Big Five personality traits and university students' academic performance: A meta-analysis

IF 3.5 2区心理学 Q1 PSYCHOLOGY, SOCIAL

Personality and Individual Differences Pub Date : 2025-03-22 DOI:10.1016/j.paid.2025.113163

Shuzhen Chen , Alan Chi Keung Cheung , Zhaobing Zeng

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Meta-analytical evidence on the linkage between university students' academic performance and personality traits, considering cultural and contextual factors, remains limited. This meta-analysis reports comprehensive assessment of the relationships between personality traits and academic performance, incorporating 84 studies published between 1995 and 2024. A total of 370 correlations with a combined sample size of 46,729 were analyzed. Academic performance was found to correlate significantly with Agreeableness (r = 0.082), Conscientiousness (r = 0.206), and Openness (r = 0.081), although two of the correlations are relatively weak. As expected, Conscientiousness was the most noteworthy predictor of academic performance. It is worth noting that extraversion is sensitive to moderating variables. There was a good degree of consistency among the measurement tools except when measuring Extraversion. Extraversion shows a negative association with academic performance in individualistic contexts (r = −0.036). Extraversion is a significant and positive factor for education majors (r = 0.046). Proportion of females weakens the influence of Extraversion. In addition, Neuroticism exhibites a significant positive association with performance among freshmen and sophomores (r = 0.042). These moderators deepen the understanding of critical role of Big Five theory in explaining academic performance.

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来源期刊

Personality and Individual Differences PSYCHOLOGY, SOCIAL-

CiteScore

8.50

自引率

4.70%

发文量

577

审稿时长

41 days

期刊介绍： Personality and Individual Differences is devoted to the publication of articles (experimental, theoretical, review) which aim to integrate as far as possible the major factors of personality with empirical paradigms from experimental, physiological, animal, clinical, educational, criminological or industrial psychology or to seek an explanation for the causes and major determinants of individual differences in concepts derived from these disciplines. The editors are concerned with both genetic and environmental causes, and they are particularly interested in possible interaction effects.