Intelligence and personality have traditionally been studied as separate entities in psychology, but more recent work has increasingly challenged this view.
Intelligence and personality have some common features; for example, they both follow a relatively stable pattern throughout the whole of one’s life, and are to some degree genetically determined.
[9] The finding that IQ predicts work performance, academic achievement, and health might also point to a link between intelligence and personality, or else be grounds for further research into their relationship.
[12] Openness shows the strongest positive relationship with g (general intelligence) among the Big Five personality traits.
[13][14] Individuals with a high level of openness enjoy the experience of learning and prefer an intellectually stimulating environment.
Researchers have noted that neuroticism is correlated with test anxiety,[19][20] which refers to the psychological distress experienced by individuals prior to, or during, an evaluative situation.
However, others researchers have argued that test anxiety is mostly incidental and caused by neuroticism, contextual pressures, and lower cognitive ability.
[24] Although it is still debatable if neuroticism reduces general intelligence, this study provided some valuable evidence and a direction for research.
[30][31] In particular, the largest current meta-analysis of 369 studies (n = 345,165) obtained a correlation of r = .01 though numerous aspect and facet level relations emerged, especially with sub-dimensions of intelligence (e.g., .32 for the industriousness aspect with general mental ability, .20 for order facet with visual processing, .39 for dependability with social studies knowledge).
The largest current meta-analyses have found few correlations between overall extraversion and intelligence (e.g., corrected r = -.02 with general mental ability based on 502 effect sizes and 393,929 people).
[40] It is worth noting, however, that the largest meta-analyses of cognitive ability and personality trait aggression have found negligible connections.