Personality,socioeconomics and crime: An international comparison

Abstract

Data from 37 countries were collected that permitted exploratory analysis of national profiles in terms of personality dimensions: psychoticism (P); extraversion (E); and neuroticism (N) and four socioeconomic indices: gross domestic product (GDP); human development index (HDI); economic growth (EG); and family size (FS) and their relationship to rates of criminal activity. Findings indicated that the socioeconomic indicators did correlate with national crime patterns. High crime nations were more likely to be the richer, industrialised countries having smalles average family size. Personality variables proved more elusive. P surprisingly was not correlated with incidence of crime rather E appeared mast closely linked to rate and type of crime. Findings are discussed in terms of measurement error and possible explanatory mechanisms.