General knowledge and personality

In recent years researchers have been interested in the correlates of individual differences in general knowledge. Some psychologists consider acquired knowledge as an important component of intelligence. The concept of crystallised intelligence explicitly includes how much information a person has acquired in their life, and a number of IQ batteries, such as the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scales include measures of general knowledge. There is evidence that general knowledge is a solid predictor of academic performance (Furnham, Monsen, & Ahmetoglu, 2009).

A number of researchers have studied how general knowledge is correlated with personality traits, particularly those belonging to the Big Five model of personality. This model comprises the five broad traits of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. As far as I am aware, the correlations between general knowledge and big five personality traits have been reported in eight different papers, reporting the results of 10 different studies. A summary of the findings is provided in the table below. The first paper (Ackerman, Bowen, Beier, & Kanfer, 2001) examined only two of the Big Five (openness to experience and extraversion), whereas the remaining papers reported results for all five traits.

Eight of the ten studies used a general knowledge test developed by Irwing, Cammock and Lynn (2001). These authors defined general knowledge as consisting of culturally valued knowledge available through a range of non-specialist sources. The test they developed was intended to provide a comprehensive sample of the full range of domains of human knowledge. The test used in the study by Schaefer et al. (2004) was also intended to assess a wide spectrum of non-specialist knowledge. The study by Ackerman et al. (2001) assessed more specialised forms of knowledge, specifically from 19 domains of academic study encompassing sciences, humanities, and civics. Additionally, tests in each domain were designed so that questions were presented with increasing levels of difficulty and once a participant was unable to answer three consecutive questions each test was terminated. In this study, general knowledge was defined as a composite of these 19 domains. From this it appears that the “general knowledge” assessed in this study was of a more specialised and advanced type than that tested in the other nine studies. One possible implication of this will be addressed later.  

The trait most consistently correlated with general knowledge is openness to experience, which had a positive correlation in all studies. Openness to experience is known to be positively correlated with measures of IQ and is characterised by intellectual curiosity and interest in learning. Hence its connection with general knowledge does not seem surprising. Findings in relation to other personality traits have been less consistent. Some researchers have proposed that extraversion (Ackerman, et al., 2001) and neuroticism (Chamorro-Premuzic, Furnham, & Ackerman, 2006) would be negatively correlated with general knowledge. Extraverted people with strong social inclinations might invest less time in non-social activities associated with learning. High neuroticism is associated with test anxiety and hence with poorer performance on ability tests. Others (Furnham & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2006) have argued that conscientiousness might have a relationship with general knowledge, although whether this should be positive or negative is unclear. Research has found that conscientiousness has a modest negative relationship with intelligence, hence people high in conscientiousness might have less general knowledge. On the other hand, students high in conscientiousness achieve higher grades than their less conscientious counterparts and might be expected therefore to have more general knowledge. However, the studies shown in Table 1 reveal that extraversion, neuroticism, and conscientiousness have inconsistent correlations with general knowledge, as there is a mixture of positive and negative correlations for each of them.

Table 1. Correlations between Big Five personality traits and general knowledge in 10 studies

Study authors	N	Extraversion	Agreeableness	Conscientiousness	Neuroticism	Openness to experience
Ackerman, Bowen, Beier, & Kanfer (2001)	320	-.24**	-	-	-	.34**
Schaefer, Williams, Goodie, & Campbell (2004)	104	.05	.00	.08	.07	.34*
Chamorro-Premuzic, Furnham, & Ackerman (2006)	201	-.16*	.02	-.05	-.18*	.16*
Furnham & Chamorro-Premuzic (2006)
Study 1	118	.06	.05	.40**	.14	.36**
Study 2	92	.01	-.12	.10	.01	.25
Study 3	108	.09	.19	.23*	-.11	.50**
Furnham, Christopher, Garwood, & Martin (2007)	430	-.08	-.07	-.12**	-.07	.31**
Furnham, Swami, Arteche, & Chamorro‐Premuzic (2008)	101	.09	.01	.08	.11	.40**
Furnham, Monsen, & Ahmetoglu (2009)	212	-.02	.04	.00	-.08	.40**
Batey, Furnham, & Safiullina (2010)	100	-.01	-.09	.23*	-.01	.10

Weighted mean correlation

1786/ 1466

-.07

-.01

.04

-.04

.32

Key: *p < .05; **p < .01 

In order to obtain a more accurate estimate of the true correlations between each of the five personality traits and general knowledge, a weighted average of the correlations for each study was computed taking into account the sample size.[1] The results are shown at the bottom of the table. Openness to experience is the only personality trait with a substantial correlation with general knowledge, with what could be considered a moderate sized effect. Extraversion and neuroticism had quite small negative correlations. These are in the direction predicted by Ackerman et al. (2001) and Chamorro-Premuzic et al. (2006) but the effect sizes are much smaller than expected. Conscientiousness has a very small positive effect, suggesting that it tends to be an inconsistent predictor. The effect of agreeableness is nearly negligible. As noted previously, the study by Ackerman et al. appears to assess a somewhat more specialist and advanced type of knowledge than the other studies. When this study is excluded from the analysis, the weighted mean correlation between extraversion and general knowledge becomes almost negligible (r = -.02), whereas the correlation between openness to experience and general knowledge barely changes (r = .31).

These results indicate that as far as the Big Five are concerned, characteristics associated with openness to experience, such as general curiosity, are the most relevant to how much knowledge of the world a person acquires. Traits such as sociability, emotional stability, and achievement orientation appear to be much less important. When considering the findings of the study by Ackerman et al., it seems possible that extraversion might have little or no relationship with relatively non-specialised forms of knowledge, but that this relationship is different for more advanced levels of knowledge usually acquired with special study. That is, people who are highly extraverted may have as much non-specialist knowledge as the average person, but acquire less knowledge at a university level than their more introverted counterparts. Studies comparing non-specialist and more advanced forms of knowledge within the same samples would help to determine if this is true.

Previous research has found a substantial gender difference in general knowledge, with men tending to have greater knowledge than women (Lynn, Irwing, & Cammock, 2002). The results presented here would suggest that gender differences in general knowledge are probably not due to differences in big five personality traits. Women tend to score higher than men in neuroticism and to a lesser extent extraversion and conscientiousness (Schmitt, Realo, Voracek, & Allik, 2008) but the correlations between these traits and general knowledge appear far too small to account for the substantial gender difference in general knowledge. Furthermore, men and women do not tend to differ on their overall scores on openness to experience. Openness to experience is usually considered to consist of a number of narrower facets, including openness to ideas, values, feelings, aesthetics, actions, and fantasy. There is research evidence that men tend to be higher on openness to ideas whilst women tend to be higher on openness to feelings (Schmitt, et al., 2008). Whether or not openness to ideas is more strongly related to general knowledge than the other facets has never been examined.

Openness to ideas has a very strong conceptual similarity to a construct called typical intellectual engagement (Mussell, 2010). A number of studies (Chamorro-Premuzic, et al., 2006; Furnham, et al., 2009; Furnham, et al., 2008) have found that typical intellectual engagement has positive correlations with general knowledge. However, a study by Furnham et al. (2008) found that overall openness to experience was a stronger predictor of general knowledge than typical intellectual engagement. This finding might indicate that the broad tendency to be open to new experiences generally, rather than a specific facet of openness, supports the acquisition of general knowledge. In a previous article I argued that gender differences in general knowledge may be related to a greater male interest in things as opposed to a greater female interest in people. Elsewhere I have suggested that gender stereotypes could play a role as well. Future research could explore the respective contributions of gender typical interests, stereotypes, and possible differences in openness facets to sex differences in general knowledge.

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© Scott McGreal. Please do not reproduce without permission. Brief excerpts may be quoted as long as a link to the original article is provided.  

This article now also appears on Psychology Today on my blog Unique - Like Everybody Else.

Other posts discussing intelligence related topics

Emotional intelligence is not relevant to understanding psychopaths

Why there are sex differences in general knowledge

Personality, Intelligence and “Race Realism”

Intelligence and Political Orientation have a complex relationship

Think Like a Man? Effects of Gender Priming on Cognition

Cold Winters and the Evolution of Intelligence: A critique of Richard Lynn’s Theory

The Illusory Theory of Multiple Intelligences – a critique of Howard Gardner’s theory

References

Ackerman, P. L., Bowen, K. R., Beier, M. E., & Kanfer, R. (2001). Determinants of individual differences and gender differences in knowledge. Journal of Educational Psychology, 93(4), 797–825. doi: 10.1037/0022-0663.93.4.797

Batey, M., Furnham, A., & Safiullina, X. (2010). Intelligence, general knowledge and personality as predictors of creativity. Learning and Individual Differences, 20(5), 532-535. doi: 10.1016/j.lindif.2010.04.008

Chamorro-Premuzic, T., Furnham, A., & Ackerman, P. L. (2006). Ability and personality correlates of general knowledge. Personality and Individual Differences, 41(3), 419-429. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2005.11.036

Furnham, A., & Chamorro-Premuzic, T. (2006). Personality, intelligence and general knowledge Learning and Individual Differences, 16, 79-90 DOI: 10.1016/j.lindif.2005.07.002 Furnham, A., Christopher, A. N., Garwood, J., & Martin, G. N. (2007). Approaches to learning and the acquisition of general knowledge. Personality and Individual Differences, 43(6), 1563-1571. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2007.04.013

Furnham, A., Christopher, A. N., Garwood, J., & Martin, G. N. (2007). Approaches to learning and the acquisition of general knowledge. Personality and Individual Differences, 43(6), 1563-1571. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2007.04.013

Furnham, A., Monsen, J., & Ahmetoglu, G. (2009). Typical intellectual engagement, Big Five personality traits, approaches to learning and cognitive ability predictors of academic performance. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 79(4), 769-782. doi: 10.1348/978185409x412147

            Furnham, A., Swami, V., Arteche, A., & Chamorro‐Premuzic, T. (2008). Cognitive ability, learning approaches and personality correlates of general knowledge.  Educational Psychology, 28 (4), 427-431 DOI: 10.1080/01443410701727376

Irwing, P., Cammock, T., & Lynn, R. (2001). Some evidence for the existence of a general factor of semantic memory and its components. Personality and Individual Differences, 30(5), 857-871. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(00)00078-7
Lynn, R., Irwing, P., & Cammock, T. (2002). Sex differences in general knowledge. Intelligence, 30(1), 27-39. doi: 10.1016/s0160-2896(01)00064-2 

            Mussell, Patrick (2010). Epistemic curiosity and related constructs: Lacking evidence of discriminant validity Personality and Individual Differences, 49 DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2010.05.014

Schaefer, P. S., Williams, C. C., Goodie, A. S., & Campbell, W. K. (2004). Overconfidence and the Big Five. Journal of Research in Personality, 38(5), 473-480. doi: 10.1016/j.jrp.2003.09.010

Schmitt, D. P., Realo, A., Voracek, M., & Allik, J. (2008). Why can't a man be more like a woman? Sex differences in Big Five personality traits across 55 cultures. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 94(1), 168-182.

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[1] This is based on the theory that larger sample sizes should be given more weight as they are more likely to provide an accurate estimate than smaller samples. When the results were compared to the unweighted mean correlations there was very little difference between them. 

Think like a man: could gender priming improve female recall of general knowledge?

 As noted in a previous posting, a number of studies have found that males outperform females on tests of general knowledge. The reasons for this are not yet clear. Women’s poorer test performance could be because they actually have acquired less knowledge than men, or it could be that they are not accessing all the knowledge they have. Studies have found that experimental manipulations can actually improve a person’s performance on general knowledge tests to an extent. Women generally perform more poorly than men on spatial tasks, yet it has also been found that it is possible to experimentally improve women’s performance on these tasks so that they equal the performance of men. Whether or not it would be possible to improve women’s performance on tests of general knowledge relative to men has not yet been examined. Such a study would help illuminate whether gender differences in this area are due to real differences in acquired knowledge or mainly due to the nature of the testing situation.

Trivial pursuit questions have been used to experimentally test general knowledge

Sex differences in general knowledge favouring males that were identified in a number of studies have been attributed to differing interests between men and women rather than differences in ability (Lynn & Irwing, 2002; Lynn, Irwing, & Cammock, 2002). Another possibility that has not been explored in the research literature is that stereotype threat could have a detrimental effect on the performance of females in tests. Stereotypes are generally more favourable to men than women in intellectual domains. Men are generally perceived as more intelligent and rate themselves higher on intelligence than women (Ortner & Sieverding, 2008). Stereotypes can have a self-fulfilling effect and have been known to affect performance on achievement tests. For example, women who are reminded of their female identity perform more poorly on maths tests compared to a control group. However, priming of stereotypes can sometimes have a positive effect. Asian women primed with their Asian identity performed better than normally on a maths test.

"Oh no, not a test!!!"

Priming of stereotypes has also been found to affect performance on tests of general knowledge for better or worse (Dijksterhuis & van Knipperburg, 1998). People who were asked to think about a typical soccer hooligan (stereotypically associated with stupidity) and to list behaviours and attributes associated with such a person performed more poorly on a general knowledge test compared to those who took the test with no priming. This experimental procedure was also performed using a prime of a professor (associated with intelligence) rather than a soccer hooligan, and in this case, people actually performed better compared to those who received no priming. Obviously, thinking of professors cannot somehow make a person more knowledgeable than they really are. The authors of this study suggested that a person’s typical performance on such a test is less than optimal, meaning there is usually room for improvement. Priming of the professor stereotype might improve performance by leading to specific behavioural changes, such as increased concentration or more analytical and systematic thinking. The hooligan prime might worsen performance by inducing sloppier thinking or reduced concentration (Dijksterhuis & van Knippenberg, 1998).

Gender differences in spatial tasks are considered to be well-established, having been extensively investigated by researchers. However, there is evidence that priming of stereotypes can improve women’s performance on such tasks to a level equivalent to that of men (Ortner & Sieverding, 2008). The stereotype prime used was that of gender itself. Participants were asked to read a text that was described as “a task to test ability to put oneself in the shoes of another person.” The text consisted of a description of a day in the life of either a “typical woman” or a “typical man”. For example, the typical woman text described a woman who looked after children, spent time chatting with her friends, and who liked to daydream. The typical man text, described a man who drove a motorbike to work, was outgoing and tough-minded, bossed people around at work, and lifted weights in his spare time. Participants were then asked to describe what they would be like if they were that person, to develop a sense of identification with the person in the story. Subsequently, they performed a mental rotation task. After being primed with the story about a typical woman, female participants performed much worse than males. Males who received this prime performed only slightly worse than males who received the typical man prime. What was very striking though was that after receiving the typical man prime, females performed nearly as well as males on this task. The authors argued that these results imply that “normal” testing situations involve subtle stereotype threats, even when stereotypes are not explicitly mentioned. Gender differences in performance can therefore be reduced by changing the way the task is presented.

Experimental tests of general knowledge have so far not examined the effects of stereotypes on gender differences in performance. It is possible that asking people to perform a knowledge test activates a subtle stereotype threat that adversely affects women. Using an experimental priming procedure such as the one described above could enhance the performance of women relative to men on such tests. If this proved to be the case it would imply that women actually know more than they are letting on when they typically perform such tests. On the other hand, if a substantial gender difference remained after such a procedure it would provide evidence that males do tend to acquire more knowledge than females. Perhaps this might be due to a greater interest in understanding how things work, as opposed to a greater interest in interpersonal concerns, which is stereotypically more feminine. Additionally, it is also possible that gender differences in general knowledge are the result of a combination of reduced female performance due to stereotype threat and greater actual knowledge by males. Even if priming stereotypes had a modest effect on female performance compared to that of males, it could provide some guidance on how to assist people of both sexes in using their knowledge more effectively.  

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© Scott McGreal. Please do not reproduce without permission. Brief excerpts may be quoted as long as a link to the original article is provided. 

This article also appears on Psychology Today on my blog Unique - Like Everybody Else.

Other posts discussing the possibilities of priming
Opening the Mind: Where Skepticism and Superstition Meet 
Reason Versus Faith? The Interplay of Intuition and Rationality In Supernatural Belief
Turning the Wheels of the MInd - Clockwise movements increase openness to experience

Are Sex And Religion Natural Enemies?

Other posts discussing intelligence related topics

Emotional intelligence is not relevant to understanding psychopaths

Why there are sex differences in general knowledge

The Knowledgeable Personality

Personality, Intelligence and “Race Realism”

Intelligence and Political Orientation have a complex relationship

Cold Winters and the Evolution of Intelligence: A critique of Richard Lynn’s Theory

The Illusory Theory of Multiple Intelligences – a critique of Howard Gardner’s theory

References

Dijksterhuis, A., & van Knippenberg, A. (1998). The relation between perception and behavior, or how to win a game of trivial pursuit.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74 (4), 865-877 DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.74.4.865

Lynn, R., & Irwing, P. (2002). Sex differences in general knowledge, semantic memory and reasoning ability. British Journal of Psychology, 93(4), 545-556. doi: 10.1348/000712602761381394

Lynn, R., Irwing, P., & Cammock, T. (2002). Sex differences in general knowledge. Intelligence, 30(1), 27-39. doi: 10.1016/s0160-2896(01)00064-2

Ortner, T. M., & Sieverding, M. (2008). Where are the Gender Differences? Male Priming Boosts Spatial Skills in Women Sex Roles, 59 (3-4), 274-281 DOI: 10.1007/s11199-008-9448-9

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Further reading

General knowledge and personality

Why are there sex differences in general knowledge?

A number of research studies have found that on average males score higher than females on tests of general knowledge (Lynn & Irwing, 2002; Lynn, Irwing, & Cammock, 2002). The reasons for this are not yet clear. Differences in verbal ability or abstract reasoning have been ruled out as explanations (Lynn & Irwing, 2002). Some researchers have argued that differences are most likely due to men and women having different interests. One study for example found that out of 19 domains of knowledge tested, males scored significantly higher on 12 domains, whereas women scored higher on two domains, medicine and cookery. Women are generally more interested in nurturing roles than men, so it makes sense that they would be more knowledgeable in these two areas. What is more puzzling though is that in other domains considered stereotypically feminine, there were either no gender differences (fashion and art), or men actually scored higher (literature). Previous research has found that women do tend to express more interest in artistic activities (Su, Rounds, & Armstrong, 2009) yet they did not have more knowledge of art than men. Males scored higher on domains related to current affairs, sports and games, and general science and biology. 

One explanation proposed for the male advantage in these domains, derived from evolutionary psychology, is that males are “biologically programmed” to be more concerned with competition for status and power, and these are central to such areas as current affairs (which includes politics and finance) and in sport and games. This seems all very well for those particular domains, especially politics, in which status and power concerns are very salient. However, “current affairs” in this study also encompassed the domains of history, geography, and exploration and discovery, and it is less clear how competition for status and power would lead to greater knowledge of these areas. Similarly, it is much less clear if this theory can explain why males would have greater knowledge of general science and biology or even the supposedly ‘feminine’ domain of literature. The authors admitted that gender differences in particular interests might be culturally determined but this still begs the question of why these differences occur, particularly in modern western societies where gender equality is increasingly emphasised.

Previous research has found that from an early age boys tend to show more interest in things, whereas girls show a greater interest in people (Su, et al., 2009). SimonBaron-Cohen (2003) has proposed that due to differences in the organisation of the brain, males have a bias towards “systematising”, that is, understanding the principles behind how things work, whereas females have a bias towards “empathising”, that is, understanding how people think and feel in particular social situations. This model might help explain why males tend to acquire greater factual knowledge than females. Males might have a greater motivation to gain factual knowledge due to a desire to understand how things in the world operate. Females might find this less appealing as they may be more motivated to learn about and understand people in their lives. As far as I know, there has not been any research examining whether gender differences in general knowledge are related to variation in systematising versus empathising.

Follow me on Facebook, Google Plus, or Twitter.

© Scott McGreal. Please do not reproduce without permission. Brief excerpts may be quoted as long as a link to the original article is provided.  

           This article also appears on Psychology Today on my blog Unique - Like Everybody Else.

Other posts discussing intelligence related topics

The Knowledgeable Personality - How general knowledge is related to Big Five personality traits 

Emotional intelligence is not relevant to understanding psychopaths

Personality, Intelligence and “Race Realism”

Intelligence and Political Orientation have a complex relationship

Think Like a Man? Effects of Gender Priming on Cognition

Cold Winters and the Evolution of Intelligence: A critique of Richard Lynn’s Theory

The Illusory Theory of Multiple Intelligences – a critique of Howard Gardner’s theory

References

Baron-Cohen, S. (2003). The essential difference: men, women and the extreme

male brain. London: Penguin.

Lynn, R., & Irwing, P. (2002). Sex differences in general knowledge, semantic memory and reasoning ability British Journal of Psychology, 93 (4), 545-556 DOI: 10.1348/000712602761381394

Lynn, R., Irwing, P., & Cammock, T. (2002). Sex differences in general knowledge Intelligence, 30 (1), 27-39 DOI: 10.1016/S0160-2896(01)00064-2

Su, R., Rounds, J., & Armstrong, P. I. (2009). Men and Things, Women and People: A Meta-Analysis of Sex Differences in Interests. Psychological Bulletin, 135(6), 859–884. doi: 10.1037/a0017364