An Investigation into the Relationship of Big Five Personality and Maximizing among Male and Females: A Case of Iranian Students

The present paper aimed to shed light into the relationship between different dimensions of personality and behavioral maximizing and mental standards. To do this, 288 students of Shiraz University from different fields of study (149 females and 139 males) took part as participants. Furthermore, to collect the intended data, two instruments of Goldberg Big Five Personality and Schwartz and colleagues questionnaires were employed. Cronbach alpha formula was used to measure the reliability of the two instruments and the factor analysis, of the principal component analysis with varimax rotation type was utilized to calculate their validity. The obtained indices showed a desirable reliability and validity for the tools. The multiple regression results of big five personality on the behavioral maximizing and mental standards of the whole sample revealed that merely neurosis is a positive and significant predictor for behavioral maximizing; and neurosis and agreement factors are positive significant factors for mental standards. Furthermore, it was understood that extraversion negatively predicts this factor. Finally, no significant difference was observed in terms of maximizing between male and female students and also between students of engineering and education faculties.