Test 8: The Big Five Personality Test
I Bought a Stationary Bike From a Big 5 in Denver Once. Does That Mean I Pass?
JSG ProTip: If you ever want to buy something — say, a piece of exercise equipment — but you don’t want to pay full price, consider asking for a price match. “But JSG,” I hear you saying, “We all know about price match. How is that a tip?” Well, you arrogant assholes, how about this: Ask them for a price match for a price that doesn’t exist.
Yeah. I bet you feel pretty dumb now.
I forget the exact dollar amounts, but I seem to remember the bike cost roughly $400 everywhere I looked … but I didn’t want to pay $400. I only wanted to pay, like, $300 or so. I had student loans, I couldn’t just throw money around recklessly! (Well, except to buy this, but can you blame me?) So I called around and asked local shops if they’d price match $300, even though I made that price up. Most places asked me to bring in the ad showing that price, which I of course couldn’t do.
But Big 5 Sporting Goods didn’t ask me. And Big 5 Sporting Goods probably should’ve asked me.
What they did ask me was where I saw that price, so I of course said “online.” The subtext here is that I found it, you know, just sort of … online. Somewhere. Could’ve been Amazon, could’ve been Pyongyang Fitness Retailers & Nuclear Research Equipment. Who cares! It’s online! Anyway, the guy I spoke to said yeah, they could do that match.
I drove up to Park Meadows Mall and bought my bike within the hour. I still have it, too. It’s sitting five feet from me in my office as I type this.
What’s the point of that long story? First: The best way to play offense as a consumer is to pit capitalist behemoths against each other. Second: I wonder what it says about me that I pulled that off? Not just that I felt fine doing it, but that the idea came to me so quickly it seemed like instinct. I wonder if there’s a personality test that can hone in on that aspect of my life.
And if not? Well, this one is called the Big Five, so it got me thinking about that story.
According to some quick Googling, the Big Five is fairly literal. It seeks to measure how a person rates within five broad categories, helpfully turned into a mnemonic anagram:
Openness to New Experiences
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
See? OCEAN. And much like the ocean, I’m hoping to “dive in” to this test haha. Really see which way the “tides” are shifting haha. Get lost “adrift” the questions haha. Set “sail” for some answers haha. Get “washed up ashore after a drunken night of carousing with pirates aboard their frigate” haha.
I want my results, is what I’m saying.
Like many tests, this one is essentially a 1-5 scale (or a -2 to 2 scale, I suppose) for a bunch of broadly-written statements, and I have to decide how much I agree or disagree. For instance, the first one is “I am the life of the party.” I have to choose one of:
Disagree
Slightly Disagree
Neutral
Slightly Agree
Agree
Pretty straightforward stuff here, and it’s only 50 questions long. Taking the test is the easy part. The hard part … well, here are my results:
It’s all so clear now! It means … uh, I have no idea what this means.
Facetiousness aside, I do have SOME idea how to read this. Factors III and V jump out right away, as I scored in the 89th and 91st percentiles, respectively. Agreeableness seems pretty accurate for me, especially when you read through its description:
Individuals who score high on agreeableness are characterized as being warm, kind, and considerate. They tend to be cooperative and are motivated to maintain harmonious social relationships. They may also have a strong sense of empathy and concern for the welfare of others.
Sounds about right! In fact, I once got praised for not taking things personally in a work meeting about whether or not some data was accurate. I was like “That’s … noteworthy? It’s not MY data, it’s just the data I pulled together.” I mean, who takes commentary on that sort of thing personally?
Then I remembered: Oh, yeah. I would have taken that sort of thing personally up until a few years ago. Not so much anymore, though, so: high Agreeableness score.
Factor V also makes sense to me, but I do have a minor quibble with it:
Individuals who score high on openness to experience are characterized as being imaginative, curious, and open to new ideas and experiences. They tend to be intellectually curious and enjoy exploring new concepts and ideas. They may also exhibit a preference for creativity and aesthetics.
It seemed pretty accurate at first, but then I thought about it some more. A lot of the questions in this test are, essentially, openness to new ideas. In other tests I’ve taken, like the MBTI, they seem to revolve around openness to new experiences. And I’m a homebody who used to spend his free time binging on Buffalo Trace to avoid existential pain.
There are shades of gray to openness, is what I’m saying.
Let’s look at the flip side. I scored the lowest (by a small margin) on Conscientiousness. Why? Well, people like me “may have difficulty setting and achieving goals, and may be more likely to engage in behaviors that are not in their best interest.” But the joke’s on you, test: My ONLY goal for several years was to make sure I had enough whiskey and mixer on hand that I wouldn’t have to wait for the liquor store to open. Looks like I can set goals after all!
Ahem.
Sometime soon, I’ m going to stack up some of the results I’ve gotten so far and see how well they agree with one another. After all, the longer I do this, the more likely it is I’ll find some contradictory results. Will that be because the tests I’m taking are skewed a certain direction? Or is my personality just harder to pin down than I thought? As of right now, I’m not sure. Sounds like we’ll be figuring it out together!
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go think up some more amazing ocean puns in case that comes up again — and I’m “shore” they will haha.
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