’Cause You’ve Got Personality

The integration of the Big Five personality traits into models of political participation represents an important advance in the political behavior literature. However, because national surveys that include political and personality measures are not widespread, such analyses have been limited in number. In addition, there have been inconsistencies within and across studies on personality and participation. The availability of more data make it possible to compare the performance of personality measurement batteries across recent political surveys, reexamine hypotheses about the link between personality and participation, test the explanatory power of personality across samples and in different contexts, and expand measures of political and civic engagement, all of which I do in this article. Personality traits do influence political participation, although the magnitude and direction of effects depend on the particular act. Extraversion has a consistent effect on participation, but the effects of Agreeableness, Openness, Conscientiousness, and Emotional Stability are much less consistent.