A new tool to assess the occurrence of personality traits: the Phenomenological Personality Factor questionnaire.

BACKGROUND

Personality traits are patterns of thoughts, feelings and actions that are usually assessed by means of psychometric questionnaires. In the present study we described the Phenomenological Personality Factor (PPF), a short questionnaire assessing the personality traits, taking into account the different interpretative models of personality.

METHODS

A sample of 554 healthy subjects (357 female; 197 males) aged 18-60 years were enrolled. Each participant was required to complete PPF, by indicating the presence/absence of the individual personality trait, and the Italian version of the Affective Neuroscience Personality Scale (ANPS).

RESULTS

The principal component analysis showed that seven factors explained the 35.07% of the total variance. Moreover, the correlation analysis revealed that the PPF components were significantly and positively associated with the ANPS scales.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings suggest that the PPF is a useful questionnaire to assess the personality traits, and the adaptive functioning, in healthy individuals.