Are people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) particularly nice? An international online case-control study of the Big Five personality factors.

BACKGROUND

Many people with ALS have been suggested to have a "nice" personality, but most ALS personality studies to date have had limited numbers of participants and have not taken into account personality differences between genders. We used Big Five Inventory data obtained from an online questionnaire looking for risk factors for ALS to investigate personality traits in large numbers of people with ALS and controls.

METHODS

A total of 741 questionnaire respondents aged 40 years and over indicated the extent to which they agreed with each of the 44 Big Five Inventory statements. Respondents were 339 with ALS (212 male, 127 female) who responded to the statements as they applied to them before their diagnosis and 402 controls (120 male, 282 female). Unpaired t tests with 95% confidence intervals were used to compare mean values of Big Five-factor scores.

RESULTS

Female respondents taken together had higher mean scores for Agreeableness and Neuroticism than all male respondents. Male ALS respondents had higher mean scores than male controls for Conscientiousness and Extraversion. Female ALS respondents had higher mean scores than female controls for Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Extraversion, and a lower score for Neuroticism.

CONCLUSIONS

Many people with ALS have personality traits that are likely to underlie the perception they are particularly "nice." This raises the possibility that genetic polymorphisms that influence personality could play a role in ALS. Furthermore, different personality traits could underlie lifestyle choices that are currently thought to be risk factors for ALS.