A pilot study of change in cerebral activity during personality rating by questionnaire and personal computer

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine cerebral blood flow in the frontal cortex area during personality self-rating tasks. Our two hypotheses were (1) cerebral blood flow varies based on personality rating condition and (2) cerebral blood flow varies based on the personality traits. This experiment measured cerebral blood flow under 3 personal computer rating conditions and 2 questionnaire conditions. Comparing the rating conditions, the results of the t-test indicated that cerebral blood flow was higher in the questionnaire condition than it was in the personal computer condition. With respect to the Big Five, the result of the correlation coefficient, that is, cerebral blood flow during a personality rating task, changed according to the trait for agreeableness. The results of the analysis of the 5-cluster on individual differences indicated that certain personality traits were related to the factors that increased or decreased cerebral blood flow. An analysis of variance indicated that openness to experience and Behavioural Activation System-drive was significant given that participants with high intellectual curiosity were motivated in this experiment, thus, their cerebral blood flow may have increased. The significance of this experiment was that by employing certain performance measures we could examine differences in physical changes based on personality traits.

Classification of Participants Based on Increase–Decrease Rate Model of Reaction Time to Personality Trait Words

“…As shown in Table 3, the participants of Cluster 2 clearly had an increased judgment time with the trait words active, restrained, tightwad, sedate, and intelligent. RT measured as time to judge negative stimulus words increased [11]. The participants in Cluster 1 showed innovative dominance.…”