De invloed van persoonlijkheidskenmerken op het bereikte opleidingsniveau

Samenvatting

The impact of personality traits on educational attainment. Summary: This article investigates the effects of the Big Five personality traits (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness) on educational attainment in the Netherlands, using data from the 1998 Family Survey Dutch Population (N=l 860 men and women with complete information on all relevant variables). In general, the impact of personality is stronger for men than for women. Emotional stability, conscientiousness, and especially openness affect educational success positively, whereas extraversion and agreeableness have small negative effects. Although we had expected that personality effects would be larger in the later stages of the educational career, no differences were found between earlier and later transitions. One important finding is that personality effects are independent of those of family background Therefore, the effects of family background are not overestimated in models without controls for personality traits.