Paying Attention to Faces May Be Linked to 'Big Five' Personality Traits

Study suggests that paying more attention to faces correlates to personality traits of extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism.

Highlights:

The personality of a person can be linked to how much they focus on a human face in pictures
A new study shows that people who tend to focus more on people’s faces have the traits of extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism
Those with higher degrees of social anxiety, sadness, and other forms of psychopathology are less affected by the phenomenon

A recent study suggests that a person’s personality and psychopathology levels may be associated with how strongly they prefer to focus on human faces within images. The study was conducted by Marius Rubo from the University of Bern, Switzerland, and colleagues.

When viewing images, even if they are visually busy, people are drawn to other human faces. There has been previous research that points to personality factors or specific diagnoses potentially playing a role in how strongly specific individuals hold this preference for focusing on human faces. In this study, the researchers assessed how several influential psychological traits might affect an individual’s preference to focus on faces.

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‘Study shows that those who pay less attention to faces often have higher levels of social anxiety, depression, and other forms of psychopathology.’

How the Study was Conducted

120 participants, most of whom were students, viewed 20 photographs depicting people in busy environments while their attention was assessed. To do this, the authors used a cursor-based tool: the photographs were blurred and only became clear within a 20-pixel radius around the cursor, which participants could move around the photograph. Afterwards, the participants responded to a questionnaire assessing the “Big Five” personality traits of extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism. The questionnaires also asked about multiple facets of psychopathology, including social anxiety, depression, empathy, alexithymia (inability to describe one’s emotions), and specific social values.

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Association of Attention to Faces with ‘Big Five’ Personality Traits

In terms of personality traits, extraversion, agreeableness, and openness to experience were positively correlated with an increased focus on faces. Individuals who reported higher empathy levels were also more likely to focus more on faces. Meanwhile, participants who scored highly on certain other facets of psychopathology, including social anxiety, depression, and alexithymia, tended to focus less on faces. In general, participants spent about 17 percent of their image viewing time looking at faces within the images.

The authors note that cursor positioning is an imperfect proxy for gaze tracking, being slower than direct gazing. They also note that attention to images of faces is partly different from attention in real life settings. However, the results suggest that face preferences may be linked both to personality and psychopathology levels.

The researchers also observe that pictures of human faces attract most people’s attention, but the phenomenon is weaker in people with higher levels of social anxiety, depression, and other forms of psychopathology.

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What does it mean to have the ‘Big Five’ Personality Traits

Many contemporary personality psychologists believe that there are five basic dimensions of personality, often referred to as the "Big 5" personality traits. These five primary personality traits are extraversion, agreeableness, openness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism.

Extraversion is sociability, agreeableness is kindness, openness is creativity and intrigue, conscientiousness is thoughtfulness, and neuroticism often involves sadness or emotional instability.

Reference:

Attention to faces in images is associated with personality and psychopathology - (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36791081/)

Source-Medindia

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