Research suggests that Conscientiousness during childhood and adulthood predict longevity, while Neuroticism may or may not significantly increase longevity.
Conscientiousness Stands Out as a Predictor of Longevity
They found that “conscientiousness in childhood was clearly related to survival in middle to old age.”
Although not all centenarian studies have found the same results, generally, people who make it to very old age are predominantly emotional stable (ie non-neurotic) extroverts – in addition to being highly conscientious.
Recently, various studies have indicated that people's personality profiles in midlife can predict whether or not they are likely to enjoy long lives. However, personality traits change and adapt throughout a person's life, and this may happen due to various factors that, in themselves, relate to mortality risk.
Over the years, experts have found a compelling link between higher levels of conscientiousness and longevity. Conscientiousness is one of the “Big Five” personality traits studied in psychology along with extraversion, agreeableness, openness, and neuroticism.
"These results suggest that high scores in the specific personality traits conscientiousness, extraversion, and openness, are associated with longevity," the researchers wrote.
This means planning, foresight, and caution are the most valued personality traits when it comes to leading a long life—All traits that C personality types are very familiar with.
They found that mortality rates prior to the pandemic were lower for extroverts, while being higher for introverts. However, during the pandemic, these rates were reversed, although there was only a slight difference.
That change is not linear, however. New research indicates that our personalities become increasingly stable as our 20s melt into our 30s, 40s and even 50s, but that that stability then often begins to taper off in old age, Research Digest reports.
The duration of human life (longevity) is influenced by genetics, the environment, and lifestyle.
The study, published in the journal Age and Ageing, also found that if the father lived to 90, it did not correlate to increased longevity and health in daughters. However, if both the mother and father lived to 90, the likelihood of the daughter achieving longevity and healthy aging jumped to 38%, researchers said.
They estimated the heritability of conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness to experience, and extraversion to be 44%, 41%, 41%, 61%, and 53%, respectively.
Agreeableness and Conscientiousness showed relatively gradual increases in absolute scores across the life span whereas Neuroticism showed relatively gradual decreases.
However, paranoid, avoidant, and dependent personality disorders are more common in older women. In general, personality disorder prevalence declines with increasing age (2). On average, patients with personality disorders demonstrate increased health care utilization but suffer from worse health care outcomes.
While the younger group's personalities remained more or less the same overall, the older group's personality traits begin to shift, so that on average, they became less open and extraverted, as well as less agreeable and conscientious.
Both resilience and self-control help people defy the aging effects of stress on their bodies. Self-control refers to the ability to manage our actions and emotions — indeed, higher self-control is linked to looking younger.
Introversion isn't totally genetic. It gets influenced by your environment at a young age, and our genes allow a certain amount of flexibility in response. This happens through “set points,” which are the upper and lower limits of how much extroversion your brain can handle.
Introverts are looked down upon for lack of good 'communication skills'. Right from an early age, introverts have to compete very hard with peers, who seem to have no problem in public or interpersonal speaking. What seems to be effortless for peers is actually the most difficult task for an introverted child.
On average, introverts and extroverts are the same in terms of intelligence. But statistics show that around 70% of gifted people are introverts. People are considered “gifted” when they exhibit above-average intelligence or a superior talent for something, such as music, art or math.
The INFP may be the toughest personality type of all for others to understand. They are seemingly easy-going and carefree, but when it comes to their values, they can become suddenly uncompromising.
Researchers have found that your Myers-Briggs personality type can impact how much money you make. Of the 16 different personality types, those with the ENTJ personality type on average earn the most money. The INFP (Introverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Perceiving) personality type on average earn the least.
The short answer: INFJ (Introverted-Intuitive-Feeling-Judgment) is the most complex Myers-Briggs Personality Type.
Overall, the rarest personality type is INFJ
The rarest personality type is the INFJ personality type, known as 'The Counselor'. INFJ is the rarest personality type across the population, occurring in just 2% of the population. It is also the rarest personality type among men.