Big 5 Traits

African Journal of Business Management

Vol. 7(15), pp. 1344-1353, 21 April, 2013
DOI: 10.5897/AJBM12.290
ISSN 1993-8233 © 2013 Academic Journals http://www.academicjournals.org/AJBM Full Length Research Paper

The big five personality traits and their relationship with work engagement among public sector university teachers of Lahore
Nayyar Raza Zaidi1*, Rana Abdul Wajid1, Farheen Batul Zaidi2, Ghazala Batul Zaidi3 and
Mohammad Taqi Zaidi4
1

Lahore School of Economics, Pakistan.
2
University of the Punjab, Pakistan.
3
MCB Bank, Pakistan.
4
Lancaster University, United Kingdom.
Accepted 2 April, 2012

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the big five personality traits and work engagement among public sector university teachers of Lahore. The subjects of the study were
399 teachers, 237 male and 161 female. They were selected randomly from all public sector universities of Lahore. In this study, Big Five Inventory (BFI) was used to measure various dimensions of personality (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience). The instrument used to measure engagement was the Utrecht Work engagement Scale
(UWES), which includes three subscales: vigor, dedication, and absorption.
Extraversion,
agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness to experience were found to be positively related to work engagement. Neuroticism was negatively related to work engagement. Multiple regression analysis showed that personality traits of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness to experience have significant effects on work engagement. However, the strength of relationship between big five traits and work engagement was not very strong (R-squared = 0.28 ).
Key words: Extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, openness to experience, big five inventory, work engagement, utrecht work engagement scale.

INTRODUCTION
People intuitively understand what psychologists have

References: Bakker AB, Demerouti E (2007). The job demands-resources model: state of the art Bakker AB, Demerouti E, Brummelhuis LL (2012). Work engagement, performance, and active learning: The role of conscientiousness Bakker AB, Schaufeli W, Leiter M, Taris T (2008). Work engagement: An emerging concept in occupational health psychology Bandura A (1978). Self system in reciprocal derminism. Am. Psychol. Basikin B (2007). Vigor, Dedication and Absorption: work engagement among secondary school English teachers in Indonesia., Paper Brief A, Weiss H (2002). Oganizational Behavior: Affect in the workplace Chung N, Angeline T (2010). Does work engagement mediate the relationship between job resources and job performance of Costa PT, McCrae RR (1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO Five-Factor (NEO-FFI) professional manual. Demerouti E, Bakker A, Nachreiner F, Schaufeli W (2001). The job demands-resources model of burnout Diener E, Lucas RE (1999). Personality and subjective well-being. In: Kahneman D, Diener E, Schwarz N Eds Digman JM (1989). Five robust trait dimensions: Development, stability, and utility Ewing RA, Smith DL (2003). Retaining quality beginning teachers in the profession Goldberg LR (1981). Language and individual differences: The search for universals in personality lexicons Goldberg LR (1990). An alternative "description of personality": The BigFive factor structure. J. Person. Soc. Psychol. 59: 1216-1229. Gosling SD, Rentfrow PJ, Swan JW (2003). A very brief measure of the Big-Five Personality Domains Goslling SD (2008). Snoop: What your Staff Says about You. New York: Basic Books. Gray EK, Watson D (2001). Emotion, mood, and temeprament: Similiarities, differences, and a synthesis Hakanen JJ, Bakker A, Schaufeli W (2006). Burnout and work engagement among teachers Hallberg UE, Johnsson G, Schaufeli WB (2007). Type A behavior and work situation: Associations with burnout and work engagement. Inceoglu I, Warr P (2012). Personality and Job Engagement. J. Psychol. Ingersoll RM (2001). Teacher turnover and teacher shortage: An organizational analysis John OP, Donahue EM, Kentle RL (1991). The Big Five Inventory-Versions 4a and 54. Berkeley, CA: University of California, Berkeley, Institute of Personality and Social Research. John OP, Naumann LP, Soto CJ (2008). Paradigm shift to the integrative Big Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and John OP, Srivastava S (1999). The Big Five trait taxonomy: History, Zaidi et al. Judge TA, Bono JE, Ilies R, Gerhardt MW (2002). Personality and leadership: A qualitative and quantitative review Kahn W (1990). Psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work Kahn W (1992). To be fully there: Psychological presence at work. Keyes C, Shmotkin D, Ryff C (2002). Optimizing well-being: The empirical encounter of two traditions Kim H, Shi KH, Swanger N (2009). Burnout and engagement: A comparative analysis using the Big Five personalityl dimensions Kline RB (2005). Principles and practices of Structural Equation Modeling Koyuncu M, Burke R, Fiksenbaum L (2006). Work engagement among women managers and professionals in a Turkish bank: potential Langelaan S, Bakker AB, van Doornen LJ, Schaufeli W (2006). Burnout and work engagement: Do individual differences make a difference? Macey WH, Schneider B (2008). The meaning of employee engagement Maslach C, Jackson SE, Leiter M (1996). Maslach Burnout Inventory Manual (3rd ed.) Maslach C, Leiter M (1997). The truth about burnout: How organizations cause personal stress and what to do about it Maslach C, Leiter M (2008). Early predictors of job burnout and engagement Maslach C, Schaufeli W, Leiter M (2001). Job burnout. Ann. Rev.