An Investigation of Personality Types within the HEXACO Personality Framework

Recent research aimed at identifying distinct personality types has generally searched for such types in the space of the dimensions of the Big Five or Five-Factor model. We extended this search to the space of the HEXACO model of personality structure, using data from a large community sample of adults. In a series of cluster analyses involving 3 to 7 clusters, the proportion of reliable variance in HEXACO dimensions that was accounted for by the types - i.e., clusters - was small, never exceeding that accounted for by clusters generated from random multivariate normal data. The predictive validity of the types and the dimensions was compared with respect to aggregated peer reports on the Big Five personality factors, and results showed that even the largest sets of HEXACO types accounted for only half as much variance as did the HEXACO dimensions. The results provide no evidence of meaningful personality types within the space of the HEXACO framework.