THE VALIDITY OF QUESTIONNAIRE AND RATING ASSESSMENTS OF EXTRAVERSION AND NEUROTICISM, AND THEIR FACTORIAL STABILITY

Groups of nominated extraverts and introverts, and of stable and neurotic subjects were given a 188-item questionnaire containing questions thought to be relevant to the measurement of these two dimensions of personality. Factor analyses were also carried out for 124 of these items making available factor loadings on these two dimensions. An analysis was carried out of the relationship between rated and self-rated behaviour, and it was concluded that as far as extraversion was concerned, there was considerable agreement between these two methods of assessment. As regards neuroticism, agreement was much less close, and a theoretical explanation of this fact is given, supported by a special analysis of the empirical data. It was found that the factor analytic method of locating the E and N factors had considerable stability as from one study to another, in spite of considerable differences between the studies in choice of sample, choice of items, and other factors.