Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Understanding the relationship between students’ personality traits and their anxiety and

attitudes towards statistics and PSYC1040

Written by: Rheanna Tai Nolasco

Tutor: Henry Wainwright

Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Abstract

An observational (correlational) research study was conducted to observe three

relationships: Neuroticism and Test & Class Anxiety; Extroversion and Asking for

Help; and Nerdiness and expected success and overall positive experience in

PSYC1040. It involved 130 students from the University of Queensland who were

taking the PSYC1040 module for the semester. Students were required to complete a

questionnaire that they were later debriefed to contain three official tests: Big Five

Personality Scale, the Nerdy Personality Traits scale and the Statistics Anxiety Rating

Scale. After being translated into bivariate scatterplots with outliers removed, data was

received and screened. From this clean data, means and standard deviations were found,

leading to the finding of the correlation coefficient and shared variance. It was observed

from the results analysis that there was a weak correlation between all three

relationships, hence it can be concluded that there is a minimal relationship between the

variables.
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Understanding the relationship between students’ personality traits and their anxiety

and attitudes towards statistics and PSYC1040

Introduction

Hypothesis 1. Neuroticism is the personality trait of being emotional and is

seemingly linked to whether an individual experiences greater or lesser anxiety during

statistics tests and classes. Hypothesis 1 predicts a positive relationship between

Neuroticism and Test and Class anxiety scores as a result of this.

Hypothesis 2. The personality trait of Extroversion reflects an individual who

looks for fulfilment outside of oneself or community. This attribute appears to

determine the anxiety associated with Asking for Help. Hence, Hypothesis 2 is I expect

to find a positive correlation between Extroversion scores and Asking for Help scores.

Hypothesis 3. Nerdiness is described as a personality attribute characterised by a

strong desire to learn and a thorough understanding of the subject. An individual’s

expected success and overall positive experiences in PSYC1040 seem to complement

these characteristics. As a result, Hypothesis 3 predicts that the Nerdiness score and

PSYC1040 expectation results will be positively correlated.

Method

Participants. 139 (33 male, 91 females, 4 not specified, 1 non-applicable) first-

year students who were enrolled in PSYCH1040, at the University of Queensland

participated voluntarily in the study. For students to be better prepared for writing their

research report, they were encouraged by tutors to participate. Participants’ ages ranged

from 17 to 45 years (M = 19.45 years, SD = 3.32 years).

Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Design. Participants were tested in an observational (correlational) study design,

the predictor variables were measures of the Big Five Personality Scale (10 items for

each sub-scale: Extroversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and

Openness) and the Nerdy Personality Attributes scale (50 items on how accurately a

statement reflected who they are). Whilst the predicted variables were the Statistics

Anxiety Rating Scale (STARS) measures and PSYCH1040 question. Participants’

responses were recorded via an online survey in the form of questions mentioned

above.

Materials. Participants of the study were required to complete a questionnaire

that adopted all the questions from the Big Five Personality Scale, the Nerdy

Personality Traits scale and the Statistics Anxiety Rating Scale. Participants answered

questions that each invited a response on a 5-point Likert scale indicating the degree to

which they agreed or disagreed with a statement or how much anxiety they would

experience in a given situation. For the final question they were asked to rate how much

they agreed/disagreed with a question about expected experience and success in

PSYC1040, on a scale of 1-100. 1 being completely disagree and 100 bring completely

agree. A copy of the questionnaires can be found in Appendix A.

Procedure. First-year university students were asked and encouraged by tutors

to complete a voluntary online questionnaire during their first PSYC1040 tutorial class.

Although there was no set time limit, it was expected to be completed within the

tutorial (2 hours). Instructions were clearly put at the top of each section of questions.

After completing the questionnaire and being debriefed on the study’s purpose and

learning that the questionnaire consisted of three official questionnaires, students were

permitted to leave. Data was collected and then compiled into raw data which was then
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

used to calculate the shared variance percentage and Pearson’s r correlation between

variables.

Results

The data was analysed with impossible scores removed. There was a total of 5

participants whose data was removed. Participant #9 was removed as their Test and

Class Anxiety result of 0 was less than the possible score of 8, whilst their PSYC1040

score of 110 was above the maximum score of 100. Participant #35 was removed as

their Neuroticism score was a 4 when the lowest possible score was 10. Participant #61

was removed because their answer of 4 did not match any of the gender indicators (1, 2

or 3). Participant #71 was removed because their score of 7 on the Extroversion

subscale was less than the lowest possible score of 10. Finally, participant #102 was

removed because their Extroversion score of 54 exceeded the possible score range of

10-50, while their nerdiness score of 49 was below the possible score range of 50-250.

After the impossible scores were removed, there were a total of 125 participants (89

females, 31 males). Table 1 displays the descriptive statistics to the variables in this

study.

Table 1
Mean and standard deviation
Variable M SD
Neuroticism 33.33 7.40
Test & Class Anxiety 25.10 7.28
Extroversion 31.30 7.13
Asking for Help 14.84 3.61
Nerdiness 121.89 25.05
PSYC1040 73.22 16.90

The data was explored graphically through bivariate scatterplot graphs found in

Appendix B. Results of the Pearson correlation indicated that there was a weak positive

correlation between the scores for Neuroticism and Test & Class Anxiety, r(125) = .45.
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

The shared variance revealed that 20.55% of Test & Class Anxiety was related to

Neuroticism, r2 = .20. There was a weak negative correlation between Extroversion and

Asking for Help, r(125) = -.21. The shared variance revealed that 4.62% of Asking for

Help was related to Extroversion, r2 = .04. From the results of the Pearson correlation.

From the results of the Pearson correlation between Nerdiness and the expected success

and overall positive experiences in PSYC1040, a weak positive correlation was

observed, r(125) = .15. The shared variance revealed that 2.40% of the expected success

and overall positive experience in PSYC1040 was related to Nerdiness. Workings may

be found in Appendix D.

Discussion

Hypothesis 1. The hypothesis of a positive relationship between Neuroticism

and Test and Class Anxiety scores was supported. Contrary to my initial assumption

that the relationship would be moderate, the relationship was weak, r(125) = .45. This

is corroborated by 20.55% of the variance in Test & Class Anxiety can be explained by

Neuroticism, this small value indicates that the other 79.85% of the variance in Test &

Class Anxiety can be due to sampling error or other variables.

Hypothesis 2. The hypothesis of a positive relationship between Extroversion

and Asking for Help was found to be false. Rather than a strong positive relationship, as

I had expected, it turned out to be a weak negative relationship with r(125) = -.21. This

strength is supported by the fact that Extroversion can explain 4.62% of the variance in

Asking for Help. This means that the remaining 95.38% of the variance in Asking for

Help could be due to sampling error or other variables.

Hypothesis 3. The hypothesis of a positive relationship between nerdiness and

expected success and overall positive experience in PSYC1040 was supported. The

strength of the relationship was predicted to be weak positive correlation, r(125) =.15.
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

The fact that Nerdiness can explain 2.40% of the variation in PSYC1040 expectation

results supports this weak strength; nonetheless, this means that the remaining 97.60%

of the variation in PSYC1040 expectation results is most likely due to sampling error or

other variables.

Appendix

Appendix A- Sample of the questionnaires

Big Five Personality Scale:

Personality type in Grey cells.

Signed numbers in right column indicate negative and positively scaled questions.

Extroversion  

Don't talk a lot 1-

Keep in the background 1-

Have little to say 1-

Don't like to draw attention to myself 1-

Am quiet around strangers 1-

Am the life of the party 1+

Feel comfortable around people 1+

Start conversations 1+

Talk to a lot of different people at parties 1+

Don't mind being the centre of attention 1+

Agreeableness  

Feel little concern for others 2-

Insult people 2-

Am not interested in other people's problems 2-

Am not really interested in others 2-

Am interested in people 2+

Sympathise with others' feelings 2+

Have a soft heart 2+

Take time out for others 2+

Feel others' emotions 2+

Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Make people feel at ease 2+

Conscientiousness  

Leave my belongings around 3-

Make a mess of things 3-

Often forget to put things back in their proper place 3-

Shirk my duties 3-

Am always prepared 3+

Pay attention to details 3+

Get chores done right away 3+

Like order 3+

Follow a schedule 3+

Am exacting in my work 3+
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Neuroticism  

Get stressed out easily 4+

Worry about things 4+

Am easily disturbed 4+

Get upset easily 4+

Change my mood a lot 4+

Have frequent mood swings 4+

Get irritated easily 4+

Often feel blue 4+

Am relaxed most of the time 4-

Seldom feel blue 4-

Openness  

Have difficulty understanding abstract ideas 5-

Am not interested in abstract ideas 5-

Do not have a good imagination 5-

Have a rich vocabulary 5+

Have a vivid imagination 5+

Have excellent ideas 5+

Am quick to understand things 5+

Use difficult words 5+

Spend time reflecting on things 5+

Am full of ideas 5+

Nerdy Personality Attributes Scale:

Signed numbers in right column indicate positively and negatively scaled questions.

I am a strange person 1+
I would describe my smarts as bookish 2+
I like science fiction 3+
I was a very odd child 4+
I am interested in science 5+
I sometimes prefer fictional people to real ones 6+
I love to read challenging material 7+
I can be socially awkward at times 8+
I gravitate towards introspection 9+
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

I watch science related shows 10+

I would rather read a book than go to a party 11+
I like to play RPGs (e.g. D&D) 12+
I care about super heroes 13+
I was in advanced classes 14+
I am more comfortable with my hobbies that I am with other people 15+
I spend recreational time researching topics others may find dry or overly rigorous 16+
I have played a lot of video games 17+
I prefer academic success to social success 18+
I have started writing a novel 19+
I spend more time at the library than any other public place 20+
I get excited about my ideas and research 21+
I collect books 22+
I like to read technology news reports 23+
I enjoy learning more than I need to 24+
My appearance is not as important as my intelligence 25+
I am an average person 1-
I don't have book smarts 2-
I don't like science fiction 3-
I was a normal child 4-
I prefer other topics to science 5-
I prefer interacting with real people over fictional ones 6-
I get bored reading challenging material 7-
I usually "fit in" in social settings 8-
I don't spend much time alone in my thoughts 9-
I'm not interested science related shows 10-
I would rather go to a party than read a book 11-
I don't know what RPGs are (e.g. D&D) 12-
I don't really thing about super heroes 13-
I was in regular classes at school 14-
I prefer to be with other people than pursuing my hobbies 15-
I spend recreational time away from books and research 16-
I have never played a lot of video games 17-
I think social success is more important than academic success 18-
I have not considered writing a novel 19-
I only go to the library when I have to 20-
I don't think my ideas or research are very exciting 21-
I don't buy many books 22-
I scroll past technology news reports in my news feed 23-
I study only what I need to 24-
I would rather be physically attractive than smart 25-
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Statistics Anxiety Rating Scale (STARS):

Test and Class Anxiety

Studying for an examination in a statistics course

Doing the coursework for a statistics course

Doing an examination in a statistics course

Walking into the room to take a statistics test

Finding that another student in class got a different answer than I did on a statistical
problem

Waking up in the morning on the day of a statistics test

Enrolling in a statistics course

Going over a final examination in statistics after it has been marked

Interpretation Anxiety

Interpreting the meaning of a table in a journal article

Making an objective decision based on empirical data

Reading a journal article that includes some statistical analyses

Trying to decide which analysis is appropriate for my research project

Reading an advertisement for a car which includes figures on fuel consumption,

depreciation, etc.

Interpreting the meaning of a probability value once I have found it

Arranging to have a body of data put into the computer

Determining whether to reject or retain the null hypothesis

Trying to understand the odds in a lottery

Watching a student search through a load of computer output for his/her research

Trying to understand the statistical analyses in the abstract of a journal article

Ask for help: anxiety associated with asking for help

Going to ask my statistics teacher for individual help with material I am having difficulty
understanding

Asking one of your lecturers for help in understanding the output of a statistics program

Asking someone in the computer lab for help in understanding the output of a statistics
program

Asking a fellow student for help in understanding the output of a statistics program
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Worth

I am a subjective person, so the objectivity of statistics is inappropriate for me

I wonder why I have to do all these things in statistics when in actual life I will never use them

Statistics is worthless to me since it is empirical and my area of interest is abstract

Statistics takes more time than it is worth

I feel statistics is a waste

I lived this long without knowing statistics, why should I learn it now?

I do not want to learn to like statistics

Statistics is for people who have a natural leaning towards maths

Statistics is a pain I could do without

I wish the statistics requirement would be removed from my academic program

I do not understand why someone in my field needs statistics

I do not see why I have to fill my head with statistics. It will have no use in my career

I cannot tell you why, but I just do not like statistics

Statistical figures are not fit for human consumption

Affective skills are so important in my (future) profession that I do not want to clutter my
thinking with something as

cognitive as statistics

I am never going to use statistics so why should I have to take it?

Fear of statistics teachers

Statistics teachers are so abstract they seem inhuman

Most statistics teachers are not human

Statistics teachers speak a different language

Statisticians are more number oriented than they are people oriented

Statistics teachers talk so fast you cannot logically follow them

Self (ability to cope with calculations and math in stats)

I have not done maths for a long time. I know I will have problems getting through statistics

I cannot even understand secondary school maths; how can I possibly do statistics?

Since I never enjoyed maths I no see how I can enjoy statistics

I do not have enough brains to get through statistics

I could enjoy statistics if it were not so mathematical

Statistics are not really bad. It is just too mathematical

I am too slow in my thinking to get through statistics

Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

PSYC1040 Expectation Question:

On a scale of 1-100, with 1 being completely disagree and 100 being completely agree, participants respond to
the following statement:

“I feel like I am going to have a positive experience and successful semester in PSYC1040.”

Appendix B- Raw Data

Impossible scores are shaded in yellow

Participant # Gende Age Neuroticism Test & Class Anxiety Extroversion Asking Nerdiness PSYC1040
r
1 2 18 40 32 39 9 129 80
2 2 17 26 27 22 12 105 75
3 1 22 30 39 16 13 128 65
4 2 18 28 22 40 12 126 85
5 2 20 30 24 41 13 120 86
6 1 24 45 32 25 17 127 80
7 2 18 20 15 39 18 144 90
8 2 17 30 31 36 16 135 81
9 1 18 31 0 45 14 63 110
10 2 17 43 29 20 16 140 60
11 2 18 23 27 33 20 118 90
12 2 21 36 30 26 17 118 50
13 2 17 28 22 31 18 113 50
14 2 28 46 20 33 20 131 67
15 1 20 28 10 39 20 118 95
16 2 18 30 23 22 17 188 30
17 2 19 37 30 39 6 85 18
18 2 20 40 14 38 14 131 90
19 2 18 23 35 43 15 103 90
20 2 18 24 22 41 11 151 80
21 2 19 40 37 36 14 152 73
22 2 18 41 34 34 15 147 94
23 2 18 32 24 26 18 95 90
24 3 24 42 27 33 16 149 80
25 2 20 38 19 36 14 139 86
26 2 18 36 22 31 13 123 80
27 2 18 30 31 26 20 139 90
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

28 1 19 15 25 37 16 109 80
29 1 19 19 8 32 16 119 68
30 2 19 36 15 36 8 56 66
31 1 20 27 13 40 17 133 100
32 2 18 41 39 39 6 109 46
33 2 18 21 20 45 18 115 79
34 2 18 39 20 36 12 85 80
35 1 17 4 29 31 16 161 70
36 2 18 35 23 43 12 148 90
37 1 22 34 23 28 15 125 74
38 2 18 41 31 26 8 103 50
39 1 18 37 23 28 17 106 80
40 2 21 29 19 22 13 119 80
41 2 20 25 11 16 20 176 50
42 2 19 33 28 39 10 118 74
43 2 18 41 28 22 13 81 80
44 2 19 32 24 32 19 143 80
45 2 18 36 37 32 12 89 50
46 1 27 30 16 35 20 172 90
47 2 22 22 22 40 9 68 50
48 2 18 33 36 40 14 88 21
49 2 17 39 28 42 16 130 85
50 1 18 22 19 38 19 118 91
51 2 18 30 24 29 18 112 80
52 1 18 27 25 26 18 115 71
53 2 18 30 30 40 6 102 45
54 2 18 30 24 34 12 78 55
55 2 19 37 31 31 15 97 60
56 1 18 22 32 27 13 111 70
57 2 18 35 23 26 17 112 90
58 2 18 30 31 25 17 121 65
59 2 18 37 21 15 16 149 87
60 1 19 34 18 27 15 169 51
61 4 18 33 35 21 17 127 58
62 2 17 40 31 36 12 96 85
63 2 17 48 34 39 7 98 98
64 2 19 38 18 32 12 92 80
65 2 35 33 24 25 20 101 75
66 1 19 30 21 28 19 141 71
67 3 18 18 13 21 15 139 76
68 2 23 33 26 28 15 127 90
69 1 21 23 20 20 15 142 70
70 1 24 35 26 33 15 113 65
71 2 17 49 30 7 17 270 95
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

72 2 18 31 14 43 12 71 67
73 2 20 36 15 33 18 143 64
74 2 17 25 27 43 12 118 80
75 1 18 24 20 27 19 104 73
76 2 20 45 20 43 18 125 80
77 2 21 34 16 27 18 127 100
78 2 24 44 27 24 18 152 70
79 3 25 36 36 31 15 166 50
80 2 19 46 40 27 13 124 70
81 2 18 27 29 35 18 101 84
82 1 17 30 24 19 16 107 61
83 2 18 36 18 23 19 173 85
84 2 19 32 33 30 17 81 70
85 1 18 36 31 32 18 92 84
86 2 17 42 26 30 15 133 65
87 1 20 47 33 27 13 153 86
88 2 17 46 38 27 7 116 28
89 2 30 38 18 27 18 125 75
90 2 19 30 19 35 16 114 65
91 2 17 35 33 37 13 83 59
92 1 19 21 17 25 19 147 85
93 1 17 35 20 19 20 154 90
94 1 27 21 13 26 13 161 70
95 2 20 25 13 33 20 138 95
96 1 22 37 26 40 13 133 70
97 2 18 38 16 28 15 125 70
98 2 19 18 25 43 18 93 60
99 1 18 34 19 33 19 109 90
100 1 22 39 32 33 18 124 100
101 2 18 41 22 20 15 115 65
102 2 41 24 36 54 8 49 72
103 1 19 30 28 25 12 112 65
104 2 22 37 26 24 16 151 90
105 2 19 33 28 33 13 155 65
106 2 18 34 28 16 15 136 70
107 2 18 35 23 38 16 127 70
108 2 20 38 38 37 15 140 50
109 2 17 35 30 42 12 109 72
110 2 18 40 33 22 10 147 87
111 2 18 31 32 37 8 136 66
112 2 18 48 37 43 14 85 90
113 2 19 42 40 28 7 131 88
114 1 20 26 15 30 20 152 83
115 2 17 37 31 25 19 143 65
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

116 3 18 43 26 24 10 147 80
117 3 18 41 31 29 19 171 90
118 2 18 44 27 36 13 117 73
119 1 19 34 30 35 14 123 80
120 2 19 27 14 38 20 131 75
121 2 19 38 22 22 17 77 90
122 2 17 22 18 35 12 122 90
123 2 18 45 40 27 12 104 25
124 2 19 31 27 26 15 86 86
125 2 18 41 21 26 11 134 50
126 2 19 23 24 34 10 104 71
127 1 19 30 21 26 17 90 78
128 1 23 26 18 34 20 118 92
129 2 18 34 24 31 12 114 60
130 2 18 29 27 34 12 88 37

Appendix C – Bivariate scatterplots

Impossible scores are coloured red

Neuroticism and Test & Class Anxiety

45

40

35

30
Test & Class Anxiety

25

20

15

10

0
10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50

Neuroticism
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Extroversion and Asking for Help

25

20

15
Asking for Help

10

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Extroversion

Nerdiness and PSYC1040

120

100

80
Nerdiness

60

40

20

0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300

PSYC1040
Personality, Nerdiness, and Attitudes Towards Statistics.

Appendix D – Table of Analysis

Table 2
Calculation of Correlation (Pearson’s r value)

Variables r r2 Working Answer

(%)
Neuroticism and Test & Class
0.453 0.2055 0.2055 x 100 20.55%
Anxiety
Extroversion and Asking for
-0.215 0.0462 0.0462 x 100 4.62%
Help
Nerdiness and PSYC1040 0.155 0.0240 0.0240 x 100 2.40%
Variables Σ ZxZy N Working Answer

Neuroticism and Test & 56.659 125 r = 56.659/125 0.453

Class Anxiety
Extroversion and Asking
-26.879 125 r = -26.879/125 -0.215
for Help
Nerdiness and
19.369 125 r = 19.369/125 0.155
PSYC1040

Table 3
Calculation of percentage of Shared Variance