RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 The Big Five personality traits and CNS arousal in the resting state
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2020.10.26.354647
DO 10.1101/2020.10.26.354647
A1 Philippe Jawinski
A1 Sebastian Markett
A1 Christian Sander
A1 Jue Huang
A1 Christine Ulke
A1 Ulrich Hegerl
A1 Tilman Hensch
YR 2020
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/10/26/2020.10.26.354647.abstract
AB Based on Eysenck’s pioneering work, CNS arousal has long been considered an encouraging biological candidate that may explain individual differences in human personality. Yet, results from empirical studies remained inconclusive. Notably, the vast majority of published results have been derived from small samples, and EEG alpha power has usually served as exclusive indicator for CNS arousal. In this study, we selected N = 468 individuals of the LIFE-Adult cohort and investigated the associations between the Big Five personality traits and CNS arousal by using the low-resolution electromagnetic tomography-based analysis tool VIGALL. Our analyses revealed that subjects who reported higher levels of extraversion and openness to experience, respectively, exhibited lower levels of CNS arousal in the resting state. Bayesian and frequentist analysis results were especially convincing for openness to experience. Among the lower-order personality traits, we obtained strongest evidence for neuroticism facet ‘impulsivity’ and reduced CNS arousal. We regard these findings as well in line with the postulations of Eysenck and Zuckerman and consistent with the assumptions of the ‘arousal regulation model’. Our results also agree with meta-analytically derived effect sizes in the field of individual differences research, highlighting the need for large studies with at least several hundreds of subjects.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.