Voters' HEXACO personality traits as predictors of their presidential leadership style preferences

Previous followership research has focused on relations between voters' personality and preferences for actual politicians' personality traits, but there is a lack of research on the relations between voters' personality and preferences for ideal political leadership styles. The aim of this research was to explore – during a presidential election – the relations between voters' HEXACO personality traits and their leadership preferences based on the circumplex leadership model. In a sample of 233 voters from Serbia, we investigated preference for presidential (charismatic, avoidant, autocratic, and democratic) leadership styles using a vignettes-based measure. The results revealed that a charismatic style (high communion and high agency) was – in line with our proposed functional principle – the most preferred style. Furthermore, HEXACO Emotionality and Honesty-Humility were most consistently related to preferred presidential leadership styles. Emotionality was positively related to a preference for a charismatic and democratic style and negatively to a preference for an autocratic style. Honesty-Humility was negatively related to a preference for an avoidant and autocratic style. We propose that the results for Emotionality may be explained by the need fulfillment principle, whereas the results for the remaining traits may be explained by the similarity principle.