Personality Traits in Latin America: A Cross-Cultural Study of the Big Five Factor Structure and its Relationship with Self-Reported Daily Behaviors

Abstract

The Big Five factors model of personality is one of the most internationally studied and applied since it has been replicated in multiple investigations in different countries and cultures. This five-dimensional structure has evidence from studies carrying out factor analyses in different versions and adaptations of personality measurement instruments under these theoretical assumptions, and cross-cultural studies reveal its universality. However, no research has investigated how this structure is replicated in Latin American countries yet. This study aimed to carry out a cross-cultural study evaluating the factorial congruence of the Revised International Personality Item Pool in Latin American countries. The validity was also analyzed assessing relationships with gender, age, and self-reported activities of daily living. The five-dimensional structure was supported by evidence in the different samples that participated in this study, preserving the individual differences that characterize each country. Differences according to gender and age were found in different personality factors, as well as relationships with recreational activities. It is concluded that the five-factor structure of the scale is replicated in Latin American samples and that the psychometric properties of the instrument are consistent. Limitations and future lines of research are discussed.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to express their gratitude to Dr. Milena Contreras for reviewing and correcting the English language in the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badges for Open Data. The data are openly accessible at https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/JU2YQ.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Fondo para la Investigación Científica y Tecnológica (FONCYT), the Secretaría de Ciencia y Tecnología de la Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (SECyT-UNC), and the Consejo de Investigaciones Científicas y Tecnológicas (CONICET).