The NEO PI 3: A More Readable Revised NEO Personality Inventory

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1 Journal of Personality Assessment ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: The NEO PI 3: A More Readable Revised NEO Personality Inventory Robert R. McCrae, Paul T. Costa, Jr. & Thomas A. Martin To cite this article: Robert R. McCrae, Paul T. Costa, Jr. & Thomas A. Martin (2005) The NEO PI 3: A More Readable Revised NEO Personality Inventory, Journal of Personality Assessment, 84:3, , DOI: /s jpa8403_05 To link to this article: Published online: 10 Jun Submit your article to this journal Article views: View related articles Citing articles: 122 View citing articles Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at Download by: [ ] Date: 23 December 2017, At: 20:44

2 MCCRAE, NEO PI 3 COSTA, MARTIN JOURNAL OF PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT, 84(3), The NEO PI 3: A More Readable Revised NEO Personality Inventory Robert R. McCrae and Paul T. Costa, Jr. National Institute on Aging, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services Baltimore, Maryland Thomas A. Martin Department of Psychology Susquehanna University Use of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI R; Costa & McCrae, 1992) in adolescent samples has shown that a few respondents have difficulty with a subset of items. We identified 30 items that were not understood by at least 2% of adolescent respondents and 18 additional items with low item-total correlations, and we wrote 2 trial replacement items for each. We used self-report and observer rating data from 500 respondents aged 14 to 20 to select replacement items. The modified instrument retained the intended factor structure and showed slightly better internal consistency, cross-observer agreement, and readability (Flesch Kincaid grade level = 5.3). The NEO PI 3 appears to be useful in high school and college samples and may have wider applicability to adults as well. The NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI; Costa & McCrae, 1985) was designed for use by adults. Shortly after its publication, it became clear that college students could also use the instrument but required separate norms (Costa & Mc- Crae, 1989). Recent studies (Baker & Victor, 2003; McCrae et al., 2002) have shown that the Revised NEO PI (NEO PI R; Costa & McCrae, 1992) can be used in samples as young as 10 but that some younger respondents have difficulty understanding certain items. McCrae et al. administered the NEO PI R to high school students with instructions to leave blank any item they did not understand. For 210 of the 240 items, at least 98% of respondents answered; the remaining 30 items included terms such as fastidious, adhere, and lackadaisical, which even some adults might find difficult. There is evidence that these 30 items are reliably problematic: Baker and Victor (2003), in a very diverse, predominantly Black U.S. sample with a mean age of 13.0 years, NEO PI R items in the Appendix are reproduced by special permission of the Publisher, Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc., North Florida Avenue, Lutz, Florida 33549, from the NEO Personality Inventory Revised by Paul T. Costa, Jr., and Robert R. McCrae, Copyright 1978, 1985, 1989, 1992 by PAR, Inc. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission from PAR, Inc. found that many of the same words were not understood by their respondents, and 15 of these 30 difficult items caused problems for Belgian children taking a Flemish version of the NEO PI R (De Fruyt, Mervielde, Hoekstra, & Rolland, 2000). Even with these problematic items, Baker and Victor (2003) reported a clear replication of the adult five-factor structure, although some empirical weaknesses were noted. Similarly, Allik, Laidra, Realo, & Pullmann (2004) reported that the adult factor structure of the Estonian NEO Five-Factor Inventory was less clearly replicated in a subsample of 12-year-olds than in older adolescents. These limitations on factor replicability might be due to true developmental changes in factor structure or to cognitive limitations in self-understanding that distort the accuracy of self-reports in younger adolescents. However, it is also possible that younger children simply did not understand the vocabulary in some of the items and that a simplified version of the NEO PI R might produce a closer approximation to the adult structure. Testing that hypothesis requires a modified version of the NEO PI R, and that more readable version could make the instrument appropriate for a wider range of respondents. In this article, we describe the development and preliminary validation of the NEO PI 3.

3 262 MCCRAE, COSTA, MARTIN Any change in an established test requires a balance between improving psychometrics and retaining known validity. Because the NEO PI R has worked well in a variety of contexts, we chose a conservative approach in which the great majority of items were retained verbatim. However, the revision process also offered an opportunity to improve a small number of items that performed poorly for reasons other than readability. In the self-report form of the NEO PI R, 14 of the 30 facet scales had coefficient alphas of.70 or less (Costa & McCrae, 1992). For these facets, we examined corrected item-total correlations in two samples: 1,959 high school students (McCrae et al., 2002) and 1,492 adults (see McCrae & Costa, 2004). A total of 24 items had item-total correlations less than.30 in both samples; 6 of these were among the 30 items already identified as problematic. Thus, 48 items, from 20 of the 30 facets, were selected for possible replacement in the NEO PI 3. One of the unusual features of the NEO PI R is the availability of two versions, Form S for self-reports and Form R for observer ratings. Because these are parallel instruments, it was necessary to change both, so data on both Form S and Form R were gathered. That design offers two advantages over a simple self-report study. First, simultaneous item selection across the two forms is a kind of cross-validation, reducing the possibility of capitalizing on chance. Second, because a subset of participants were sibling pairs who rated themselves and each other, the design makes it possible to examine cross-observer validity evidence on the NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 in an adolescent sample. METHOD Participants and Procedure Participants were 536 individuals ranging in age from 14 to 20 who constituted the first phase of a larger study spanning the adolescent and adult life span. Age and sex were stratified, with overrepresentation of the late adolescent groups because evidence suggests that age changes are most marked then (Costa & McCrae, 2002). After tabulating the frequency of missing items for preliminary analyses, protocols were screened for validity using the criteria specified in the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI R) and NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) Professional Manual (Costa & McCrae, 1992) for validity checks, random responding, and missing items, 1 and all further analyses were conducted on the 500 respondents who had valid protocols for both Form S and Form R. 2 Participants resided in 26 1 The Manual specifies that a protocol is invalid if more than 40 items are missing. Because we included an additional 96 items in the test booklet, we increased that value proportionately to In our experience, invalid protocols typically retain some validity (cf. Carter et al., 2001). After recoding missing values as neutral, coefficient alphas for the NEO PI 3 Form S scales ranged from states, although most were from Pennsylvania. Characteristics of the sample are given in Table 1. The sample was predominantly White. High academic achievers were overrepresented in this sample in which the majority expected to obtain a postbaccalaureate degree. Most (474) listed English as their best language, although 82 respondents also spoke other languages with their families. Potential participants were contacted by one of 53 undergraduate research assistants from two liberal arts colleges located in the eastern and southern United States. Most participants were acquaintances of the research assistants. Research assistants described the study to potential participants and if they were under 18 years of age, to a parent as well. If an individual expressed interest in participating (and, when necessary, the parent agreed), the research assistant submitted a referral with the identity, age, and contact information for the participant. Questionnaires were then mailed to participants. To implement the cross-observer design, an attempt was made to recruit sibling pairs in which both individuals were aged 14 to 20 and both agreed to rate and be rated by the other. Complete data were obtained from 90 pairs. Individuals not paired with a sibling chose an anonymous target to rate and were asked to specify their relationship to the target. Most (226) rated friends, 79 rated siblings, and 12 rated a spouse or domestic partner. Approximately once per week, research assistants were forwarded a list of all individuals they had referred within the past 10 weeks who had not yet returned their questionnaires. Research assistants were encouraged to contact such participants to ask whether they had questions about any aspect of the task, tell them that they could break their work into sessions of whatever number and length were convenient to them, and encourage them to return the questionnaire. This approach worked well: 62.8% of all questionnaires mailed to females were returned as were 48.5% of the questionnaires sent to males. Participants and research assistants were each paid $20 for completed questionnaires. Instruments The NEO PI R is a 240-item questionnaire that assesses 30 specific traits (or facets), 6 for each of the five basic personality dimensions: Neuroticism (N), Extraversion (E), Openness to Experience (O), Agreeableness (A), and Conscien-.80 to.88 in the subsample of 36 invalid protocols; for Form R, they ranged from.75 to.90. Correlations between the Form S domains and the Subjective Well-Being scale remained significant for Neuroticism (r =.34, N = 35, p <.05) and Extraversion (r =.35, N = 35, p <.05) as did the correlation between Conscientiousness and self-reported grades (r =.42, N = 35, p <.05). These results suggest that whereas researchers may wish to discard questionable protocols, clinicians may still obtain some useful information from nominally invalid protocols, cautiously interpreted.

4 TABLE 1 Characteristics of the Sample Characteristic n % Gender Male Female Age Ethnicity Hispanic White Black Asian/Pacific Islander Other Self-reported grades All As Mostly As Mostly As and Bs Mostly Bs Mostly Bs and Cs Mostly Cs Mostly Cs and Ds Highest degree expected High school College Master s degree Doctoral degree Family income < $40, $40,000 to 80, > $80, Note. ns do not sum to 500 because of missing data. NEO PI tiousness (C). Items are answered on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. Scales are roughly balanced to control for the effects of acquiescence. Data on the reliability and validity of the instrument is summarized in the Manual (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Parallel self-report (Form S) and observer rating (Form R) versions have been validated. For each of the 48 items identified as potentially problematic, two alternatives were written. The first was generally a restatement of the item in simpler words; the second, a new item theoretically relevant to the facet. The keying of the two alternatives matched the original item so that scoring keys for the NEO PI 3 would match those of the NEO PI R. For this study, the 96 alternative items were interspersed among the 240 original items. In addition to the NEO PI R, respondents completed several brief measures of well-being: The Affect Balance Scale (Bradburn, 1969), a Satisfaction Index that asks about various aspects of life (Costa & McCrae, 1984), the one-item Delighted Terrible Scale (Andrews & Withey, 1976), and the 5-item Satisfaction With Life Scale (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985). These scales were all intercorrelated (rs =.42 to.73, all ps <.001), so they were summed to form a single Subjective Well-Being (SWB) scale (α =.88). In adult samples, NEO PI R N has been shown to be negatively related to subjective well-being, whereas E, A, and C are positively related (e.g., McCrae & Costa, 1991). Well-being was included in this study as a criterion variable to provide partial evidence of construct validity of the NEO PI 3 in an adolescent sample. Item Selection The choice of replacement items was based on a number of considerations. For each of the 20 facet scales that were to be revised, we first created a subscale criterion score composed of all the items that were to be retained and correlated this score with the problematic item and its two alternatives in both Form S and Form R versions. In general, results from the two forms were similar. If one of the alternatives was correlated at least as strongly with the criterion score as the original item, it was selected. This strategy was questionable for those facets in which several items were to be replaced because the few remaining items formed a less-than-optimal criterion. We therefore also extracted a single general factor from all original and replacement items for each such facet; item selection was then based on factor loadings. Three of the replacement items that would have been chosen by these methods of item selection were answered by less than 98% of the sample and were thus deemed inappropriate for the NEO PI 3. Some of the replacement items that would have been selected for N5: Impulsiveness were more strongly related to C than to N, and were therefore discarded. In a few instances, neither of the intended alternatives improved on the original, but other alternative items written for the same facet did, and these were selected. Preliminary Analyses RESULTS Respondents had been asked to circle any word or phrase they did not understand. A tally showed that the most difficult words for this sample were fastidious (times circled in Form S = 57), panhandlers (39), permissiveness (33), shrewdness (28), lackadaisical (26), methodical (20), aesthetic (14), overindulge (12), and cynical (11). This list shows substantial overlap with the problem words in Baker and Victor (2003). After discarding three Form S and seven Form R protocols with more than 56 missing items, we counted the number of missing responses for each item and identified 18 items with lessthan98%responserate;13oftheseoverlappedwiththe30 identified by McCrae et al. (2002), and 3 were from the pool of alternative items. The similarity of results in Baker and Victor (2003), McCrae et al. (2002), and this study suggests that the most problematic items were accurately identified.

5 264 MCCRAE, COSTA, MARTIN To gauge the representativeness of the sample of 500 valid protocols, we scored the NEO PI R and compared mean values with the published college student age norms. Both males and females had means of 50 ± 3 T-score points for all domains and facets. Item Analyses Acceptable replacements were found for 37 of the 48 items 3 slated for revision; these are shown in the Appendix. Five of the 30 items with low readability in McCrae et al. (2002) were answered by more than 98% of this sample and had psychometric properties that could not be improved on with the available alternatives. However, 25 of the 30 difficult items were replaced, which eliminated all of the frequently circled words identified in the preliminary analysis with the exception of methodical. When Item 70, I am not a very methodical person, was replaced by I m not a very orderly or methodical person, the item became intelligible to more respondents, and the validity of the item improved considerably. Of the 18 additional items identified as having low item facet correlations in previous studies, 12 were replaced, and 4 of the remaining items worked well in this sample(corrected item facet rs =.30 to.38). Thus, only 2 consistently problematic items (48 and 52) remain in the NEO PI 3, and Item 52 is acceptable in Form R (corrected item facet r =.32). Table 2 reports data on the original and replacement items. Columns 3 and 4 give Flesch Kincaid grade level for the original and replacement item. For 21 of the 25 items with low readability, reading grade level was reduced with the new item, and overall, the median grade for the 37 items decreased from 8.3 to 4.4. Columns 5 and 6 present corrected item facet correlations for the NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 for Form S; similar data for Form R are given in columns 7 and 8. For Form S, correlations increased with 32 of the 37 replacements, and the median corrected item facet correlation increased substantially from.28 to.37. For Form R, correlations increased with 32 of the replacements, and the median rose from.30 to.42. Scale Analyses Table 3 reports analyses of the scales for both versions; they show that both work well in this adolescent sample and that the NEO PI 3 scales appear to offer a slight improvement. Columns 2 and 3 of Table 3 report coefficient alphas for the two versions of Form S. At the domain level, the two versions have equivalent reliability (median α =.89); at the facet level, revisions lead to alphas that are the same or higher in 18 of the 19 cases, with notable improvements for A6, Tender-Mindedness and C2, Dutifulness. Only O6, Values, 3 Items 19, 48, 52, 53, 87, 112, 201, 231, 233, 234, and 239 were not replaced. shows a small drop in internal consistency, and both E4, Activity, and O4, Actions continue to show marginal internal consistency despite the revision. Columns 5 and 6 show similar results for Form R. Columns 4 and 7 show equivalence correlations between the old and new versions of the scales that were revised for Form S and Form R, respectively. The domain scores are virtually unchanged, with all correlations.98 or higher as would be expected given the extensive item overlap and data from a single administration. In self-reports, the facet scale correlations range from.83 for A6, Tender-Mindedness (in which ½ the items were changed) to.98 for O2, Aesthetics, and A5, Modesty. Comparable results are seen for observer ratings. All these correlations support the view that the new scales measure equivalent constructs. Columns 8 and 9 of Table 3 report cross-observer correlations, which compare favorably to most studies using adults (cf. McCrae et al., 2004). Revisions made little difference at the domain level. At the facet level, notable improvements were found for N5, Impulsiveness, O6, Tender-Mindedness, and C3, Dutifulness. Curiously, validity declined a bit for A5, Modesty. We examined the readability of NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 facets using the Flesch Kincaid reading grade level. For 17 of the 19 facets with item changes, readability increased. Only E4, Activity, showed a small increase in reading difficulty from 3.2 years to 4.0 years. Across all 30 facets, the median grade level decreased slightly from 5.2 to 5.0. Factor Structure Principal component analysis was conducted on Form S and Form R facets for both the NEO PI R and the NEO PI 3. In each case, parallel analysis (Cota, Longman, Stewart, Holden, & Fekken, 1993) clearly indicated the presence of five factors. After varimax rotation, the intended structure was found in each analysis, with congruence coefficients ranging from.91 to.98. McCrae, Zonderman, Costa, Bond, and Paunonen (1996) recommended that factor replication be evaluated after rotation toward the normative adult Form S structure (Costa & McCrae, 1992); results for Form S are reported in Table 4. The structures of the original and revision are very similar, and both closely approximate the adult structure, with congruence coefficients ranging from.94 to.98. Across the revision, the most noteworthy changes are for N5, Impulsiveness and E4, Activity, which show increased loading on their intended factor, and E5, Excitement Seeking and A6, Tender-Mindedness, which show decreased loadings. For the latter two facets, the diminished factor loadings in conjunction with higher internal consistency (see Table 3) suggest that the scales contain more specific variance and thus may be improved markers of their intended construct. Note that despite low internal consistency, E4, Activity and O4, Actions were clear definers of their intended factor.

6 NEO PI TABLE 2 Item Selection Statistics Flesch Kincaid Grade Item Total, Form S Item Total, Form R Facet Item NEO PI R NEO PI 3 NEO PI R NEO PI 3 NEO PI R NEO PI 3 N1 121 a,b N4 16 a N4 136 a N N5 21 a,b N E3 42 a E E4 47 a,b E E6 57 a E6 147 a O2 8 a,b O O O6 118 a O6 148 a O6 238 a,b A1 4 a,b A2 219 a,b A A5 114 a A6 29 a A A6 119 a,b A6 149 a C1 5 a,b C C1 125 a C1 185 a,b C C2 70 a,b C2 160 a,b C C3 165 a C C4 20 a,b Mdn Note. For item total analyses,n= 500. See Table 4 for facet labels. NEO PI R = Revised NEO Personality Inventory; N = Neuroticism; E = Extraversion; O = Openness; A = Agreeableness; C = Conscientiousness. a Item left missing by more than 2% of the sample in McCrae et al. (2002). b Item left missing by more than 2% of the present sample. Results for Form R are very similar, with congruence coefficients ranging from.92 to.98 after targeted rotation. Similar changes in loadings are found for N5, Impulsiveness, E4, Activity, E5, Excitement Seeking, and A6, Tender-Mindedness in the Form R revision. Correlates To provide preliminary evidence of validity, we correlated NEO PI 3 scales with SWB, gender, age, and self-reported grades. As hypothesized, SWB was significantly related to N, E, A, and C (rs =.53,.30,.17, and.39, respectively; all ps <.001) but not to O (r =.07, ns). Consistent with research on gender differences (Costa, Terracciano, & McCrae, 2001), women scored higher than men on all five domains, although the effects were small in magnitude (rs =.10 to.24, ps <.05). Consistent with earlier studies of adolescents (Mc- Crae et al., 2002; Robins, Fraley, Roberts, & Trzesniewski, 2001), there were small cross-sectional increases in O and C (rs =.11 and.12, respectively; ps <.05) but no age associations for the other factors. Self-reported grades were related only to C (r =.33, p <.001), which has been noted as the main predictor of grades in other populations (e.g., Chamorro-Premuzic & Furnham, 2003; Lievens, Coetsier, De Fruyt, & De Maeseneer, 2002). All these correlates suggest that NEO PI 3 scales have convergent and discriminant validity when used in an adolescent population. Analyses in Subsamples The NEO PI R has been used extensively in college-age samples, and the NEO PI 3 is a relatively minor modifica-

7 266 MCCRAE, COSTA, MARTIN TABLE 3 Internal Consistency, Cross-Version Correlations, and Cross-Observer Correlations for NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 Scales Form S Form R Coefficient α Coefficient α Cross-Observer r ra R3 Scale NEO PI R NEO PI 3 NEO PI R NEO PI 3 r R3 NEO PI R NEO PI 3 Domains N *** 38*** E *** 60*** O *** 55*** A *** 47*** C *** 53*** Mdn Facets N *** 40*** N2 b *** N3 b *** N *** 39*** N * 21** N6 b *** E1 b *** E2 b *** E *** 44*** E *** 51*** E *** 54*** E *** 49*** O1 b *** O *** 59*** O3 b *** O *** 29*** O5 b *** O *** 44*** A *** 26*** A ** 22** A3 b *** A *** 51*** A *** 38*** A * 23** C *** 35*** C *** 46*** C *** 46*** C *** 43*** C5 b *** C6 b *** Mdn Note. N = 500, except for cross-observer correlations (n = 180). See Table 4 for facet labels. Decimal points are omitted. Median for facets is across all 30 scales. NEO PI R = Revised NEO Personality Inventory; N = Neuroticism; E = Extraversion; O = Openness; A = Agreeableness; C = Conscientiousness. a Equivalence coefficient, NEO PI R with NEO PI 3 scale. b Facet unchanged. *p <.05. **p <.01. ***p < The factor structure among these younger adolescents was virtually identical to the structure of the full adolescent sample, with factor congruencies for Forms S and R all.98 or.99. tion, so results so far are not surprising. There are, however, only a handful of studies using the NEO PI R in high school age samples. We therefore repeated the major analyses, restricting the sample to the 204 respondents aged 14 to 17. Results are reported in Table 5; values for NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 domains are similar, with a slight overall advantage for the revised version. Compared to the total group, the internal consistency is slightly higher, whereas cross-observer agreement, factor structure, 4 and correlates are virtually the same. Allik et al. (2004), in an Estonian sample, found that 14-year-olds had personality structures very similar to adults and that the structure was practically indistinguishable from adult personality by age 16 (p. 445). This appears to be the case for American adolescents as well, from both self and observer perspectives. Finally, academically successful adolescents were overrepresented in this sample, although the NEO PI 3 was designed chiefly for individuals with limited vocabularies. To examine the performance of the instrument in a group more closely resembling those on whom it may be used, we analyzed NEO PI 3 responses of 113 individuals who reported getting grades in the B to D range (see Table 1). Inter-

8 NEO PI TABLE 4 Factor Structure for Form S NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 Facet Scales After Targeted Rotation Procrustes-Rotated Principal Component N E O A C VC a Scale and Facet R 3 R 3 R 3 R 3 R 3 R 3 N1: Anxiety b.97 b N2: Angry Hostility c b.99 b N3: Depression c b.99 b N4: Self-Consciousness b.97 b N5: Impulsiveness b.99 b N6: Vulnerability c b.98 b E1: Warmth c b.98 b E2: Gregariousness c b.97 b E3: Assertiveness b.99 b E4: Activity b.98 b E5: Excitement Seeking b.97 b E6: Positive Emotions b.96 b O1: Fantasy c b.95 b O2: Aesthetics b.99 b O3: Feelings c b.98 b O4: Actions b.99 b O5: Ideas c b.99 b O6: Values A1: Trust b.98 b A2: Straightforwardness b.96 b A3: Altruism c b.93 d A4: Compliance b.99 b A5: Modesty d.87 d A6: Tender-Mindedness b.93 d C1: Competence b.99 b C2: Order b.96 b C3: Dutifulness b.98 b C4: Achievement Striving b.99 b C5: Self-Discipline b b.99 b C6: Deliberation d b.96 b Congruence e.98 b.98 b.97 b.97 b.94 b.94 b.96 b.96 b.98 b.98 b.97 b.97 b Note. N = 500. Components are rotated toward the adult normative structure (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Loadings greater than.40 in absolute magnitude are underlined. NEO PI R = Revised NEO Personality Inventory; N = Neuroticism; E = Extraversion; O = Openness; A = Agreeableness; C = Conscientiousness. R = NEO PI R; 3 = NEO PI 3. a Variable congruence coefficient; total congruence coefficient in the last row. b Congruence higher than that of 99% of rotations from random data. c Scale unchanged in revision. d Congruence higher than that of 95% of rotations from random data. e Congruence with adult normative NEO PI R structure. nal consistencies for the five domains in this subsample were only slightly lower than those seen in the full sample, ranging from.85 to.89 for Form S and from.84 to.93 for Form R. Although factor analyses normally require a minimum of 200 participants, analyses in this subsample nevertheless closely approximated the adult structure, with congruence coefficients of.88 to.96 for Form S and.87 to.93 for Form R. 5 All of these can be considered replications using Haven and ten Berge s (1977) rule of thumb. Only 44 of these respondents had sibling raters, but the cross-observer correlations were significant for N (r =.38, p <.05), E (r =.55, p <.001), O (r =.49, p <.001), and C (r =.46, p <.01) and showed a trend for A(r =.29, p <.10). Finally, we correlated domain scores with SWB, gender, age, and grades. Even in this much smaller subsample, significant correlations with SWB were 5 Congruences with the factor structure in the full adolescent sample ranged from.95 to.99 for Form S and from.94 to.98 for Form R. found for N, E, and C (rs =.42,.22, and.33, respectively; all ps <.05). Females scored higher than males on E, O, and A. Neither age nor self-reported grades were related to personality; the former because the expected effects are too small to be seen in this smaller sample and the latter perhaps because of restriction of grade range from B to D. In general, however, it appears that the NEO PI 3 functions well in academically average adolescents. DISCUSSION Schinka and Borum (1994) reported that the NEO PI R had an overall Flesch Kincaid grade level of 5.7 but noted that some items and scales had higher reading levels and concluded that a reasonable degree of confidence that the subject has the capability of comprehending all inventory items is probably only warranted if the subject has completed at least 10 years of formal education with average grades or better (p. 98). That conclusion might seem to sharply limit

9 268 MCCRAE, COSTA, MARTIN TABLE 5 Internal Consistency, Cross-Observer Agreement, Factor Congruences, and Correlations With SWB for NEO PI R and NEO PI 3 Domain Scales in Respondents Aged 14 to 17 NEO PI R/NEO PI 3 Domain Variable N E O A C Coefficient alpha Form S.90/.91.89/.90.89/.89.88/.88.90/.92 Form R.91/.92.89/.90.86/.87.91/.90.93/.94 Cross-observer correlation Form S/Form R.35***/.38***.58***/.57***.62***/.61***.53***/.52***.53***/.54*** Factor congruence coefficient a Form S.97/.98.96/.96.95/.96.96/.95.97/.97 Form R.97/.97.96/.97.93/.90.94/.94.95/.95 Form S correlation SWB.47***/.50***.24***/.26***.09/.08.29***/.28***.47***/.52*** Gender b.11/.12.26***/.25***.20**/.20**.19**/.20**.03/.05 Grades.09/.09.07/.06.08/.08.15*/.13.31***/.33*** Note. n = 204 for coefficient alpha and congruence coefficients; n = 111 for cross-observer correlations; ns = 201 to 204 for Form S correlations. SWB = Subjective Well-Being Scale; NEO PI R = Revised NEO Personality Inventory; N = Neuroticism; E = Extraversion; O = Openness; A = Agreeableness; C = Conscientionsness; Form S = self-reports; Form R = observer ratings. a Congruence coefficients with adult normative NEO PI R structure after Procrustes rotation; all coefficients higher than those of 99% of rotations from random data. b Male = 0, female = 1. *p <.05. **p <.01. ***p <.001. the portion of the adolescent population for whom the NEO PI R would be appropriate. In fact, however, there is no requirement that test respondents understand each and every item in an inventory. One of the reasons to have multi-item scales is to allow an occasional missing or misunderstood item without seriously compromising the validity of the assessment. That is presumably why the NEO PI R has already proven useful in adolescent populations (Baker & Victor, 2003; De Fruyt et al., 2000; McCrae et al., 2002). Nevertheless, it is surely the case that one would want to minimize the number of misunderstood items, and the NEO PI 3 is a step in that direction. It has an overall reading grade level of 5.3 and has eliminated most of the items that adolescents aged 14 to 20 find difficult. For those with limited reading skills, these changes should increase the accuracy of assessments as well as making the test-taking experience less frustrating. Psychometrically, the NEO PI 3 shows modest improvements over the generally good performance of the NEO PI R. An examination of the items in the Appendix shows that the new items are shorter and more up to date but also more colloquial. Translators of the NEO PI R have frequently remarked on the informal and idiomatic language of the instrument and have been encouraged to maintain the sense rather than the literal wording of the items. The NEO PI R has generally worked well in translation (e.g., Costa, McCrae, & Jónsson, 2002), and the NEO PI 3 presumably would, too. Although a more readable NEO PI R was initially conceived as an adaptation for adolescent respondents, the NEO PI 3 may have wider applicability. It would be reasonable to examine its use in younger respondents (cf. Markey, Markey, Tinsley, & Ericksen, 2002) and in adults. If subsequent research shows that these results generalize to other age groups, it might be reasonable to consider the NEO PI 3 as a replacement for the NEO PI R for respondents of all ages. In the meantime, either the NEO PI R or the NEO PI 3 can appropriately be used for adolescents age 14 and up. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We thank the undergraduates who worked on this project. We especially thank Erin Weller for helping to develop the materials, procedures, and files on which data collection relied. We thank Erin Weller, Kathy Wulderk, Amanda Jones, Rebecca Fritschie, Danielle Quigg, and Rachael Gebely for managing the considerable work of preparing and mailing questionnaires, communicating with research assistants, scanning data, and resolving problems as they arose. We greatly appreciated their warmth, straightforwardness, competence, and orderliness. Thanks, too, to each of the 53 undergraduates who recruited participants and reminded them of our interest in receiving their packets. REFERENCES Allik, J., Laidra, K., Realo, A., & Pullmann, H. (2004). Personality development from 12 to 18 years of age: Changes in mean levels and structures of traits. European Journal of Personality, 18, Andrews, F. M., & Withey, S. B. (1976). Social indicators of well-being: Americans perceptions of life quality. New York: Plenum. Baker, S. R., & Victor, J. B. (2003, August). Adolescent self-reports of personality and temperament: NEO PI R and TPQ. Paper presented at the 11th European Conference on Developmental Psychology, Milan, Italy.

10 NEO PI Bradburn, N. M. (1969). The structure of psychological well-being. Chicago: Aldine. Carter, J. A., Herbst, J. H., Stoller, K. B., King, V. L., Kidorf, M. S., Costa, P. T., Jr., et al. (2001). Short-term stability of NEO PI R personality trait scores in opioid-dependent outpatients. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 15, Chamorro-Premuzic, T., & Furnham, A. (2003). Personality predicts academic performance: Evidence from two longitudinal university samples. Journal of Research in Personality, 37, Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (1984). Personality as a lifelong determinant of well-being. In C. Malatesta & C. Izard (Eds.), Affective processes in adult development and aging (pp ). Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (1985). The NEO Personality Inventory manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources. Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (1989). The NEO PI/NEO FFI manual supplement. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources. Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI R) and NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO FFI) professional manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources. Costa, P. T., Jr., & McCrae, R. R. (2002). Looking backward: Changes in the mean levels of personality traits from 80 to 12. In D. Cervone & W. Mischel (Eds.), Advances in personality science (pp ). New York: Guilford. Costa, P. T., Jr., McCrae, R. R., & Jónsson, F. H. (2002). Validity and utility of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory: Examples from Europe. In B. De Raad & M. Perugini (Eds.), Big Five assessment (pp ). Göttingen, Germany: Hogrefe & Huber. Costa, P. T., Jr., Terracciano, A., & McCrae, R. R. (2001). Gender differences in personality traits across cultures: Robust and surprising findings. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, Cota, A. A., Longman, R., Stewart, R., Holden, R. R., & Fekken, G. C. (1993). Comparing different methods for implementing parallel analysis: A practical index of accuracy. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 53, De Fruyt, F., Mervielde, I., Hoekstra, H. A., & Rolland, J.-P. (2000). Assessing adolescents personality with the NEO PI R. Assessment, 7, Diener, E., Emmons, R. A., Larsen, R. J., & Griffin, S. (1985). The Satisfaction With Life Scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 49, Haven, S., & ten Berge, J. M. F. (1977). Tucker s coefficient of congruence as a measure of factorial invariance: An empirical study (Heymans Bulletin 290 EX). University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands. Lievens, F., Coetsier, P., De Fruyt, F., & De Maeseneer, J. (2002). Medical students personality characteristics and academic performance: A Five-Factor Model perspective. Medical Education, 36, Markey, P. M., Markey, C. N., Tinsley, B. J., & Ericksen, A. J. (2002). A preliminary validation of preadolescents self-reports using the Five-Factor Model of personality. Journal of Research in Personality, 36, McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (1991). Adding Liebe und Arbeit: The full Five-Factor Model and well-being. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 17, McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (2004). A contemplated revision of the NEO Five-Factor Inventory. Personality and Individual Differences, 36, McCrae, R. R., Costa, P. T., Jr., Martin, T. A., Oryol, V. E., Rukavishnikov, A. A., Senin, I. G., et al. (2004). Consensual validation of personality traits across cultures. Journal of Research in Personality, 38, McCrae, R. R., Costa, P. T., Jr., Terracciano, A., Parker, W. D., Mills, C. J., De Fruyt, F., et al. (2002). Personality trait development from 12 to 18: Longitudinal, cross-sectional, and cross-cultural analyses. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83, McCrae, R. R., Zonderman, A. B., Costa, P. T., Jr., Bond, M. H., & Paunonen, S. V. (1996). Evaluating replicability of factors in the Revised NEO Personality Inventory: Confirmatory factor analysis versus Procrustes rotation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70, Robins, R. W., Fraley, R. C., Roberts, B. W., & Trzesniewski, K. H. (2001). A longitudinal study of personality change in young adulthood. Journal of Personality, 69, Schinka, J. A., & Borum, R. (1994). Readability of normal personality inventories. Journal of Personality Assessment, 62, N1: APPENDIX Deleted Items and Their Replacements (in Boldface) for the NEO PI I m seldom apprehensive about the future I seldom feel nervous. N4: 16. In dealing with other people, I always dread making a social blunder. 16. When I m around people, I worry that I ll make a fool of myself I often feel inferior to others I often feel that I am not as good as others When people I know do foolish things, I get embarrassed for them I feel awkward around people. N5: 21. I rarely overindulge in anything. 21. It doesn t bother me too much if I can t get what I want. 81. I have little difficulty resisting temptation. 81. I m always in control of myself. E3: E4: 42. I sometimes fail to assert myself as much as I should. 42. Sometimes I don t stand up for my rights like I should. 17. I have a leisurely style in work and play. 17. I have a laid-back style in work and play. 47. When I do things, I do them vigorously. 47. I act forcefully and energetically. E5: 202. I m attracted to bright colors and flashy styles I like loud music. E6: 57. I have sometimes experienced intense joy or ecstasy. 57. I have felt overpowering joy I don t consider myself especially light-hearted I m not happy-go-lucky. O2: 8. Aesthetic and artistic concerns aren t very important to me. 8. I m not really interested in the arts. O4: 78. Once I find the right way to do something, I stick to it. 78. I like the old-fashioned methods I m used to Sometimes I make changes around the house just to try something different I believe variety is the spice of life. O6: 118. I believe that the different ideas of right and wrong that people in other societies have may be valid for them Our ideas of right and wrong may not be right for everyone in the world.

11 270 MCCRAE, COSTA, MARTIN A1: 148. I believe that loyalty to one s ideals and principles is more important than open-mindedness I believe that it s better to stick to your own principles than to be open-minded I believe that the new morality of permissiveness is no morality at all People should honor traditional values, not question them. 4. I tend to be cynical and skeptical of others intentions. 4. Often, people aren t as nice as they seem to be. A2: 219. I pride myself on my shrewdness in handling people I m pretty slick when it comes to dealing with people. A4: 229. I often get into arguments with my family and co-workers I sometimes get into arguments. A5: 114. I try to be humble I m not a show-off. A6: 29. Political leaders need to be more aware of the human side of their policies. 29. When making laws and social policies, we need to think about who might be hurt. 59. I m hard-headed and tough-minded in my attitudes. 59. I don t worry much about the homeless I have no sympathy for panhandlers I have no sympathy for beggars Human need should always take priority over economic considerations Human need is more important than economics. C1: 5. I m known for my prudence and common sense. 5. I m known for my common sense. 35. I don t take civic duties like voting very seriously. 35. I sometimes act thoughtlessly I pride myself on my sound judgment I have good judgment I m a very competent person I have many skills. C2: 10. I would rather keep my options open than plan everything in advance. 10. I don t mind a little clutter in my room. 70. I am not a very methodical person. 70. I m not a very orderly or methodical person I tend to be somewhat fastidious or exacting I m picky about how jobs should be done. C3: 105. Sometimes I cheat when I play solitaire I ignore a lot of silly little rules I adhere strictly to my ethical principles I follow my ethical principles strictly I d really have to be sick before I d miss a day of work I try to go to work or school even when I m not feeling well. C4: 20. I am easy-going and lackadaisical. 20. I m not very ambitious. Robert R. McCrae Box 03 Gerontology Research Center 5600 Nathan Shock Drive Baltimore, MD mccraej@grc.nia.nih.gov Received June 18, 2004 Revised August 25, 2004