Citation

Satchell L, Morris P, Mills C, O'Reilly L, Marshman P, Akehurst L. J. Nonverbal Behav. 2017; 41(1): 35-44.

Affiliation

0000 0001 0728 6636grid.4701.2Department of Psychology, University of Portsmouth, King Henry Building, King Henry 1 Street, Portsmouth, PO1 2DY UK.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10919-016-0240-1

PMID

28203036

PMCID

PMC5283505

Abstract

Behavioral observation techniques which relate action to personality have long been neglected (Furr and Funder in Handbook of research methods in personality psychology, The Guilford Press, New York, 2007) and, when employed, often use human judges to code behavior. In the current study we used an alternative to human coding (biomechanical research techniques) to investigate how personality traits are manifest in gait. We used motion capture technology to record 29 participants walking on a treadmill at their natural speed. We analyzed their thorax and pelvis movements, as well as speed of gait. Participants completed personality questionnaires, including a Big Five measure and a trait aggression questionnaire. We found that gait related to several of our personality measures. The magnitude of upper body movement, lower body movement, and walking speed, were related to Big Five personality traits and aggression. Here, we present evidence that some gait measures can relate to Big Five and aggressive personalities. We know of no other examples of research where gait has been shown to correlate with self-reported measures of personality and suggest that more research should be conducted between largely automatic movement and personality.

Language: en

Keywords

Big Five personality; Gait biomechanics; Trait aggression