60 I. THEORETICAL  PERSPECTI vES AND  CONCEPT uAL uNITS
Preliminary  Definitions
Because the traditional labels are so easily 
misunderstood, we provide short definitions 
of the five dimensions in Table 2.2 (cf. Costa 
& McCrae, 1992; John, 1990; Tellegen, 
1985). Briefly, Extraversion implies an en -
ergetic approach  toward the social and ma -
terial world and includes traits such as so -
ciability, activity, assertiveness, and positive 
emotionality. Agreeableness contrasts a pro -
social and communal orientation toward 
others with antagonism and includes traits 
such as altruism, tender-  mindedness, trust, 
and modesty. Conscientiousness describes 
socially prescribed impulse control that fa -
cilitates task- and goal-  directed behavior, 
such as thinking before acting, delaying 
gratification, following norms and rules, 
and planning, organizing, and prioritiz -
ing tasks. Neuroticism contrasts emotional 
stability and even-  temperedness with nega -
tive emotionality,  such as feeling anxious, 
nervous, sad, and tense. Finally, Openness 
to Experience (vs. closed-  mindedness) de -
scribes the breadth, depth, originality, and 
complexity of an individual’s mental and 
experiential life .
The numbering convention from I to V, 
favored by Saucier and Goldberg (1996) and 
Hofstee et al. (1997), is useful because it re -
flects the relative size of the factors in lexi -
cal studies. Factor I and II, which primarily 
summarize traits of interpersonal nature, 
tend to account for the largest percentage 
of variance in personality ratings, followed 
by Factor III, whereas the last two factors 
are by far the smallest in lexical studies (de 
Raad, Perugini, et al., 1998). However, the 
Roman numerals are hard to remember, 
and the order of the factors is not invariant 
across studies. Thus, we favor the mnemonic 
convention suggested by the initials given in 
Table 2.2. They evoke multiple associations 
that represent more fully than a single word 
the broad range of meaning captured by 
each of the factors: E stands for Extraver -
sion, Energy, or Enthusiasm; A stands for 
Agreeableness, Altruism, or Affection; C 
is for Conscientiousness, Control, or Con -
straint; N is for Neuroticism, Negative Af -
fectivity, or Nervousness; and O for Open -
ness, Originality, or Open-  Mindedness. The 
reader intrigued by anagrams may have no -ticed that these letters form the OCEAN of 
personality dimensions.
A Proposal for New Factor Names 
for Applied  Contexts
Unfortunately, initials like C, E, and O 
(George, Helson, & John, 2011) may serve 
as efficient labels for personality research -
ers but they are not easily accessible for 
nonexpert audiences, such as educators, 
economists, or public policy makers. It is 
time for personality psychologists to reach 
out to these kinds of audiences and to share 
with them what we have learned about these 
important socio-  emotional characteristics 
(e.g., John & De Fruyt, 2015; see also Abra -
hams et al., 2019).
In Table 2.6, we summarize a recent pro -
posal for new factor and facet names (Primi, 
John, Santos, & De Fruyt, in press). This 
proposal evolved over the past seven years 
in a collaboration that began at the Orga -
nization for Economic Collaboration and 
Development (OECD; see John & De Fruyt, 
2015), which initiated a project on the as -
sessment of socio-  emotional competencies 
in public school students. The OECD ar -
gued that characteristics like compassion, 
responsibility, and assertiveness (i.e., the 
facet level in the hierarchical Big Five model) 
are learned and practiced during develop -
ment, and the school environment can play a 
role in this developmental process. Thus, ed -
ucators, economists, and policy makers have 
shown a great interest in the Big Five and 
the constructs at the more specific facet level 
(see Heckman, Jagelka, & Kautz, Chapter 
42, this volume).
Further work continued at the Instituto 
Ayrton Senna in Sao Paulo, Brazil, focused 
on developing an inventory that could as -
sess the concepts defined by Soto and John’s 
(2017a) literature review in public school 
settings in Brazil. As shown in Table 2.6, 
the proposed label for Conscientiousness 
emphasizes self-  management skills in com -
pleting tasks and assignments; because the 
Productiveness facet (Soto & John, 2017a) 
is such an important attribute in school con -
texts, Primi et al. (in press) divided it into 
three more specific facets, namely Deter -
mination, Focus, and Perseverance. The E 
domain appears as Engaging with Others. 