She emphasized that introverts can be just as successful and bring a ton of great ideas and accomplishments of their own to society, and that people should be applauded for being who they are, rather than being forced into one prototype of a person.
Moving onto the articles about “affect” vs “effect”, the main points revolved around affect being used as a verb, while effect should be used as a noun. They also give examples of how to remember this distinction, such as through the “RAVEN trick”.
Moving into what I discussed in my discussion board post, according to Cherry’s and Koerth-Baker’s articles, the “Big Five Personality Dimensions” are Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Openness/Openness to Experience.
According to Koerth-Baker, Big Five Personality Tests more reliable than other online personality tests because everyone has a little bit of each trait, and it tells you where you fall on the spectrum for each cluster. This is better than grouping people by type, because that assumes we are all far apart from one another, when in reality we are typically pretty close.
On the Five Factor Personality Test, my results were that I was relatively high (35) on Extraversion, relatively high (31) on Agreeableness, Relatively high on conscientiousness (44), relatively low (10) on Neuroticism, and about average (25) on Openness. To be more specific, relatively low means my score was in the bottom 30%, relatively high means in the top 30%, and about average is somewhere in the middle.
On the Big Five Personality Test, my results were that I scored 67% on Openness to Experience, 81% on Conscientiousness, 73% on Extraversion, 75% on Agreeableness, and 12.5% on Neuroticism. To get the average scores for the population, I would have had to make an account, so I do not know those.
My results were similar on both tests. On both, I scored very low on Neuroticism and high on Extraversion, Conscientiousness, and Agreeableness. I guess a difference is being average for openness on one of the tests, and seemingly higher than average on the other. However, they were pretty consistent overall.
I think the results certainly match my own conception of my personality. I think of myself as outgoing, easy to get along with, and very organized, resembling some of the traits I scored high in. On the contrary, I am not very moody or negative often, so I expected to be low in neuroticism.
I totally agree with Susan Cain’s (2012) suggestion that society should better appreciate persons who are introverted. I am an extrovert, however, as she mentioned, a third to a half of people are introverts. Building off of this, people do their best work and succeed most when the environment is something they are comfortable with. So, I think society should appreciate introverts because they can thrive and bring their own great things to society when they are in an environment they are comfortable with, just like extroverts can in their proper environment.
I certainly think their are benefits to scoring low on neuroticism. This is associated with emotional instability, so having a low score is nice because it means a person is consistent and generally more positive. Outside of this, there are not any of the factors that stick out to me that would be better to be on the “low” side.
Reflecting on this assignment, I enjoyed taking the 2 personality tests. I always love to participate in things like this, because I get interested in seeing what the results will be, and if they will match my actual personality. I learned about these tests in AP psychology in high school, but it is nice to have an assignment about them again, to remind myself of the different components.
Additionally, it was worthwhile to read the articles and take the quiz about “affect” vs “effect”. Honestly, I never really knew when to use each of these forms, so these articles shed some light on that and now I understand the difference. It is funny how I can be so far into my education and not know such a simple distinction!
Also, I enjoyed the TED talk about introversion, because I am so used to just hearing about extraversion. Like the lady mentioned, introversion seems to be casted as a negative thing in society, when this shouldn’t be the case. She brought up some excellent points, and I really hope that people begin to value introverts more, because they are just as important as extroverts!
Nicky's Blog 