The impact of personality traits on the positive mental health of Canadian adults during the COVID-19 pandemic: A Replication and Extension Study

Abstract The COVID-19 epidemic was first reported in 2019 and rapidly spread across the globe. Many studies have shown that the COVID-19 pandemic adversely affected mental health. Individual differences such as personality could influence people’s responses to the pandemic. For example, the results of a previous study by Shokrkon and Nicoladis (2021) showed that the personality trait of Extroversion positively and Neuroticism negatively contributed to the mental health of Canadians. The goal of our study was to replicate this study using the same tasks and a similar population and extend it by including all 5 personality traits in our analysis and also controlling for the variable of Response to COVID-19 Stress (in addition to demographic variables). Our results were similar to Shokrkon and Nicoladis (2021) and we also found that Extroversion positively and Neuroticism negatively are associated to the mental health of Canadians. We also found that Agreeableness, Openness to Experience, and Conscientiousness are positively and significantly related to the mental health of Canadians. Our results could provide a guide for the screening of people more at risk for mental health issues based on personality traits.