Compilation and Validation of Two Short Forms to Measure HEXACO Dimensions in Elementary School Children

Area of Science:

• Developmental Psychology
• Personality Psychology

Background:

• Few personality assessments for children utilize the HEXACO Model of Personality.
• Existing HEXACO measures are often unsuitable for elementary school-aged children (8-10 years).

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate HEXACO-based short-form personality measures for elementary school children using parent reports.
• To address the lack of appropriate personality assessment tools for this age group.

Main Methods:

• Utilized Ant Colony Optimization, a meta-heuristic algorithm, for item selection from 122 parent-reported items.
• Developed a 54-item short form (latent facet structure) and an 18-item ultra-short form (correlated factors model).
• Assessed model fit, re-test reliability (6 months), and convergent/divergent validity in independent samples.

Main Results:

• Both the 54-item and 18-item short forms demonstrated good model fit and high re-test correlations.
• The measures showed largely expected convergent and divergent validity with socio-emotional constructs and performance measures.
• Evidence supports the construct, re-test, and predictive criterion validity of the developed short forms.

Conclusions:

• The study successfully created and validated two brief HEXACO personality measures for children aged 8-10 via parent report.
• These new instruments provide reliable and valid tools for assessing child personality structure and development.
• The findings contribute to a better understanding of personality in childhood using the HEXACO framework.