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Cited by 256Personality Traits and PsychologyEvolutionary Psychology and Human BehaviorPsychological Testing and Assessment

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 81 of the 82 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

The Distance Between Mars and Venus: Measuring Global Sex Differences in Personality

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Del Giudice, Marco, Booth, Tom, Irwing, Paul·2012·PLoS ONE
DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0029265PMC PMC3251566
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Abstract

BACKGROUND: Sex differences in personality are believed to be comparatively small. However, research in this area has suffered from significant methodological limitations. We advance a set of guidelines for overcoming those limitations: (a) measure personality with a higher resolution than that afforded by the Big Five; (b) estimate sex differences on latent factors; and (c) assess global sex differences with multivariate effect sizes. We then apply these guidelines to a large, representative adult sample, and obtain what is presently the best estimate of global sex differences in personality. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Personality measures were obtained from a large US sample (N = 10,261) with the 16PF Questionnaire. Multigroup latent variable modeling was used to estimate sex differences on individual personality dimensions, which were then aggregated to yield a multivariate effect size (Mahalanobis D). We found a global effect size D = 2.71, corresponding to an overlap of only 10% between the male and female distributions. Even excluding the factor showing the largest univariate ES, the global effect size was D = 1.71 (24% overlap). These are extremely large differences by psychological standards. SIGNIFICANCE: The idea that there are only minor differences between the personality profiles of males and females should be rejected as based on inadequate methodology.

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  1. A Fausto-Sterling, 1992, Myths of gender: Biological theories about women and men (2nd ed.)
  2. 1994, The 16PF fifth edition technical manual

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Metadata

Authors
Del Giudice, M., Booth, T., & Irwing, P.
Affiliations
University of Manchester (GB)
ORCID
Booth, Tom
Venue
PLoS ONE
Publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Published
2012-01-04
Volume
7
Issue
1
Pages
e29265
ISSN
1932-6203 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0029265
PMC
PMC3251566
OpenAlex
W2156603052
Cited by
256
References
82
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 17 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 24 · 2021: 16 · 2020: 67 · 2019: 14 · 2018: 14 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 19 · 2015: 13 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 16 · 2012: 5
FWCI
16.19
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • PLoS ONE (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Research Explorer (The University of Manchester) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
  • ArTS Archivio della ricerca di Trieste (University of Trieste https://www.units.it/) (submittedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Institutional Research Information System University of Turin (University of Turin) (submittedVersion)
  • Edinburgh Research Explorer (University of Edinburgh) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Funders
Regione Piemonte (L.R.n.4./2006, 4/2006)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Personality Traits and Psychology
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Psychological Testing and Assessment
Keywords
sex differences in personality, Big Five personality traits, 16PF, latent variable models, multigroup analysis, methodological limitations
MeSH terms
Adult, Female, Humans, Male, Personality, Personality Inventory, Personality Tests, Psychometrics, Surveys and Questionnaires, Sex Characteristics, Sex Differentiation, Mars, Venus

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