Le Big Five Inventory français permet-il d'évaluer des facettes en plus des cinq grands facteurs ?

International audience; Introduction. The Big Five Inventory (BFI) developed by John et al. (1991) is one of the most widely accepted tools for assessing dimensions of personality. It comprises 44 items that assess five broad dimensions of personality (the Big Five Factors): Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism and Openness to experience. Based on correlations with the facets described in the NEO Personality Inventory Revised (NEO PI-R), another Big Five assessment tool with 240 items and 6 facets per dimension, Soto and John (2009) showed that the dimensions in the BFI could be divided into two facets each (ten facets altogether). These results are in line with those of DeYoung, Quilty and Peterson (2007), who ran factorial analyses with all the NEO PI-R facets and the International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) and identified ten intermediate factors (between facets and dimensions) they called “aspects” (two per dimension). The goal of the present study is to investigate the ten facets described by Soto and John in a French sample, using the French version of the BFI (BFI-Fr), which has good psychometric properties, and to check whether the pattern of correlations of these facets with the NEO PI-R match those of the American version. Method. We created three groups. The first comprised 360 students from the ILEPS (Institut Libre d’Education Physique Supérieure) and Tours University (psychology undergraduates). Participants (mean age 21.1 years  2.30; 58% women) completed the BFI-Fr and the NEO PI-R. The second comprised 142 psychology students from Tours University (mean age 20.6 years  1.78; 81% women); they completed the BFI-Fr twice, two weeks apart (test and retest). The third comprised 252 psychology students from Paris-Nanterre University (mean age 23 years  4.2; 89% women) who described a total of 405 people they knew well (mean age 35.2  10.8; 49% women) using the peer-report format of the BFI-Fr. Results. In the self-report format, eight of Soto and John’s ten aspects had acceptable internal consistency (based on Guildford’s (1954) internal consistency criteria, due to the small number of items), with Cronbach’s α between .60 and .86 and test-retest correlations between .71 and .89, showing satisfactory temporal stability. We found a single facet for Extraversion (Assertiveness), two for Agreeableness (Altruism and Compliance), two for Conscientiousness (Self-Discipline and Order), one for Neuroticism (Anxiety), and two for Openness to Experience (Openness to aesthetics and Openness to ideas). Based on their convergence with the corresponding facets in the NEO PI-R, these eight facets showed satisfactory external validity. With regard to the peer-report format, the Activity facet of Extraversion, which did not have sufficient internal consistency in the self-report format, had acceptable properties (i.e. 9 out of 10 facets). Only the Depression facet of Neuroticism still had insufficient internal consistency. In this study, we proposed an improvement of two facets (Activity and Compliance) and added one facet specific to the French version (Emotional Instability) in place of the Depression facet. Discussion. We showed that the BFI-Fr can be used to assess nine of the ten facets described by Soto and John. We also identified an Emotional Instability facet, replacing the Depression facet of Neuroticism. DeYoung et al. (2007) considered that anxiety and depression are indissociable and can be represented by a Neuroticism aspect they labeled Withdrawal. They suggested a second aspect of this dimension they called Volatility (with the N2 Angry Hostility facet of the NEO PI-R as main marker and the N5 Impulsiveness and N3 Depression as secondary markers). The Emotional Instability facet we found corresponds closely to the N2 Angry Hostility facet of the NEO PI-R and appears to be a satisfactory marker of DeYoung et al.’s (2007) Volatility aspect. Although this study has limitations, particularly related to the samples (students), the BFI-Fr facets (derived from those defined by Soto and John in the BFI or proposed as improvements on the original facets) match the corresponding NEO PI-R facets and can also be seen as main markers of the aspects defined by DeYoung et al.; Le Big Five Inventory (BFI) de John (1991) représente un des outils les plus consensuels de l'évaluation dimensionnelle de la personnalité. Les cinq grandes dimensions qu'il mesure sont~: l'Extraversion, l'Agréabilité, le Caractère consciencieux, le Névrosisme et l'Ouverture. Soto et John (2009) ont montré qu'il était possible de considérer deux facettes par dimension du BFI. L'objectif de cette étude est de savoir s'il est possible de retrouver ces dix facettes dans un échantillon français, en s'appuyant sur les corrélations avec les facettes équivalentes du NEO PI-R (NEO Personality Inventory Revised). Méthode Le premier échantillon constitué de 360~étudiants de l'Institut libre d'éducation physique supérieure (ILEPS) et de l'Université de Tours (en psychologie) a permis de tester la validité externe des facettes du BFI-Fr en lien avec celles du NEO PI-R. Le second échantillon constitué de 142~étudiants de psychologie de l'Université de Tours a permis de rechercher la validité temporelle (test et retest). Le troisième échantillon constitué de 252~étudiants en psychologie de l'Université de Paris-Nanterre a permis de tester la forme hétéro-évaluative du BFI-Fr. Résultats et discussion Le BFI-Fr permet d'évaluer neuf des dix facettes proposées par Soto et John~: Activité et Assertivité pour la dimension Extraversion~; Altruisme et Compliance pour la dimension Agréabilité~; Ordre et Autodiscipline pour la dimension Caractère consciencieux~; Anxiété pour la dimension Névrosisme~; Ouverture à l'esthétique et Ouverture aux idées pour la dimension Ouverture. L'étude a permis de définir une facette Instabilité émotionnelle en remplacement de la facette Dépression du Névrosisme qui ne présentait pas de qualités psychométriques suffisantes. AbstractIntroduction The Big Five Inventory (BFI) developed by John et al. (1991) is one of the most widely accepted tools for assessing dimensions of personality. It comprises 44 items that assess five broad dimensions of personality (the Big Five Factors): Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism and Openness to experience. Based on correlations with the facets described in the NEO Personality Inventory Revised (NEO PI-R), another Big Five assessment tool with 240 items and 6 facets per dimension, Soto and John (2009) showed that the dimensions in the BFI could be divided into two facets each (ten facets altogether). These results are in line with those of DeYoung et al. (2007), who ran factorial analyses with all the NEO PI-R facets and the International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) and identified ten intermediate factors (between facets and dimensions) which they called "aspects" (two per dimension). The goal of the present study is to investigate the ten facets described by Soto and John in a French sample, using the French version of the BFI (BFI-Fr), which has good psychometric properties, and to check whether the pattern of correlations of these facets with the NEO PI-R match those of the American version. Method We created three groups. The first comprised 360 students from the Institut libre d'éducation physique supérieure (ILEPS) and Tours University (psychology undergraduates). Participants (mean age 21.1 years ± 2.30; 58% women) completed the BFI-Fr and the NEO PI-R. The second comprised 142 psychology students from Tours University (mean age 20.6 years ± 1.78; 81% women); they completed the BFI-Fr twice, two weeks apart (test and retest). The third comprised 252 psychology students from Paris-Nanterre University (mean age 23 years ± 4.2; 89% women) who described a total of 405 people they knew well (mean age 35.2 ± 10.8; 49% women) using the peer-report format of the BFI-Fr. Results In the self-report format, eight of Soto and John's ten aspects had acceptable internal consistency (based on Guildford's (1954) internal consistency criteria, due to the small number of items), with Cronbach's α between 0.60 and 0.86 and test-retest correlations between 0.71 and 0.89, showing satisfactory temporal stability. We found a single facet for Extraversion (Assertiveness), two for Agreeableness (Altruism and Compliance), two for Conscientiousness (Self-Discipline and Order), one for Neuroticism (Anxiety), and two for Openness to Experience (Openness to aesthetics and Openness to ideas). Based on their convergence with the corresponding facets in the NEO PI-R, these eight facets showed satisfactory external validity. With regard to the peer-report format, the Activity facet of Extraversion, which did not have sufficient internal consistency in the self-report format, had acceptable properties (i.e. 9 out of 10 facets). Only the Depression facet of Neuroticism still had insufficient internal consistency. In this study, we proposed an improvement of two facets (Activity and Compliance) and added one facet specific to the French version (Emotional Instability) in place of the Depression facet. Discussion We showed that the BFI-Fr can be used to assess nine of the ten facets described by Soto and John. We also identified an Emotional Instability facet, replacing the Depression facet of Neuroticism. DeYoung et al. (2007) considered that anxiety and depression are indissociable and can be represented by a Neuroticism aspect they labeled Withdrawal. They suggested a second aspect of this dimension they called Volatility (with the N2 Angry Hostility facet of the NEO PI-R as main marker and the N5 Impulsiveness and N3 Depression as secondary markers). The Emotional Instability facet we found corresponds closely to the N2 Angry Hostility facet of the NEO PI-R and appears to be a satisfactory marker of DeYoung et al.'s (2007) Volatility aspect. Although this study has limitations, particularly related to the samples (students), the BFI-Fr facets (derived from those defined by Soto and John in the BFI or proposed as improvements on the original facets) match the corresponding NEO PI-R facets and can also be seen as main markers of the aspects defined by DeYoung et al.