Personality profiles ans social skills in adolescents.

LACUNZA, A.; CONTINI DE GONZALEZ, N.; CORONEL, PAOLA

San Sebastian

Congreso; 9° Conference of the International Test Commission; 2014

International Test Commission

There is controversy over the impact of personality traits on social behaviour. It is argued that personality by itself is not enough to guarantee an adequate social adjustment and that social skills are presented as an adaptation factor to it. The objectives of this work were a) to describe the social skills in adolescents who attend school in San Miguel de Tucumán, Argentina, and b) to establish relations between personality dimensions and social skills in the participants. A quantitative study with a comparative and transversal design and a non-probability and purposive sampling was carried out. 260 adolescents between 12 and 15 years old who attend state and private schools were administered the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ-J), the Silvia and Martorell Socialization Battery (BAS-3) and a sociodemographic survey. The results showed that deficits in social skills were related to withdrawal and social anxiety in adolescents from state schools, while their peers from private schools showed deficits in leadership. Regarding personality traits, adolescents with lower consideration of others showed lower extraversion and higher emotional toughness (psychoticism), a trait which is also associated with adolescents who lack social self-control. Emotional instability (neuroticism) was related to withdrawal and social anxiety, while low perception of leadership was associated with lower extraversion. The data described emphasize the bidirectional relations between social behaviour and personality during a stage of identity consolidation in adolescents, in particular. Moreover, it is highlighted the importance of delving into the role of context in shaping personality profiles with psychopathological tendencies related to social deficits.