Intelligence, “Big Five” personality traits, and work drive as predictors of course grade

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(02)00330-6Get rights and content

Abstract

General intelligence, Big Five personality constructs, and a measure of work drive were studied in relation to course grade in an undergraduate psychology course taught by the same professor for 175 students over a 5-year period. Using a hierarchical multiple regression analysis, general intelligence accounted significantly for 16% of the variance in course grade; Big Five personality measures accounted significantly for an additional 7% of the variance; and work drive accounted significantly for an additional 4% of the variance. However, when work drive was entered before the Big Five variables, the Big Five variables did not add significantly (either as a set or individually) to the prediction of course grade. Results were discussed in terms of the importance of personality constructs in uniquely predicting academic performance and the need for additional study using more diverse predictors and aggregated criterion measures.

Section snippets

Research design

A field study of students in one course taught by one instructor over a period of 5 years measured course grades, general intelligence via the Otis–Lennon test, a measure of the “Big Five” personality traits tailored for college students, and a measure of work drive.

Participants

The sample for this study was comprised of a total of 175 students enrolled in a senior-level course in psychological testing from 1997 to 2001 at a large southeastern state university. The same professor taught this course each of

Results

Table 1 displays the descriptive statistics and the correlation matrix for the study variables. As can be seen from this table, the following constructs were significantly related to course grade: Openness (r=0.16, P<0.05), Conscientiousness (r=0.18, P<0.05), Work Drive (r=0.28, P<0.01), and general intelligence (r=0.40, P<0.01).

To examine the incremental validity of the Big Five and work drive constructs above and beyond general intelligence, we conducted a hierarchical multiple regression

Discussion

Our results confirmed the significant, positive relationship between general intelligence and course grade. This result is consistent with results of other studies that found a significant positive relationship between SAT/ACT scores and course grades (Dollinger & Orf, 1991, Paunonen & Ashton, 2001). Since SAT correlates about 0.70 with the Otis Lennon Mental Ability Test (Otis & Lennon, 1969), it is an open question whether SAT or ACT scores uniquely related to course grades after controlling

References (44)

  • N.W Brown

    Cognitive, interest, and personality variables predicting first—semester GPA

    Psychological Reports

    (1994)
  • D Cherrington

    The work ethic: working values and values that work

    (1980)
  • J Cohen et al.

    Applied multiple regression/correlation analysis for the behavioral sciences

    (1983)
  • P Costa et al.

    The NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and the NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) professional manual

    (1985)
  • J Digman

    Personality structureemergence of the five-factor model

    Annual Review of Psychology

    (1990)
  • E.D Dyer

    Can university success and first-year job performance be predicted from academic achievement, vocational interest, personality and biographical measures?

    Psychological Reports

    (1987)
  • L.R Goldberg

    The development of marker variables for the Big-Five factor structure

    Psychological Assessment

    (1992)
  • R Hill et al.

    Double jeopardywork ethic differences in youth at risk of school failure

    Career Development Quarterly

    (1999)
  • R Hogan

    Personality assessment

  • O John

    The “big five” factor taxonomy: dimensions of personality in the natural language and in questionnaires

  • R Kanungo

    Measurement of job and work involvement

    Journal of Applied Psychology

    (1982)
  • E Lawler et al.

    Relationship of job characteristics to job involvement, satisfaction, and intrinsic motivation

    Journal of Applied Psychology

    (1970)
  • Cited by (159)

    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text