Neuroticism or negativity is a personality trait with disagreement on its definition, but widely understood to be associated with negative emotions. It is one of the Big Five traits. People high in neuroticism experience negative emotions like fear, anger, shame, envy, or depression more often and more intensely than those who score low on neuroticism. Highly neurotic people have more trouble coping with stressful events, are more likely to insult or lash out at others, and are more likely to interpret ordinary situations (like minor frustrations) as hopelessly difficult. Neuroticism is closely related to mood disorders such as anxiety and depression.
Individuals who score low in neuroticism tend to be more emotionally stable and less reactive to stress. They tend to be calm, even-tempered, and less likely to feel tense or rattled. Although they are low in negative emotion, they are not necessarily high in positive emotions, which are more commonly associated with extraversion and agreeableness. Neurotic extroverts, for example, would experience high levels of both positive and negative emotional states, a kind of "emotional roller coaster".
Definition Neuroticism is a trait in many models within personality theory, but there is some disagreement on its definition. It is sometimes defined as a tendency for quick arousal when stimulated and slow relaxation from arousal, especially concerning negative emotional arousal. This definition has some overlap with sensory processing sensitivity (SPS) as described by psychologist Elaine Aron, although SPS is associated with greater responsiveness both to adverse environments and supportive ones.
Another definition focuses on emotional instability, negative emotionality, or maladjustment as opposed to emotional stability or good adjustment. It has also been defined in terms of reduced self-control and impaired ability to manage psychological stress. This aligns with the conceptualization offered by Barlow and colleagues, where neuroticism is understood as a trait with genetic, neurobiological, and environmental roots. In this framework, neuroticism is marked by stress-specific reactivity as well as beliefs that the world is an unsafe or unpredictable place and difficult to cope with.
Various personality tests produce numerical scores, and these scores are mapped onto the concept of "neuroticism" in various ways, which has created some confusion in the scientific literature, especially with regard to sub-traits or "facets".
Measurement Like other personality traits, neuroticism is typically viewed as a continuous dimension rather than a discrete state.
The extent of neuroticism is generally assessed using self-report measures, although peer-reports and third-party observation can also be used. Self-report measures are either lexical or based on statements. Deciding which measure of either type to use in research is determined by an assessment of psychometric properties and the time and space constraints of the study being undertaken.
Lexical measures use individual adjectives that reflect neurotic traits, such as anxiety, envy, jealousy, and moodiness, and are very space and time efficient for research purposes. Lewis Goldberg (1992) developed a 20-word measure as part of his 100-word Big Five markers. Saucier (1994) developed a briefer 8-word measure as part of his 40-word mini-markers. Thompson (2008) systematically revised these measures to develop the International English Mini-Markers which has superior validity and reliability in populations both within and outside North America. Internal consistency reliability of the International English Mini-Markers for the Neuroticism (emotional stability) measure for native English-speakers is reported as 0.84, and that for non-native English-speakers is 0.77.
Statement measures tend to comprise more words, and hence consume more research instrument space, than lexical measures. Respondents are asked the extent to which they, for example, "Remain calm under pressure", or "Have frequent mood swings". While some statement-based measures of neuroticism have similarly acceptable psychometric properties in North American populations to lexical measures, their generally emic development makes them less suited to use in other populations. For instance, statements in colloquial North American English like "feeling blue" or "being down in the dumps" are sometimes hard for non-native English-speakers to understand.
Neuroticism has also been studied from the perspective of Gray's biopsychological theory of personality, using a scale that measures personality along two dimensions: the behavioural inhibition system (BIS) and the behavioural activation system (BAS).Gray, J.A. (1981). A critique of Eysenck's theory of personality, In H.J. Eysenck (Ed.) A model for personality (pp 246–276)Gray, J.A. (1982). The neuropsychology of anxiety: An enquiry into the functions of the septo-hippocampal system. The BIS is thought to be related to sensitivity to punishment as well as avoidance motivation, while the BAS is thought to be related to sensitivity to reward as well as approach motivation. Neuroticism has been found to be positively correlated with the BIS scale, and negatively correlated with the BAS scale.
Neuroticism has been included as one of the four dimensions that comprise core self-evaluations, one's fundamental appraisal of oneself, along with locus of control, self-efficacy, and self-esteem. The concept of core self-evaluations was first examined by Judge, Locke, and Durham (1997), and since then evidence has been found to suggest these have the ability to predict several work outcomes, specifically, job satisfaction and job performance.
There is a risk of selection bias in surveys of neuroticism; a 2012 review of N-scores said that "many studies used samples drawn from privileged and educated populations".
Neuroticism is highly correlated with the startle reflex in response to fearful conditions and inversely correlated with it in response to disgusting or repulsive stimuli. This suggests that Neuroticism may increase vigilance where evasive action is possible but promote emotional blunting when escape is not an option. A measure of the startle reflex can be used to predict the trait neuroticism with good accuracy; a fact that is thought by some to underlie the neurological basis of the trait. The startle reflex is a reflex in response to a loud noise that one typically has no control over, though anticipation can reduce the effect. The strength of the reflex as well as the time until the reflex ceases can be used to predict both neuroticism and extraversion.
Mental disorder correlations Questions used in many neuroticism scales overlap with instruments used to assess mental disorders like anxiety disorders (especially social anxiety disorder) and mood disorders (especially major depressive disorder), which can sometimes confound efforts to interpret N scores and makes it difficult to determine whether each of neuroticism and the overlapping mental disorders might cause the other, or if both might stem from other causes. Correlations can be identified.
A 2013 meta-analysis found that a wide range of clinical mental disorders are associated with elevated levels of neuroticism compared to levels in the general population. It found that high neuroticism is predictive for the development of anxiety disorders, major depressive disorder, psychosis, and schizophrenia, and is predictive but less so for substance use and non-specific mental distress. These associations are smaller after adjustment for elevated baseline symptoms of the mental illnesses and psychiatric history.
The five big studies have described children and adolescents with high neuroticism as "anxious, vulnerable, tense, easily frightened, 'falling apart' under stress, guilt-prone, moody, low in frustration tolerance, and insecure in relationships with others", which includes both traits concerning the prevalence of negative emotions as well as the response to these negative emotions. Neuroticism in adults similarly was found to be associated with the frequency of self-reported problems.
These associations can vary with culture: for example, Adams found that among upper-middle-class American teenaged girls, neuroticism was associated with eating disorders and self-harm, but among Ghanaian teenaged girls, higher neuroticism was associated with magical thinking and extreme fear of enemies.
Recent research further support the process linking neuroticism to internalizing psychopathology. Individuals with higher levels of neuroticism are more likely to engage in repetitive negative thinking and exhibit greater anxiety sensitivity, both of which increase vulnerability to anxiety and depressive disorders. These findings suggest that the relationship between neuroticism and psychopathology is influenced not only by emotional instability itself but also by cognitive processes linked to psychological distress.
Mood disorders Disorders associated with elevated neuroticism include mood disorders, such as depression and bipolar disorder. Mood disorders tend to have a much larger association with neuroticism than most other disorders.
Personality disorders A 2004 meta-analysis attempted to analyze personality disorders in light of the five-factor personality theory and found that elevated neuroticism is correlated with many personality disorders.
Theories of causation
Mental-noise hypothesis Studies have found that the mean reaction times will not differ between individuals high in neuroticism and those low in neuroticism, but that, with individuals high in neuroticism, there is considerably more trial-to-trial variability in performance reflected in reaction time standard deviations. In other words, on some trials neurotic individuals are faster than average, and on others they are slower than average. It has been suggested that this variability reflects noise in the individual's information processing systems or instability of basic cognitive operations (such as regulation processes), and further that this noise originates from two sources: mental preoccupations and reactivity processes.
Flehmig et al. (2007) studied mental noise in terms of everyday behaviours using the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire, which is a self-report measure of the frequency of slips and lapses of attention. A "slip" is an error by commission, and a "lapse" is an error by omission. This scale was correlated with two well-known measures of neuroticism, the BIS/BAS scale and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. Results indicated that the CFQ-UA (Cognitive Failures Questionnaire- Unintended Activation) subscale was most strongly correlated with neuroticism (r = .40) and explained the most variance (16%) compared to overall CFQ scores, which only explained 7%. The authors interpret these findings as suggesting that mental noise is "highly specific in nature" as it is related most strongly to attention slips triggered endogenously by associative memory. In other words, this may suggest that mental noise is mostly task-irrelevant cognitions such as worries and preoccupations.
Evolutionary psychology