Extraversion personality, perceived health and activity participation among community-dwelling aging adults in Hong Kong

Abstract

Activity participation is essential to the wellbeing of aging adults. Divergent levels of activity participation within aging populations have been explained from diverse perspectives, but the interaction effects of key determinants, such as personality and health, are often ignored. This study examines the effects of extravert personality on aging adults’ activity levels by addressing its interaction with perceived physical health and mental health. A sample of 304 adults aged 50 and older was selected using systematic sampling from participants of an institute for promoting active aging at a university in Hong Kong in 2017. Data on socio-demographic characteristics, perceived physical and mental health, extraversion personality traits, and level of activity participation were collected using a telephone survey. Most participants (46.7%) reported moderate activity levels and over a quarter (26.6%) reported high or low activity levels. Multi-nominal logistic regression analyses show that extraversion was associated with an increased likelihood of reporting moderate (OR = 1.85, p = .036) but not high (p > .05) activity levels when adjusted for perceived physical and mental health and socio-demographics, with low activity levels being the constant comparison. Meanwhile, extraversion predicted both moderate (OR = 3.84, p = .014) and high (OR = 5.06, p = .032) activity levels for participants with poor or average perceived mental health. However, the interaction effects of extraversion with perceived physical health or mental health were not significant in predicting either moderate or high activity levels (p > .05). The implications for enhancing activity participation among aging adults are discussed in view of both personality and perceived health status.

Health-Related Quality of Life and Death Anxiety Among Hemodialysis Patients

“…Extraversion is one of the most critical personality traits, referred to as "sociability, activity, assertiveness, and positive emotionality", which means specific affection on participation in physical, cognition, and social activities (31). As confirmation for this finding, our study showed extraversion could be a predictor of mental HQL, physical HQL, and social relationship HQL, as well as death anxiety.…”

Associations between MDMA/ecstasy use and physical health in a U.S. population-based survey sample

“…For instance, ter Bogt et al (2006) surveyed a sample of Dutch party-goers and found that there may be significant pre-drug differences between individuals who do and do not consume ecstasy across personality traits. Importantly, the individuals who consumed ecstasy were noted to have more extraverted personalities, a trait that has been linked to greater engagement in physical activity (Lai and Qin, 2018; Rhodes and Smith, 2006; Wilson and Dishman, 2015). Thus, pre-drug personality differences such as these may predict healthier lifestyles for individuals who consume ecstasy, leading to more positive physical health outcomes.…”

Age and extraversion differences in heart rate reactivity during working memory tasks

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