The five factor model of personality and heritability: Evidence from Denmark

While previous studies have shown that the traits in the FFM are moderately heritable, it is important to examine whether earlier results hold across different contexts. To date, few studies from the Scandinavian context have estimated the heritability of the FFM. We remedy this shortcoming by making use of a large sample of Danish twins who completed a 60-item personality inventory. Our results confirm that previous findings regarding the heritability of personality traits hold in the Danish context. We find that there are differences in mean levels and heritability estimates of personality traits across gender, though the differences in heritability estimates are not statistically significant. We find a significant common environment component for several of the personality traits, which indicates that the rearing environment of Danish twins may influence the development of some personality traits.