AbstractsPsychology

Teacher ratings are available on a large sample of Chinese children aged 3 to 12 years using the Inventory of Child Individual Differences (ICID, Halverson, Havill, & Deal, 2002). The ICID was developed based on parent and teacher free descriptions of child personality. Data from two other instruments, the Digman and Shmelyov Scale (DSS, Digman & Shmelyov, 1996) and the Temperament Battery for Children-Revised (TABC-R, Martin & Bridger, 1999) were also available on the same sample. Exploratory factor analysis of the ICID resulted in a four-factor structure. The four ICID factors can be related to the adult Big Five theoretical framework. Exploratory factor analysis of the DSS resulted in a three-factor structure. Each of the ICID factors can also be related to one or more of the DSS factors, and vice versa. These results indicate that free description approach did not overlook any dimension derived based on a more top-down approach. Based on regression analysis using the TABC-R scales as predictors and the ICID factors as criteria, a substantial amount of variance of each of personality dimensions can be explained by temperament traits.