van Tilburg, Wijnand AP (2019) 'It's not unusual to be unusual (or: A different take on multivariate distributions of personality).' Personality and Individual Differences, 139. pp. 175-180. ISSN 0191-8869

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Abstract

Personality, and many other psychological constructs, are assumed to be distributed along multiple dimensions. The current research demonstrates an intriguing implication that these multidimensional distributions hold: as dimensionality increases, people are located progressively further away from the average. In other words, multivariate models of personality render people to be rather ‘unusual.’ I review the geometric and statistical basis for this phenomenon and then illustrate its occurrence in real life using large, open-source personality data. This research offers a fresh perspective on the behavior of multivariate distributions for those who are interested in personality, psychological testing, or enjoy a lighthearted (but substantial) take on statistics.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Personality; Multivariate distribution; Multidimensionality; Big-5; 16PF
Divisions:	Faculty of Science and Health Faculty of Science and Health > Psychology, Department of
SWORD Depositor:	Elements
Depositing User:	Elements
Date Deposited:	08 Nov 2019 14:18
Last Modified:	11 Apr 2022 14:42
URI:	http://repository.essex.ac.uk/id/eprint/25853

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