Executive functions, temperament and character traits: A quantitative analysis of the relationship between personality and prefrontal functions

The intent of our study, conducted on a sample of 98 psychiatric outpatients, was to explore the correlations between executive functions and traits of temperament and character. Executive functions were assessed through Frontal Assessment Battery and the traits of temperament and character using the Temperament and Character Inventory. From our sample, a significant link between certain traits of temperament and character and a lower efficiency of some specific executive functions and higher efficiency of others clearly emerge. The interpretation that we propose of the data which emerges from the study appears to be coherent with a modern vision of the mental phenomena which seem to achieve non linear interactions among the psychological, biological and relational dimensions which are characteristic of the human being. The complex system of interactions between brain, mind and relations described could be conceptualized as a process embodied and situated in a specific environment, not separable from the body and relationships. The knowledge of this embodied process is important for grounding the "affective computing" direction research. It is necessary to increase the size of the sample group in order to be able to generalize the statements, program experiments finalized at verifying the predictions of the model.