Gender differences in implicit and explicit personality traits

• A high-powered study (N = 14,348) on gender differences in implicit personality traits.
• Multivariate interaction between gender and type of measure (implicit vs. explicit).
• At the implicit level, gender differences were much smaller.
• Men are higher than women in implicit Extraversion.
• Gender differences in explicit personality may be largely influenced by social norms.

This article investigates gender differences in implicit and explicit measures of the Big Five traits of personality. In a high-powered study (N = 14,348), we replicated previous research showing that women report higher levels of Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion and Neuroticism. For implicit measures, gender differences were much smaller for all, and opposite in sign for Extraversion. Somewhat higher levels of implicit Neuroticism and Agreeableness were observed in women, and somewhat higher levels of implicit Extraversion and Openness were observed in men. There was no gender difference in implicit Conscientiousness. A possible explanation is that explicit self-concepts partly reflect social norms and self-expectations about gender roles, while implicit self-concepts may mostly reflect self-related experiences.

Graphical representation of gender differences (d) across traits and measures. Higher ds represent higher female scores. Error bars represent 99% CIs around the ds.Figure optionsDownload as PowerPoint slide