‘Old wine in new bottles’? Relationships between overexcitabilities, the Big Five personality traits and giftedness in adolescents

• We examined the relation between overexcitability (OEs), the Big Five and giftedness.
• We applied the OEQ-II and the NEO-FFI in the gifted and control adolescents.
• We discovered different patterns of OEs in the two groups.
• Giftedness moderated the relation of OEs with openness and extraversion.
• We found dissimilar relations between OEs and the Big Five traits in both groups.

This study examined the relationship between types of overexcitability (OEs), Big Five dimensions, and giftedness. A sample of intellectually gifted adolescents (N = 132) and controls (N = 103) completed the OEQ-II and the NEO-FFI. As hypothesized, the gifted scored higher than controls on intellectual OE, imaginational OE, and openness to experience but lower on neuroticism. Contrary to expectations, group-related differences were found for sensual OE, but not for emotional OE. Moreover, SEM analysis showed that giftedness moderated the relation of OEs with openness and extraversion. The relations between sensual OE and openness as well as between psychomotor OE and extraversion were stronger in the gifted than in controls. Relationships between sensual, intellectual, imaginational OEs and extraversion turned out to be significant only in the controls.