Questionnaire Description

The Eysenck Personality Questionnaire – Revised Short Scale (EPQ-R S) consists of 48 questions and is designed to assess four dimensions of personality: neuroticism, extraversion, psychoticism, and a lie scale. It is based on the Eysenck’s theory of personality and is primarily used in adult populations. The Inventory of Child Individual Differences (ICID) is based on free parental descriptions of their children’s personality and behavior from preschool through adolescence. It assesses children through 15 dimensions, including emotionality, extraversion, aggressiveness, sociability, interpersonal sensitivity, optimism, inhibition, passivity, frustration tolerance, and others. Its construction was based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods and is applied cross-culturally.

Data Analysis and Use

The EPQ-R S was administered to a sample of 946 individuals (422 men and 524 women), aged between 16 and 73 years. Data analysis relied on psychometric indices of internal consistency and test-retest reliability, which yielded satisfactory results for most dimensions except psychoticism. The Greek ICID sample consisted of 1,089 children aged 3 to 12 years, along with their parents, with concurrent psychometric evaluation in Greece, Sweden, and China. The sample was stratified across age and social groups. Factor analysis confirmed the structure of the 15 scales, and additional analysis examined correlations between parental assessments and actual child behavior and personality traits.

Purpose

The aim of the EPQ-R S is to assess adult personality according to Eysenck’s theoretical model. This tool is used to evaluate individual differences across core personality dimensions. Similarly, the purpose of the ICID is to assess children’s personality and behavior from the perspective of their parents, aiming to better understand children’s individuality and link personality traits to psychological and social functioning.

Scoring

Scoring for the EPQ-R S is binary, with each question answered as “yes” or “no.” A “yes” answer is scored as 1 and a “no” as 0, except for reverse-worded items where the opposite applies. The ICID uses a 7-point Likert scale (1 = does not apply at all, 7 = applies very much), where parents rate how well each statement describes their child. Each scale score is derived from the average of relevant item scores, after reversing negatively worded items where necessary.

References

Alexopoulos, D. S., & Kalaitzidis, I. (2004). Psychometric properties of Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised (EPQ-R) Short Scale in Greece. Personality and Individual Differences, 37, 1205–1220.
Eysenck, H. J., & Eysenck, S. B. G. (1991). Eysenck Personality Questionnaire – Revised (EPQ-R). London: Hodder & Stoughton.
Besevegis, E., Pavlopoulos, V., & Motti-Stefanidi, F. (2003, August). Parents’ views of desirable and actual personality characteristics of their children. Paper presented at the XIth European Conference on Developmental Psychology, Milan.
Halverson, C. F., Havill, V., Deal, J. E., Baker, S., Victor, J., Pavlopoulos, V., Besevegis, E., & Wen, L. (2003). Personality structure as derived from parental ratings of free descriptions of children.