Active Brains, Active Personality The hypothesis that individual personality traits originate in the brain was tested by scientists who sought to find correlations between brain activity (shown in red) and personality traits. People who rated themselves high in four of the Big Five (conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, neuroticism—but not openness) also had more activity in brain regions that are known to relate to those traits. Here are two side views (left) and a top and bottom view (right) of brains of people high in neuroticism. Their brain regions known to be especially sensitive to stress, depression, threat, and punishment (yellow bull’s-eyes) were more active than the same brain regions in people low in neuroticism (DeYoung et al., 2010).

DEYOUNG, ET. AL. TESTING PREDICTIONS FROM PERSONALITY NEUROSCIENCE: BRAIN STRUCTURE AND THE BIG FIVE PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE JUNE 2010 21: 820-828, FIRST PUBLISHED ON APRIL 30, 2010 DOI:10.1177/0956797610370159