IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0103846.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Infant SES as a Predictor of Personality—Is the Association Mediated by Intelligence?

Author

Listed:
  • Trine Flensborg-Madsen
  • Erik Lykke Mortensen

Abstract

Background: Although research into the continuity and change of personality traits during a lifespan has been fairly extensive, little research has been conducted on childhood predictors of adult personality. Purpose: We aimed to investigate the association between infant socioeconomic status (SES), and Eysenck personality traits in adulthood. An additional aim was to investigate whether intelligence and education may mediate this association. Methods: SES of 9125 children in the Copenhagen Perinatal Cohort was recorded at a 1-year examination. A subsample of this cohort, comprising 1182 individuals, participated in a follow-up at 20–34 years and was administered the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) which includes measures of neuroticism, extraversion, psychoticism and the so-called lie-scale. Associations of SES with each of the four personality traits were analysed by bivariate and partial correlations, and the mediating effects of intelligence and years of education were analysed. Results: Higher SES in infancy was associated with lower neuroticism (r = −0.06; p = 0.05), lower lie-scale scores (r = −0.11; p = 0.0002), and higher psychoticism (r = 0.09; p = 0.003). However, analyses of mediation revealed no direct effect of infant SES on any of the adult personality traits, but only indirect effects mediated by intelligence and years of education, with intelligence being the main mediating factor. Conclusion: Only weak associations were observed between infant SES and personality in young adulthood, and the observed associations were mediated by adult intelligence and educational level. Thus, factors associated with infant SES or family background appears to have weak direct effects on personality development.

Suggested Citation

  • Trine Flensborg-Madsen & Erik Lykke Mortensen, 2014. "Infant SES as a Predictor of Personality—Is the Association Mediated by Intelligence?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(7), pages 1-8, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0103846
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0103846
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0103846
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0103846&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0103846?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Evangelia E. Antoniou & Ambarish Dutta & Kenneth M. Langa & David Melzer & David Llewellyn, 2013. "Personality Profile of the Children of Long-Lived Parents," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 68(5), pages 730-738.
    2. Robert S. Wilson & Carlos F. Mendes de Leon & Julia L. Bienias & Denis A. Evans & David A. Bennett, 2004. "Personality and Mortality in Old Age," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 59(3), pages 110-116.
    3. Bosma, H. & Van Jaarsveld, C. H. M. & Tuinstra, J. & Sanderman, R. & Ranchor, A. V. & Van Eijk, J. Th. M. & Kempen, G. I. J. M., 2005. "Low control beliefs, classical coronary risk factors, and socio-economic differences in heart disease in older persons," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(4), pages 737-745, February.
    4. Frank, John W. & Cohen, Richard & Yen, Irene & Balfour, Jennifer & Smith, Margot, 2003. "Socioeconomic gradients in health status over 29 years of follow-up after midlife: the Alameda county study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 57(12), pages 2305-2323, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Shoham, David A. & Vupputuri, Suma & Kaufman, Jay S. & Kshirsagar, Abhijit V. & Diez Roux, Ana V. & Coresh, Josef & Heiss, Gerardo, 2008. "Kidney disease and the cumulative burden of life course socioeconomic conditions: The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 67(8), pages 1311-1320, October.
    2. Hanna Solinge & Kène Henkens, 2018. "Subjective life expectancy and actual mortality: results of a 10-year panel study among older workers," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 155-164, June.
    3. Ibrahim Mohammed & Wassiuw Abdul Rahaman & Priscilla Twumasi Baffour, 2020. "The role of personality traits in predicting days lost due to illness: evidence from the World Bank’s Skills toward Employment and Productivity survey," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 67(2), pages 163-188, June.
    4. Reuben Ng & Heather G. Allore & Becca R. Levy, 2020. "Self-Acceptance and Interdependence Promote Longevity: Evidence From a 20-year Prospective Cohort Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(16), pages 1-15, August.
    5. Sánchez-Izquierdo, Macarena & Fernández-Ballesteros, Rocío & Valeriano-Lorenzo, Elizabeth Lucía & Botella, Juan, 2023. "Intelligence and life expectancy in late adulthood: A meta-analysis," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    6. Hajime Iwasa & Hiroki Inagaki & Yukie Masui & Yasuyuki Gondo, 2022. "Relationship between Personality and Mortality among Japanese Older Adults: A 14-Year Longitudinal Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(4), pages 1-8, February.
    7. Dana Hübelová & Alice Kozumplíková, 2019. "Evaluation of Demographic and Socio-economic Factors of Mortality in the South Moravian Region (Czech Republic)," Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, Mendel University Press, vol. 67(5), pages 1255-1267.
    8. Lantz, Paula M. & Golberstein, Ezra & House, James S. & Morenoff, Jeffrey, 2010. "Socioeconomic and behavioral risk factors for mortality in a national 19-year prospective study of U.S. adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(10), pages 1558-1566, May.
    9. Xuemei Wang & Ting Zhang & Jing Wu & Shaohua Yin & Xi Nan & Maolin Du & Aiping Liu & Peiyu Wang, 2019. "The Association between Socioeconomic Status, Smoking, and Chronic Disease in Inner Mongolia in Northern China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-12, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0103846. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.