Big5 personality and WeChat

The Relationship Between Personality Traits and Communication Styles

on Wechat Steffi Christo Angeline CarrieSophia Lomo Rella

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Agenda

Introduction

Literature ReviewResearch MethodResults & Discussions

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Introduction

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Introduction1

• CMC augments and complements the traditional way people communicate with one another.• Now, mobile IM applications play an important role in many people’s daily life thanks to the popularity of smartphones.

•Whatsapp:350m | WeChat:272m• iResearch: Smartphone internet usage time in China is dominated by instant messaging use, at 18.1%. 

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Introduction1

• Previously, one area of research has shown that self-reported personality traits are good predictors of SNS usage and are reflected in personal profiles or webpages on SNS .

(Correla et al., 2010; Kramer & Winter, 2008; Ong et al., 2011)

• Personality traits has been long discussed and conceptualized in various dimensions.

• Particularly, the Big-Five personality traits model: most widely used & extensively researched.

(Gosling et al., 2003)

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Introduction---Big Five Personality Traits Model1

• Extraversion: related with sociability, assertiveness and high level of emotional expressiveness.• Neuroticism: related with emotional instability and irritability.• Conscientiousness: related with high level of self-control,

thoughtfulness and scrupulousness. • Openness to experience: related with wide interests,

aesthetic and creativity. • Agreeableness: related with kindness, affection and high

level of responsiveness.

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Introduction---Big Five Personality Traits Model1

• Our primary goal is to fill a gap in the literature by analyzing the relationship between personality traits and communication styles on mobile IM– in this case, WeChat.

EmoticonsVoice chat

Moments update

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Literature Review

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Literature Review2

• Communication Style

• Norton’s Definition

• Self-management

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Literature Review---Communication Style2

Three aspects

Voice chat use

Moments update

Emoticon use

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Literature Review---Communication Style2

•Open, extraverted people: receive more emoticons • Conscientious people: receive less emoticons (Xu, 2007)

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Literature Review---Communication Style2

•Current study limitation:

Few research has explored the relationship between use of voice

chat and personality traits.

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Literature Review---Communication & Personality2

• Communication and personality characteristics are “inherently intertwined”. (Daly, 1987)

• Eysenck’s personality model

• Chan’s study (2011) on the relationship between the asynchronous and synchronous CMC and shyness and sociability.

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Literature Review---Big Five & Personality Use2

• Extraversion ---- the most prominent one in predicting SNS usage (Correa et al., 2010; Ong et al., 2011)

• High extraversion level ---- High frequency of IM usage (Ehrenberg et al., 2008)

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Literature Review---Big Five & Internet Use2Two competing

hypothesis:

Social Compensation

“Rich-get-richer” Hypothesis

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Literature Review---Hypotheses2• H1a: There will be a positive relationship between extraversion and the frequency of emoticon use on WeChat.

• H1b: There will be a positive relationship between extraversion and the frequency of voice chat use on WeChat.

• H1c: There will be a positive relationship between extraversion and the frequency of updating Moments on WeChat.

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Literature Review---Big Five & Internet Use2

• High neuroticism ---- Stronger interest in online communication (Correa et al., 2010; Wolfradt & Doll, 2001)• Openness to experience ---- positively related with the

Internet use. (Tuten and Bosnjak (2001) • Conscientiousness ---- negatively related with the

Internet and CMC usage (Butt & Philips, 2008)• Agreeableness----negatively related to high level of

Internet use (Wilson et al.2010)

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Literature Review---Hypotheses2• H2a: There will be a positive relationship between neuroticism and

the frequency of emoticon use on WeChat.

• H2b: There will be a positive relationship between neuroticism and the frequency of voice chat use on WeChat.

• H2c: There will be a positive relationship between neuroticism and the frequency of updating Moments on WeChat.

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Literature Review---Hypotheses2• H3a: There will be a positive relationship between openness

and the frequency of emoticon use on WeChat.

• H3b: There will be a positive relationship between openness and the frequency of voice chat use on WeChat.

• H3c: There will be a positive relationship between openness and the frequency of updating Moments on WeChat.

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Literature Review---Hypotheses2• H4a: There will be a negative relationship between conscientiousness and frequency of emoticon use on WeChat.

• H4b: There will be a negative relationship between conscientiousness and the frequency of voice chat use on WeChat.

• H4c: There will be a negative relationship between conscientiousness and the frequency of updating Moments on WeChat.

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• H4a: There will be a negative relationship between agreeableness and the usage of emoticon on WeChat.

• H4b: There will be a negative relationship between agreeableness and the frequency of voice chat usage on WeChat.

• H4c: There will be a negative relationship between agreeableness and the frequency of updating Moments on WeChat.

Literature Review---Hypotheses2

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Research Method

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Research Method---Sampling3

• Online survey, hosted on www.sojump.com

• Snowball sampling, 358 respondents

• 341 WeChat users

• 17 non-WeChat users (excluded)

• 120 Males, 221 Females

35.2%

64.8%MaleFemale

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Research Method---Measurement3

• NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI, McCrae & Costa, 1992) was used to measure the Big Five personality traits.

• Participants rated their agreement to each item for a given personality on a five-point Likert scale (1= strongly disagree to 5= strongly agree). M SD. Cornbach’s

alpha

Extraversion 3.51 0.51 0.76

Neuroticism 2.84 0.59 0.81

Conscientiousness

3.36 0.44 0.80

Openness 3.55 0.53 0.72

Agreeableness 3.32 0.52 0.62

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Research Method---Measurement3

•Five-point Likert scale (1= never to 5=all the time)

•Frequency of emoticon use: how often do you use emoticon?

(M=3.64 SD. =1.45)

• Frequency of voice chat use: how often do you use voice chat? (M=3.33 SD.= 1.45)

• Frequency of Moments update : how often do you update Moments? (M=2.95 SD.=1.47)

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•Demographics •Gender (1=Male, 2=Female)

•Age

Research Method---Measurement3

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Research Results & Discussions

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Research Results---Correlations4

Emoticon use

Voice chat use

Moments update

Extraversion r=.21**, p=.00

r=.19**, p=.00r=.18**, p=.00

Neuroticism r=-.04, p=.47

r=-.05, p=.32

r=-.00, p=.96

Conscientiousness

r=.10, p=.06

r=.12*, p=.02

r=.06, p=.25

Openness r=.14**,p=.01

r=.07, p=.18r=.11**, p=.04

Agreeableness r=.07, p=.18

r=.09, p=.12r=.01, p=.90

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level.*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level.

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Research Results---Correlations between DVs4

DV1 Emoticon use

DV2 Voice chat use

DV3 Moments update

DV1 Emoticon use r=1 r=.75**, p=.00 r=.67**, p=.00

DV2 Voice chat use r=.75**, p=.00 r=1 r=.67**, p=.00

DV3 Moments update r=.67**, p=.00 r=.67**, p=.00 r=1**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level.

*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level.

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Research Results---Regression4Personality and emoticon use• F (7,323)= 6.78• Adjusted R2 = .11• P<.001

Explained, 10.9%

10.9% of the variance was explained.

Unexplained 89.1%

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Research Results---Regression4

3.2% of the variance was explained.

Personality and voice chat use• F (7,323)= 2.56• Adjusted R2= .032• P=.014

ExplainedUnexplainedUnexplained

96.8%

Explained 3.2%

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Research Results---Regression4

8.4% of the variance was explained.

ExplainedUnexplainedUnexplained

91.6%

Explained 8.4%

Personality and Moments update• F (7,323)= 5.30• Adjusted R2 = .08• p<.001

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Research Results---Regression4

　 Emoticon use Voice chat use Moments update

Model Beta Sig Beta Sig Beta SigExtraversion .19 .00 .17 .01 .19 .00Neuroticism .04 .58 .01 .83 .01 .88

Conscientiousness .05 .44 .04 .57 .02 .74

Openness .08 .16 .t .73 .04 .50

Agreeableness .03 .56 .02 .81 -.07 .23

Age -.21 .00 .00 .98 -.13 .02Gender .13 .02 .13 .02 .21 .00

H1a, H1b, H1c were supported

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Discussions41. Extraversion was found POSITIVELY related to emoticon use, voice chat and Moments update frequency.       → “rich get richer” (Correa et al., 2010)

2. Neuroticism, openness, agreeableness, conscientiousness were NOT significant predicators of emoticon use, voice chat or Moments update frequency.

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Discussions43. For control variables:(1)AGE was found NEGATIVELY related to emoticon use

and Moments update.

--Younger people tend to frequently use emoticon and updates messages.

　 Emoticon use Voice chat use Moment update

model β Sig β Sig β Sig

Age -0.21 0.00 0.00 0.98 -0.13 0.02

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Discussions4(2) For GENDER, 1=male, 2=female, therefore FEMALES tend to use emoticon, voice chat and updating Moments more frequently than MALES.

　 Emoticon use Voice chat use Moments update

model β Sig β Sig β Sig

Gender 0.13 0.02 0.13 0.02 0.21 0.00

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Implications

• 1. Designers of mobile IM tools:

• For extraverted people, creative functions could be added, such as voice filter;

• Customize emoticons targeting at different genders: retain female users + involve male users (“masculine features”);

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Implications

•2. Future researchers:

•Investigate the relationship between online communication style and Chinese version of Big Six personality traits model ( CHEUNG, Fanny ).

•Consider the influence of communication context, interpersonal perception and relationship intimacy on communication style.

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Limitations•Non-probability sampling, low representativeness•Uneven female to male ratio• Pilot test

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