Big six personality traits in the Africa Long Life Study

Kurzfassung/Abstract

We explored Big Six personality traits and their correlates among 18-year-olds from Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa (N = 1,746). Established Big-Five and Six-inventories contain culture-specific phrasing and lack fit and measurement invariance in Africa. Using the original maker terms from diverse lexical studies used to build the HEXACO, we created new, single-term Big Six scales with good fit and measurement invariance across countries, which we used to explore concurrent and predictive associations with mental/physical health, and religiosity. Results for Honesty, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness replicated findings from North America and Europe, while Extraversion and Emotionality did not, indicating more cultural-specificity. Our method represents a middle path between imported and culture-specific personality research, a promising approach for cross-cultural research.