Do personality traits affect productivity? Evidence from the laboratory

While survey data supports a strong relationship between personality and labour market outcomes, the exact mechanisms behind this association remain unexplored. We take advantage of a controlled laboratory set-up to explore whether this relationship operates through productivity. Using a real-effort...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Economic journal (London) Vol. 126; no. 592; pp. 654 - 681
Main Authors Cubel, Maria, Nuevo-Chiquero, Ana, Sanchez-Pages, Santiago, Vidal-Fernandez, Marian
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Oxford Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.05.2016
John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Wiley-Blackwell
Oxford University Press
Wiley
Subjects
Arbeitsproduktivität
Bildungsertrag
Großbritannien
Impact analysis
Labor market
Labor productivity
Laboratories
Personality
Personality tests
Personality traits
Persönlichkeitsmerkmal
Productivitat laboral
Productivity
Rendiment
Studies
Tests de personalitat
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Summary:While survey data supports a strong relationship between personality and labour market outcomes, the exact mechanisms behind this association remain unexplored. We take advantage of a controlled laboratory set-up to explore whether this relationship operates through productivity. Using a real-effort task, we analyse the impact of the Big Five personality traits on performance. We find that more neurotic subjects perform worse, and that more conscientious individuals perform better. These findings suggest that at least part of the effect of personality on labour market outcomes operates through productivity. In addition, we find evidence that gender and university major affect this relationship.
Bibliography:ASBLab Small Project Grants Fund
Australian School of Business (ASB) Special Research Grant
ark:/67375/WNG-GKTDTSN2-G
ArticleID:ECOJ12373
istex:A91D13504A76050F24812A123EA3094DFDAEC0C1
Spanish Ministry of the Economy and Competitiveness - No. ECO2012-33243
Data S1.
The authors acknowledge funding from the Australian School of Business (ASB) Special Research Grant and the ASB Lab Small Project Grants Fund. Cubel acknowledges funding from the Spanish Ministry of the Economy and Competitiveness research grant ECO2012‐33243. We thank Justin Cheong for excellent research assistance, Jason Fletcher, Nicholas Feltovich, Gigi Foster, Ben Greiner, Erkut Ozbay, the editor Andrea Galeotti and two anonymous referees for their constructive comments, and the participants at the BIG seminar at the University of Barcelona, the University of Sheffield, University of Stirling, MBEES 2014, ESA World Meeting 2014, Alicante Workshop on Gender Issues in Experimental Economics and the RES Meeting 2015 for useful suggestions.
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 14
ISSN:0013-0133
1468-0297
1468-0297
DOI:10.1111/ecoj.12373