Personality and EU Attitudes: Relationships across EU Attitude Dimensions

Bert N. Bakker – University of Amsterdam

Claes H. de Vreese – University of Amsterdam

Abstract

We still do not fully understand why attitudes towards the European Union (EU) differ

among citizens. In this study, we turn to the Big Five personality traits Openness,

Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism as antecedents of EU

attitudes. Based on a national survey, we focus on attitudes towards widening and

deepening of the EU, trust in EU institutions, identification with the EU, and negative affect

experienced towards the EU. The nature of the EU attitude is expected to condition the

strength and direction of the association of a particular EU attitude with a personality trait.

The Big Five traits are indeed predictors of some but not all EU attitudes and will shape how

citizens’ respond to changes in the institutional set-up of the EU.

Key words: EU attitudes, Personality, Big Five

Citizens differ profoundly in their attitudes towards the European Union (EU) which

influence vote choice in elections for the European parliament (de Vries and Tillman, 2011;

van Spanje and de Vreese, 2011), EU referendums (Hobolt and Brouard, 2010; Hobolt, 2005;

Schuck and de Vreese, 2008), and national elections (de Vries, 2007; de Vries et al., 2011;

Tillman, 2004). Extant research has documented that socio-economic status, political

sophistication, and evaluations of the government as well as the economy are antecedents

of EU attitudes (Franklin et al., 1994; Gabel, 1998; Ray, 2003; Tillman, 2012). Likewise, anti-

immigrant attitudes, political ideology and national identity are predictors of EU attitudes

(Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Carey, 2002; Harteveld et al., 2013; Hobolt, 2014; Kritzinger,

2003). Yet, we still do not fully understand why attitudes towards the EU differ among

citizens.

Recent research re-emphasizes that personality is an important antecedent of political

attitudes (Gerber et al., 2011; Jost et al., 2003; Mondak and Halperin, 2008). A commonly

employed model of personality is the Big Five model of personality which isolates the traits

Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism (Digman, 1990;

Goldberg, 1992; McCrae and Costa, 1987). Big Five traits shape political attitudes when the

attitude involves specific goals and values that relate to one or more Big Five traits (Gerber

et al., 2010; Jost et al., 2009; Mondak, 2010). In the only study up to this point, Schoen

(2007) showed that support for further integration of the EU is associated with high levels of

Openness and Agreeableness but low levels of Conscientiousness.

The literature on EU attitudes has, however, demonstrated that EU integration is only

one of multiple EU attitudes (Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Hobolt and Brouard, 2010). For

instance, attitudes towards EU integration can be divided into (1) support for the widening

of the EU by enlarging the number of member states and (2) support for the deepening of

the EU by further integrating existing policies (Hobolt, 2014; Karp and Bowler, 2006). Others

have isolated trust in EU institutions (Harteveld et al., 2013; Lubbers, 2008), identification

with the EU (Bruter, 2003; Hobolt and Brouard, 2010; Lubbers, 2008), and negative affect

towards the EU (Boomgaarden et al., 2011) as EU attitudes.

We theorize that the nature of the EU attitude conditions the strength and direction of

the association with the Big Five traits. In a national survey conducted in the Netherlands,

we confirm that the EU attitude conditions the strength and direction of the association with

Big Five traits. For instance, we demonstrate that the Big Five trait Openness is positively

associated with the support for widening of the EU, but this trait is unrelated to deepening

of the EU. The effects of the Big Five traits on EU attitudes are independent of commonly

identified antecedents of EU attitudes such as government evaluation, economic outlook,

national identity and anti-immigrant attitudes. In doing so, we push the research on

personality and EU attitudes an important step further.

The contribution of this study is twofold. First, by establishing the direct associations

between the Big Five traits and EU attitudes, we demonstrate that personality is an

important antecedent of EU attitudes. This implies that scholars of EU attitudes should

consider personality as an antecedent of EU attitudes. Second, this study has isolated a set

of personality characteristics which should interact with the environment in shaping citizens’

attitudes towards the EU. For instance, our findings suggest that the open-minded,

agreeable, and neurotic citizens will respond positively to the widening of the EU by

including new countries. Acknowledging that the personality of citizens differs, politicians,

policy makers and the news media could tailor their messages to the motives and needs

rooted in the specific Big Five traits in order to inform the public and increase the legitimacy

of the EU.

Big Five Personality Traits and Political Attitudes

A rich body of research has studied the association between citizens’ personality and

political attitudes (see for a reviews, Carney et al., 2008; Jost et al., 2003). We turn to a

commonly used categorization of psychological dispositions: the Big Five model of

personality. The Big Five model of personality encapsulates a wide variety of individual

differences in the traits Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and

Neuroticism (Digman, 1990; Goldberg, 1992). Specifically, people open to experience have a

lively imagination, are curious and open-minded and have few behavioral inhibitions.

Conscientious persons prefer order, adhere to social norms, plan and organize tasks, control

impulses, are goal-oriented and are reluctant to change. Extraverts seek excitement, are

outgoing and social. Agreeable citizens are tender-minded, trusting, altruistic and caring.

Lastly, neurotic persons are self-conscious and have a tendency to experience negative

affect such as anger, anxiety and depression.

Personality traits are core characteristics that share a set of attributes which make it

possible to assume that they shape attitudes and behaviors (Asendorpf and Aken, 2003).

Specifically, Big Five traits are heritable (Yamagata et al., 2006), develop in early childhood

(Edmonds et al., 2013), are robust across cultures (McCrae and Terracciano, 2005) and are

stable over time (Cobb-Clark and Schurer, 2012). Accordingly, Big Five traits can be seen as

“stable individual level differences in people’s motivational reactions to circumscribed

classes of environmental stimuli” (Denissen and Penke, 2008: 1286). The attitudes and

behaviors that are influenced by personality traits, so called surface characteristics, are more

amendable to cultural and social influences and less stable than personality traits (Asendorpf

and Denissen, 2006). Surface characteristics are likely to develop over time as the product of

the interaction between core characteristics and experiences from the environment

(McCrae, 2009). Building upon the aforementioned characteristics, the Big Five traits have

been used to explain individual differences in a wide range of surface characteristics such as

health behavior (Ozer and Benet-Martínez, 2006), and academic achievement (Paunonen

and Ashton, 2001).

Political attitudes are a typical example of surface characteristics (McCrae and Costa,

2008). In the domain of politics, Big Five traits are likely to shape attitudes when the issue

involves specific goals and values that relate to these traits (Jost et al., 2009; Mondak, 2010;

Schoen, 2007). For instance, Big Five traits have shown to be antecedents of attitudes

towards immigrants (Freitag and Rapp, 2015), punishment of criminals (Kandola and Egan,

2014) and moral issues (Gerber et al., 2010; Mondak, 2010). Importantly, the strength and

direction of the associations between personality traits, such as the Big Five traits, and

political attitudes is conditional upon the attitudes of interest (Carney et al., 2008; Feldman

and Johnston, 2014; Van Hiel and Mervielde, 2004). For instance, the Big Five trait

Neuroticism is positively associated with left-wing economic attitudes as these would

accommodate the fear and anxiety experienced by market risks (Gerber et al., 2010), but the

trait is generally unrelated to attitudes towards immigrants and moral issues (Freitag and

Rapp, 2015; Kandola and Egan, 2014; Mondak, 2010). The strength and the direction of the

association between the Big Five trait and the EU attitudes seem to be conditioned by the

nature of the political attitude.

Big Five Personality Traits and EU Attitudes

The association between personality traits and support for integration of the EU was

addressed by Schoen (2007). Specifically, Schoen (2007) demonstrated that the high scorers

on Openness and Agreeableness are supportive of further integration of the EU and the

introduction of the Euro. Moreover, Conscientiousness was associated with opposition to EU

integration. The study by Schoen (2007) illustrates that Big Five traits are important

antecedent of attitudes towards EU integration.1 Support for EU integration itself is,

however, only one of multiple EU attitudes (Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Easton, 1975; Hobolt

and Brouard, 2010; Hobolt, 2014). We theorize that different Big Five traits are antecedents

of different EU attitudes. In this study we focus upon attitudes towards (1) widening of the

EU, (2) deepening of the EU, (3) trust in EU institutions, (4) identification with the EU, and (5)

negative affect towards the EU. Importantly, formulating our expectations we have observed

three different patterns. First, there are associations between Big Five traits and EU attitudes

which, supported by earlier research, lead to strong directional expectations. An illustrative

example is the expected positive association between Openness and the widening of the EU.

Second, some expectations are not necessarily fuelled by earlier research but can be inferred

from research outside the domain of politics. The expected positive association between

Neuroticism and the experience of negative affect towards the EU fits within this category.

Third, some expectations are necessarily more explorative due to competing insights based

upon earlier literature or the paucity of extant research. For instance, the association

between Extraversion and most EU attitude dimensions falls within this category. In the

1 In a recent study, Tillman (2013: 573) demonstrated that high scorers on authoritarianism

tend to experience more “fears about the building of the European Union”. Authoritarianism

is, however, a construct associated with low levels of Openness and Agreeableness (Sibley

and Duckitt, 2008). This further supports the finding that high scorers on Openness and

Agreeableness support the integration of the EU.

remainder of this section, we develop an argument for the expected relationships between

the Big Five traits and the five EU attitudes.

Deepening and Widening

We start with the association between Big Five traits and attitudes towards the integration

of the EU. Attitudes towards EU integration can be divided into attitudes towards widening

of the EU and attitudes towards deepening of the EU (Hobolt, 2014; Karp and Bowler, 2006).

Widening of the EU taps into the attitudes towards new member states in general or

admission of specific countries such as Turkey (de Vreese et al., 2008; Hobolt, 2014; Karp

and Bowler, 2006). Attitudes towards the deepening of the EU tap into further integrating

the common policies of the EU such as the implementation of a common currency and the

integration in a common foreign policy (Hobolt, 2014; Karp and Bowler, 2006). We argue

that Big Five traits are differentially associated attitudes towards widening and deepening of

the EU. In doing so, we expand the work by Schoen (2007) who treated support for EU

integration as a uni-dimensional construct.

The drive for new experiences, imaginativeness, and tolerance rooted in Openness make

persons high on Openness more likely to support the widening of the EU. The

imaginativeness make the open-minded more likely to consider alternatives (Petersen and

Aarøe, 2013). The tolerance rooted in Openness leads to positive attitudes towards out-

group members (Freitag and Rapp, 2015). Lastly, the drive for new activities makes high

scorers on Openness the most likely to migrate to another country (Canache et al., 2013). In

sum, we expect that the open-mindedness, curiosity, imaginativeness, and tolerance rooted

in Openness leads to a positive association of this trait with attitudes towards the widening

of the EU. Importantly, we do not think that the further integration of, complex, EU policies

will resonate with the motives rooted in Openness. Therefore, we do not expect that

Openness is associated with the support for the deepening of the EU.

Conscientious persons prefer order, adhere to social norms, plan and organize tasks,

control impulses, are goal-oriented, and are reluctant to change. On the one hand, we could

expect that conscientious persons oppose the widening and deepening of the EU as they are

reluctant to change and prefer the status quo (Schoen, 2007). However, conscientious

persons are also dutiful and strive for achievement (Costa et al., 1991). Accordingly, they

could also support the widening and deepening of the EU as this is the appropriate mean to

achieve such goals. Given these competing insights, we do not formulate directional

expectations regarding the associations between Conscientiousness and deepening and

widening of the EU.

The widening of the EU is expected to resonate with the trusting, caring and tender-

minded motives rooted in Agreeableness. Therefore, we expect that Agreeableness is

positively associated with support for widening of the EU. We do not expect to find an

association between Agreeableness and the deepening of the EU as the development of

these, mostly abstract, EU policies does not resonate with the motives rooted in

Agreeableness.

Neurotic persons tend to adopt political attitudes which accommodate the experienced

negative affect. For instance, neurotic persons support economic policies such as income

redistribution because these policies accommodate the market risks (Gerber et al., 2010).

Widening as well as deepening of the EU would accommodate the experienced fear caused

by, for instance, globalization. Therefore, we expect to find positive associations between

Neuroticism and both widening and deepening of the EU.

Lastly, the association between Extraversion and political attitudes is generally not well

understood (Gerber et al., 2010; Sibley et al., 2012). Therefore, we will not formulate

directional expectations.

Trust in EU institutions

Next, we discuss the association between Big Five traits and trust in the EU institutions

(Harteveld et al., 2013; Lubbers, 2008). Highly agreeable citizens are trusting, altruistic,

tender-minded, and value cooperation. Agreeable persons trust the political establishment

(Mondak and Halperin, 2008) and support parties that are part of the political establishment

(Bakker, Rooduijn, et al., 2015). Therefore, we expect to find a positive association between

Agreeableness and trust in EU institutions.

Trust in institution does not directly resonate with the motives and needs rooted in the

traits Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion and Neuroticism. For instance, Neuroticism

taps into the tendency to experience negative affect, self-consciousness and insecurity. We

do not expect that these motives resonate with Trust in EU institutions. Similar arguments

can be made for the other three Big Five traits. Therefore, we do not expect that the trust in

EU institutions will resonate with any of the other Big Five traits.

European Identity

Next, we turn to the identification with the EU. Open-minded citizens are less likely to

commit themselves to organizations such as political parties (Bakker, Hopmann, et al., 2015;

Bakker, Klemmensen, et al., 2015). Moreover, Openness is unrelated to the identification

with the nation (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014; Sagiv et al., 2012). Consequently, we do not expect

an association between Openness and the identification with the EU.

Conscientiousness is associated with a preference for structure and order. The

identification with groups, such as the EU, could accommodate this preference for order and

structure. However, the association of Conscientiousness with national identification is

inconsistent (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014; Sagiv et al., 2012). Accordingly, it is an open-ended

question whether conscientious citizens also identity with the EU.

Agreeable citizens might identify with in-groups as they are attracted by the ”communal

and cooperative components” of group identification (Gerber et al., 2012: 661). Indeed,

agreeable citizens tend to identify with the nation (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014; Sagiv et al.,

2012). The identification with the nation could imply that agreeable citizens have low levels

of identification with the EU (Carey, 2002). However, the strong national identity of

agreeable citizens does not exclude the formation of a strong EU identity (Boomgaarden et

al., 2011; Hooghe and Marks, 2005). Therefore, we do not formulate a directional

hypothesis.

Turning to Neuroticism, recent research observed a negative association between

Neuroticism and national identification (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014; Sagiv et al., 2012). This is

explained by stressing that identification with an in-group could foster emotional stability,

which leads to a negative association between Neuroticism and in-group identification.

However, identification with the in-group could also reduce the negative affect experienced

by neurotic persons. If this is the case, then we should expect to find a positive association

between Neuroticism and EU identity. Given these competing expectations, we do not

formulate a directional expectation.

Lastly, Extraverts commit themselves to organizations (Erdheim et al., 2006) such as

political parties (Bakker, Hopmann, et al., 2015; Bakker, Klemmensen, et al., 2015; Gerber et

al., 2012) because the group membership provides them the opportunity to interact with

other people. However, identification with a nation, or supra-national entity, does not offer

the same social benefits as group identification. Accordingly, Extraversion was unrelated to

national identification (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014; Sagiv et al., 2012). Following this line of

reasoning, we do not expect that Extraversion is associated with the EU identification.

Negative Affect

Emotions receive increasing attention in the study of political behavior (Druckman and

McDermott, 2008; Garry, 2013). Boomgaarden and colleagues (2011) demonstrated that the

negative affect towards the EU make-up a distinct EU attitude dimension. Neurotic citizens

are prone to experience negative affect such as fear and anxiety. Consequently, we expect

that neurotic persons experience negative affect towards the EU. Neuroticism is the only Big

Five trait which clearly captures the tendency to experience negative affect. The other traits

are not expected to be associated with the affect experienced towards the EU.

To summarize, the nature of the EU attitude dimension conditions the expected

association with the Big Five traits. Specifically, we expect that support for widening of the

EU is associated with high levels of Openness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism.

Support for deepening of the EU is expected to be related with high levels of Extraversion

and Neuroticism. Agreeableness is the only trait expected to be positively associated with

the trust in EU institutions. We do not expect any associations between personality traits

and identification with the EU. Lastly, Neuroticism is expected to be positively associated

with the negative affect experienced towards the EU. Table 1, provides a schematic overview

of our expectations.

[Insert Table 1 – around here]

Methods

To test our hypotheses we use original data from an elaborate survey conducted in the

context of the 2014 European Parliament election (Authors, 2014). The fieldwork was

conducted by the survey company TNS NIPO. The sample was drawn from a 240,000 person

database which is representative of the Dutch adult population. High-speed internet

penetration in the Netherlands is extraordinarily high enabling a high quality sample. In the

first wave 2,803 respondents were invited to participate in the study. The study was fielded

between December 13 and December 26, 2013. In total, 2,189 panelists responded to the

survey which equals a 78.1 percent response rate. The fifth wave consisted of panelists that

were re-contacted after they had completed the fourth wave of the survey. The fifth wave

was fielded between June 20 and June 26 2014. In total, 1,379 respondents were contacted

and 1,174 responded which equals an 85.1 percent re-contact rate.

The attitudinal variables of interest in this study were measured in the first wave of the

survey. The Big Five personality traits were measured in the fifth wave of the survey. This is

not a problem as personality traits are stable in adulthood (Cobb-Clark and Schurer, 2012)

and over short time-periods (Gerber, Huber, Doherty and Dowling, 2013). Moreover, Bloeser

and colleagues (2013) demonstrated that the Big Five traits are robustly associated with

political attitudes. Therefore, we believe that have obtained reliable estimates of the

association between personality traits and different EU attitude dimensions. Accordingly, we

rely upon the 1,174 respondents that completed the survey in the first and fifth wave.

In this study we focus upon 14 items that tap into attitudes towards (1) widening of the

EU, (2) deepening of the EU, (3) trust in EU institutions, (4) identification with the EU, and (5)

negative affect towards the EU. Here, we briefly discuss the measurement of each attitude.

Table 2 (second column) provides the wording of the 14 items used to measure the different

attitudes. Note that the items included in this survey were all scored on scales ranging from

1 to 7.

The widening of the EU was measured using three items asking respondents to indicated

to what extent they agree with inclusion of specific countries into the EU (Hobolt and

Brouard, 2010; Karp and Bowler, 2006). In this study we focus upon Turkey, Montenegro and

Iceland. Deepening of the EU was measured by asking to what extent citizens support the

further integration of the EU by asking about their attitudes towards integration in general

(Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Lubbers, 2008).

Trust in EU institutions was measured using two items tapping into support for European

institutions (Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Gabel, 1998; Harteveld et al., 2013). Specifically, we

focus upon trust in the European Commission and the European Parliament (Lubbers, 2008;

Weßels, 2007). European identity was measured using three items. One item taps into the

extent to which respondents are proud to be a European (Karp and Bowler, 2006; Lubbers,

2008). The second item asks respondents about the extent to which they feel connected to

the EU, while the third item taps into feelings towards European symbols such as the flag

(Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Bruter, 2003). Negative affect toward the EU was measured

using four items tapping into fear, threat, anger and disgust. This is grossly in line with

Boomgaarden and colleagues (2011) who demonstrated these four items group into one

dimension measuring negative affect towards the EU.

Using a confirmatory factor analysis, we confirmed that there are five distinct EU

attitudes (see Table 2). Having confirmed the factor structure of our EU attitudes, we

created five additive scales, one for each EU attitude that we all scored on a scale from the

lowest observed value (0) through the highest observed value on the scale (1). Table 3

provides the descriptive statistics of the five attitude dimensions.2

[Insert Table 2 – around here]

The Big Five traits were measured using the 20-item Mini-International Personality Item Pool

(Mini-IPIP; Donnellan et al., 2006). The Mini-IPIP is a reliable and valid inventory of the Big

Five traits (Baldasaro et al., 2013; Cooper et al., 2010; Donnellan et al., 2006). The inventory

operationalizes each Big Five trait using four items per trait. Participants were asked to

respond to items such as “I get easily upset” which taps into Neuroticism (see

Supplementary Material A for the item wording of all Mini-IPIP items). Each item was scored

on a seven-point Likert-scale (1 = very inaccurate; 7 = very accurate). We have confirmed the

factor structure of the Mini-IPIP (Supplementary Material B). Moreover, the internal

reliabilities of the five personality dimensions were acceptable (see Table 3).

To summarize, the dataset employed in this study has three advantages compared to

existing datasets. First, our sample is among the first studies to include an extensive battery

of EU attitude dimensions (Boomgaarden et al., 2011; Hobolt and Brouard, 2010). Second,

we use a valid and reliable personality inventory that relied upon 4 items per trait. The use

of a larger personality inventory has clear advantage that we decrease the risk to

underestimate and overestimate of the influence of personality on political attitudes (Credé

et al., 2012). Third, our dataset is unique because it combines the multidimensional

2 Supplementary Material C, Table C.2, provides the correlations between the dependent

variables and the independent variables.

operationalization of EU attitudes with a personality inventory which is, to our best

knowledge, not possible using existing datasets.

[Insert Table 3 – around here]

In order to isolate the effect of personality on EU attitudes, we estimate conservative OLS

regression models in which we control for a set of control variables that have been used as

predictors of EU attitudes. First, we control for indicators of socio-economic status that have

been used as predictors of EU attitudes, namely gender, age, education and income (Gabel

and Palmer, 1995; Gabel, 1998; Hakhverdian et al., 2013; Lubbers and Jaspers, 2011).

Second, we control for a set of political motivational control variables, namely government

approval (Anderson, 1998; Franklin et al., 1994), economic outlook (Anderson and Reichert,

1996; Gabel and Whitten, 1997), political interest and political knowledge (Boomgaarden et

al., 2011; Gabel, 1998; Tillman, 2012), national identity (Harteveld et al., 2013; Kritzinger,

2003) and anti-immigrant attitudes (de Vreese et al., 2008; McLaren, 2002).3 Note that in

order to assess the substantive effects of the personality traits on EU attitudes, we calculate

the predicted EU attitude among respondents that score two standard deviations below the

mean on the personality trait and respondent that score two standard deviations above the

mean on the personality trait keeping the control variables at their central tendencies.

3 The item wordings and descriptive statistics of these variables are provided in

Supplementary Material C.

Results

Table 4 provides the results for our analyses in five columns, one model for each association

between EU attitudes and personality. We start with attitudes towards widening the EU (see

Table 4, column 1) which was scored from opposition to the widening of the EU (0) through

support for widening of the EU (1). In line with our expectations, Openness is positively

associated with support for widening the EU. Specifically, respondents that score high on

Openness (e.g., two standard deviations above the mean) tend to be more supportive of

widening the EU (0.43 [95%CI = 0.39, 0.46]) compared to respondents that score low (e.g.,

two standard deviations below the mean) on Openness (0.32 [95%CI = 0.29, 0.36]) while

keeping all other variables at their central tendencies. Also in line with our expectations,

respondents that score high on Agreeableness tend to be more supportive of widening the

EU (0.41 [95%CI = 0.38, 0.44]) compared to respondents that score low on Agreeableness

(0.33 [95%CI = 0.30, 0.37]). Likewise, we observe that the highly neurotic respondents are

more supportive of widening the EU (0.42 [95%CI = 0.39, 0.45]) compared to low neurotic

respondents (0.34 [95%CI = 0.31, 0.36]). Conscientiousness is indeed unrelated to attitudes

towards widening the EU. Unexpectedly we find that high scorers on Extraversion are less

supportive of widening of the EU (0.34 [95%CI = 0.31, 0.37]) compared to respondents that

score low on Extraversion (0.41 [95%CI = 0.38, 0.44]). We discuss the implication of this

unexpected finding in the conclusion.4

4 One might wonder whether the personality correlates of attitudes towards the admission

of Iceland differ from the admission of Turkey and/or Montenegro. We tested this and show

in Supplmentary Material D that there is no meaningful distinction between Iceland on the

one hand and Turkey and Montenegro on the other hand.

The effects of the Big Five traits on the attitudes towards widening of the EU are

substantive. To illustrate this, we compare the reported effects of the Big Five traits with the

effects of government approval on support for widening the EU. Respondents that have a

positive evaluation of the government (e.g., score two standard deviations above the mean

on governmental approval) tend to be more supportive of widening of the EU (0.43 [95%CI =

0.41, 0.45]) compared to respondents that score two standard deviations below the mean

on governmental approval and evaluate the government negatively (0.31 [95%C I= 0.29,

0.34]). We thereby demonstrate that effects of the Big Five traits on attitudes towards

widening of the EU are comparable to the effect of governmental approval on attitudes

towards widening of the EU.

Turning to the deepening of the EU, we observe a different pattern (Table 4, column 2).

The deepening of the EU was scored on a scale ranging from opposition to deepening of the

EU (0) through support for deepening of the EU (1). In line with our expectations,

Neuroticism is positively associated with the support for deepening the EU. Specifically, high

neurotic persons are more supportive of the deepening of the EU (0.29 [95%CI = 0.26, 0.32])

more compared with low neurotic respondents (0.22 [95%CI = 0.19, 0.24]). As expected,

Openness and Extraversion were unrelated to attitudes towards deepening the EU. We did

not formulate a directional hypothesis for Conscientiousness. Here, we observe that

Conscientiousness is positively associated with support for deepening the EU. Specifically,

we observe that conscientious respondents were more supportive of deepening the EU (0.29

[95%CI = 0.26, 0.31]) compared with low conscientiousness respondents (0.22 [95%CI = 0.19,

0.25]). This suggests that conscientious persons see the EU as a way to achieve their goals.

The effects of Neuroticism and Conscientiousness on attitudes towards deepening of the

EU are modest compared with the effect of government approval on deepening of the EU.

Specifically, a very positive approval of the government leads to more support for deepening

of the EU (0.31 [95%CI = 0.29, 0.33]) compared with a very negative evaluation of the

government (0.19 [95%CI = 0.17, 0.21]). Do note that we also find a negative effect of

Agreeableness on attitudes towards deepening of the EU, which is somewhat larger

compared with the effect of Neuroticism and Conscientiousness.

Trust in the EU was scored to range from low trust (0) to high trust (1). Contrary to our

expectations, trust in EU institutions was not associated with Agreeableness (Table 4,

column 3). Instead, we observe that the conscientious citizens tend to be somewhat more

trusting of EU institutions, compared with low conscientious citizens. We discuss the

implications of this unexpected finding in our conclusion.

Next, we turn to the association between the Big Five traits and identification with the

EU. This scale was scored to range from low identification with the EU (0) through high

identification with the EU (1). In line with our expectations we do find any associations

between the Big Five traits and identification with the EU (Table 2, column 4).

Lastly, we turn to the association between the Big Five traits and the experience of

negative affect towards the EU. High scorers indicate that people experience negative affect,

whereas low scores signals that respondents agree that the EU. As expected, we observe

that the neurotic respondents experience more negative affect (0.41 [95%CI = 0.38, 0.44)

compared to the emotionally stable respondents (0.36 [95%CI = 0.34, 0.38). The effect of

Neuroticism is smaller compared with covariates such as governmental approval. For

instance, positive government approval is associated with the experience of less negative

affect (0.46 [95%CI = 0.43, 0.48) compared with a negative government approval

(0.31[95%CI = 0.29, 0.34).

[Insert Table 4 – around here]

In sum, we find evidence that the Big Five traits are antecedents of some but not all EU

attitudes. Next, we will briefly discuss the control variables included in this study. First,

governmental approval is associated with support for widening and deepening of the EU, the

trust in EU institutions, and the identification with the EU. Moreover, governmental approval

is negatively associated with the experience of negative affect. This pattern is grossly

mirrored with regard to the economic outlook. Next, the effects of political interest and

knowledge on EU attitudes are modest and less consistent (see also, Boomgaarden et al.,

2011). Lastly, negative attitudes towards immigrants are consistently negatively associated

with the different EU attitudes.

One might put forward that personality traits influence EU attitudes via their effect on

the political motivational variables (Mondak, 2010: 5). We have assessed the possibility of

these indirect associations between personality traits and EU attitudes using a structural

equation model. In Supplementary Material E, we demonstrate that personality only directly

influences EU attitudes and that the effects are not mediated or suppressed by the control

variables. This additional analysis suggests that there is a direct resonance between the Big

Five traits and some of the EU attitudes.5

5 We have also explored the interaction between personality traits and political

sophistication, political interest and education because we could expect that the association

between personality and EU attitudes is stronger among the more sophisticated citizens

(Jost et al., 2009). Evidence is mixt and further research is warranted. We present the results

in Supplementary Material F.

Discussion

In this study we have established that Big Five personality traits are antecedents of a diverse

set of EU attitudes. The widening of the EU is associated with high levels of Openness,

Agreeableness and Neuroticism and low levels of Extraversion. Deepening of the EU is

positively associated with Neuroticism as well as Conscientiousness. Trust in EU institutions

is positively associated with Conscientiousness, whereas we expected Agreeableness to be

an antecedent of this trait. The identification with the EU is unrelated to EU attitudes. Lastly,

the experience of negative affect towards the EU is associated with high levels of

Neuroticism. These results demonstrate that the nature of the EU attitude conditions the

strength and direction of the association with one or more Big Five Traits. We have

compared the effects of the Big Five traits with the established antecedents of EU attitudes

such as governmental performance. The effects of the personality traits on EU attitudes are

smaller compared to this antecedent. Yet, this might not be surprising as this, and other

antecedents of the EU attitudes, such as economic outlook, immigrant attitudes, national

identity, are conceptually closer related to the EU attitudes.

We observed some unexpected associations for the trait Agreeableness. The absence of

the expected association between Agreeableness and trust in EU institutions could be driven

by at least two alternative explanations. First, this could suggest the trust, tender-

mindedness and altruism do not resonate with the trust in EU institutions. While

Agreeableness was related to trust in national politicians (Mondak and Halperin, 2008), it

could be that the trust in supranational level institutions is too distant or abstract. Our null-

finding could also be driven by the operationalization of the dependent or independent

variable. The dependent variable is operationalized in line with earlier research (Harteveld et

al., 2013; Lubbers, 2008) which makes it unlikely to underlie the null finding. Personality

traits were measured using the 20-item Mini-IPIP which is a reliable and valid instrument of

the Big Five traits which has been successfully employed in the study of political attitudes

(Osborne and Sibley, 2013). Perhaps, future research could include even larger personality

inventories and explore possible associations at the lower order facet level (Hirsh et al.,

2010; Osborne et al., 2013). Future research will have to further explore the association

between Agreeableness and the trust in EU institutions. Similarly, the unexpected positive

association between Conscientiousness and trust in the EU needs to be replicated before

conclusions can be drawn.

In this study we build upon the commonly made assumption that personality traits shape

attitudes towards the EU. Yet, some studies question the extent to which personality traits

(chore characteristics) shape political attitudes (surface characteristics). First, political

attitudes are also relatively stable over time (Ansolabehere et al., 2008). Second, political

attitudes also develop before adulthood (Hatemi et al., 2009). Third, studies that rely upon

twin research methodology (Medland and Hatemi, 2009), find that personality traits and

political attitudes are correlated but point out that the influence of genes on political

attitudes is only to a limited extent mediated by personality traits (Funk et al., 2013; Verhulst

et al., 2010). These insights raise awareness that there are alternative explanations that not

necessarily support the dominant assertion that personality traits shape political attitudes.

Importantly, at this point further research is necessary to address the nature of the

relationship between personality and political attitudes (see also, Feldman, 2013; Kandler et

al., 2014).

This study opens up for three agenda’s for further research. First, future research should

assess the association between personality and EU attitudes across political contexts.

Generally speaking, personality traits are distributed similarly across, western, countries

(Schmitt et al., 2007). However, the behavioral manifestations of personality traits could

differ across different political contexts (McAdams and Pals 2006). For instance, Tolbert and

Redlawsk (2012) demonstrated that Openness is only a predictor of gay rights in the US in

states that have conservative laws, while Openness is not associated with attitudes towards

gays in states with liberal laws towards gays. Comparative research should therefore

theorize and assess how the associations Big Five traits and EU attitudes are moderated by

the political context. The effects of Openness on attitudes towards widening of the EU might

only be present among current member states but not among candidate member states.

These and other hypotheses could be explored in future research.6

Second, the EU is an ongoing project which has been marked by large changes in the

institutional set-up which severely influence the attitudes of citizens towards the EU

(Hakhverdian et al., 2013; Semetko et al., 2003). Future research, relying upon longitudinal

datasets, could explore if and to what extent personality traits shape the response to

changes in the institutional set-up of the EU. Personality traits are expected to condition

how citizens respond to important changes in the EU such as the acceptance of austerity

measures (Bechtel et al., 2014), the admission of new member states (de Vreese et al.,

2008), and the deepening of the EU (Hakhverdian et al., 2013).

6 There are some existing datasets that could be utilized in this regard. Yet, these studies are

not without limitations when it comes to the measures of EU attitudes and the

operationalization of personality. Some samples only contain measures of some but not all

traits (i.e., European Social Survey), while others contain measures of the Big Five but only a

limited number of EU attitudes (i.e. World Values Surveys and different household panels).

Third, personality traits should interact with the political environment in shaping EU

attitudes. Page and Shapiro (1992) argued that the media are likely to shape perceptions of

international and foreign policy issues. When it comes to EU attitudes, Schuck and De Vreese

(2006), for instance, demonstrated that a frame which stresses the risk associated with

further EU integration make citizens less likely to support EU integration. Zaller (1992: 23),

noted that personality shapes how citizens respond to situational stimuli. Recent research

suggests that citizens are especially influenced by situational stimuli such as campaign adds

or frames when the content of the stimuli resonates with the motives and needs rooted in a

personality trait (Dinesen et al., 2014; Gerber, Huber, Doherty, Dowling, et al., 2013; Hirsh et

al., 2012). Future research could address whether personality traits interact with the media

in shaping EU attitudes.

To conclude, this study offers two clear implications for the study of the public opinion

towards the EU. First, scholars interested in understanding public opinion towards the EU

should take Big Five personality traits into account in order to get a complete understanding

of why persons differ in their attitudes towards the EU. However, the multidimensional

nature of EU attitudes makes that personality traits are more relevant for some than for

other traits. For instance, scholars interested in attitudes towards widening of the EU should

take the Big Five traits into account, whereas most Big Five traits are unrelated to the

identification with the EU.

Second, the results of our study imply that personality traits will condition how persons

respond to changes in the institutional set-up of the EU. Media increasingly pay attention to

the EU (Gattermann and Vasilopoulou, 2015; Koopmans, 2007). Accordingly, personality

traits will condition the effects of the media on EU attitudes. For instance, the open-minded,

agreeable and neurotic will respond welcoming to the admission of new countries to the EU.

Likewise, extraverts will respond positively to the increase in the use of symbols which stress

the identity of the EU. In the short run this insight will hopefully raise awareness among

politicians, policy makers, the news media and European citizens that profound

psychological differences underlie the roots of political conflict. In the long run, politicians,

policy makers, and the news media could utilize the knowledge that personality underlies EU

attitudes in order to tailor their communication more effectively to the motives rooted in

personality traits.

Tailoring information to the personality traits of voters could have positive as well as

negative consequences for the democratic legitimacy of the EU. On the one hand, elites can

better inform citizens about the upcoming changes in the institutional set-up of the EU. The

positive consequence of an informed public is that this will increase the democratic

legitimacy of the EU (Trenz, 2008). On the other hand, the increased tailoring of information

to the personality traits of citizens could have negative consequences for the legitimacy of

the EU. The shared information environment will become smaller and voters will be less

exposed to information that challenges their beliefs. As a consequence attitudes towards the

EU could polarize (Stroud, 2010; Taber and Lodge, 2006). We believe that, eventually,

research addressing the association between personality and EU attitudes could play a key

role in the discussion of the democratic legitimacy of the EU. Our study just marks a starting

point.

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Table 1 Overview of the Direct Associations between Personality Traits and EU attitudes Widening Deepening Trust Identity Negative Affect

Openness + Conscientiousness Extraversion Agreeableness + + Neuroticism + + +

A blank space indicates that we expect no association between a specific EU attitude dimension and a Big Five trait. (+) signals a positive association between the trait and the EU attitude dimension. (-) signals a negative association between the trait and the EU attitude dimension.

Table 2 Item Wording and Confirmatory Factor Analysis results for the Five EU Attitude Dimensions # Item wording Widening Deepening Trust Identity Negative Affect

1 Admission of Turkey7 0.71 2 Admission of Iceland7 0.57 3 Admission of Montenegro7 0.88 4 “The European Union should become one country” 0.68 5 “I am in favor of efforts being made to unify Europe” 0.95 6 Trust in European Parliament8 0.92 7 Trust in EU Commission8 0.95 8 “Being a citizen of the European Union means a lot to me” 0.94 9 “The European flag means a lot to me” 0.86 10 “I am proud to be a European citizen” 0.78 11 “I am afraid of the European Union” 0.78 12 “I am threatened by the European Union” 0.82 13 “I am angry about the European Union” 0.82 14 “I am disgusted about the European Union” 0.83

Model fit indices: Chi2 = 337.695; RMSEA = 0.059 [0.053, 0.065]; CFI = 0.972; TLI = 0.962; SRMR = 0.040.

7 For each of the following countries, to what extent are you in favour of or against it becoming a member of the EU?” This is followed by the

presentation of three items measuring the admission of Turkey, Iceland and Montenegro”.

8 ”Now, thinking about political institutions for a moment. Using a scale that reaches from 1 to 7, on which 1 means that you have no trust at all

and 7 means that you have a great deal of trust, how much trust do you have in the following institutions?” This was followed by a list of

national institutions as well as the European Parliament and the EU commission.

Table 3 Descriptive Statistics of the Dependent and Independent Variables M SD Alpha 1 2 3 4 5

EU Attitudes 1. Widening 0.39 0.24 0.73 - 2. Deepening 0.26 0.24 0.70 0.33* - 3. Trust 0.34 0.22 0.93 0.44* 0.51* - 4. Identity 0.28 0.22 0.87 0.34* 0.63* 0.63* - 5. Negative Affect towards the EU 0.36 0.26 0.90 -0.36* -0.32* -0.57* -0.35* - Personality traits 6 7 8 9 10 6. Openness 0.60 0.17 0.58 - 7. Conscientiousness 0.71 0.18 0.71 0.07* - 8. Extraversion 0.55 0.20 0.77 0.21* 0.07* - 9. Agreeableness 0.70 0.18 0.77 0.16* 0.27* 0.22* - 10. Neuroticism 0.38 0.20 0.76 -0.16* -0.16* -0.20* -0.07* -

*p<0.05; All scales are scored from 0 to 1. N=1,174

Table 4 The Relationship between Personality Traits and Deepening the EU, Widening the EU, Trust towards EU institutions, Identification witht he EU and Negative Affect towards the EU. Widening Deepening Trust Identity Negative Affect

towards the EU (1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

Openness 0.15* 0.07 0.02 -0.02 -0.05 (0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.04)

Conscientiousness -0.01 0.11* 0.06* -0.02 -0.07

(0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04)

Extraversion -0.09* 0.06 0.02 0.06 0.00

(0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04)

Agreeableness 0.11* -0.14* 0.00 -0.03 -0.01

(0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.04)

Neuroticism 0.12* 0.08* 0.03 0.04 0.07*

(0.03) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04)

Sex -0.01 -0.00 0.02 0.03* -0.01

(0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01)

Age 0.00 0.01* -0.00 -0.00 -0.01

(0.00) (0.01) (0.00) (0.00) (0.01)

Education 0.02* -0.00 0.00 -0.00 -0.02*

(0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00)

Income 0.00 0.00 -0.00 0.00 0.00

(0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00)

Government Approval 0.18* 0.19* 0.32* 0.19* -0.23* (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) Economic Outlook 0.17* 0.14* 0.30* 0.23* -0.35* (0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04)

Political Interest 0.03 0.10* 0.09* 0.11* 0.02

(0.03) (0.03) (0.02) (0.02) (0.03)

Politcial Knowledge 0.02 -0.07* -0.06* -0.10* 0.02

(0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03)

Anti-immigrant -0.11* -0.11* -0.14* -0.11* 0.14*

(0.03) (0.03) (0.02) (0.03) (0.03)

National identity -0.08* -0.17* -0.11* -0.06* 0.18*

(0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03)

Constant 0.10 0.16* 0.12* 0.15* 0.59*

(0.06) (0.06) (0.05) (0.05) (0.06)

N 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174

R2

0.20 0.15 0.41 0.20 0.31 ∆F

2 7.82 4.48 ns ns 2.39

OLS regression coefficients with standard errors reported in parentheses. Weights are applied. *p<0.05

Supplementary Material A – Item Wording Mini-IPIP Introduction to participants

Describe yourself as you generally are now, not as you wish to be in the future. Describe yourself as you honestly see yourself, in relation to other people you know of the same sex as you are, and roughly your same age. So that you can describe yourself in an honest manner, your responses will be kept in absolute confidence. Indicate for each statement whether it is 1. Very inaccurate, 2. Moderately inaccurate 3. Neither accurate nor inaccurate 4. Moderately accurate 5. Very accurate Table A.1 Item wording of the 20-item IPIP measure

Trait Wording

Openness

1 Have a vivid imagination 2 Am not interested in abstract ideas (R) 3 Have difficulty understanding abstract ideas (R) 4 Do not have a good imagination (R) Conscientiousness

1 Get chores done right away 2 Like order 3 Make a mess of things (R) 4 Often forget to put things back in their proper place (R) Extraversion

1 Am the life of the party 2 Talk to a lot of different people at parties 3 Don’t’ talk a lot (R) 4 Keep in the background (R) Agreeableness

1 Sympathize with others’ feelings 2 Feel others’ emotions 3 Am not interested in other people’s problems (R) 4 Am not really interested in others (R) Neuroticism

1 Get upset easily 2 Have frequent mood swings 3 Am relaxed most of the time (R) 4 Seldom feel blue (R)

Supplementary Material B – Factor Structure Mini-IPIP We ran a Confirmatory Factor Analysis to assess factor structure of the Mini IPIP. The factor structure is acceptable (see Table B.1). The indices of the model fit are not perfect but they are in line with existing research (Baldasaro et al., 2013; Cooper et al., 2010; Donnellan et al., 2006). Table B.1 Factor Loadings and Model Fit Mini-IPIP Openness Conscientiousness Extraversion Agreeableness Neuroticism

O1 0.24

O2 0.66

O3 0.82

O4 0.34

C1 0.57

C2 0.62

C3 0.65

C4 0.63

E1 0.62

E2 0.65

E3 0.73

E4 0.70

A1 0.61

A2 0.56

A3 0.72

A4 0.80

N1 0.64

N2 0.72

N3 0.66

N4 0.64

Model fit indices: Chi2 = 980.23; RMSE A= 0.066 [0.062, 0.070]; CFI = 0.861; TLI = 0.835; SRMR = 0.057).

Supplementary Material C – Descriptive statistics

Here we describe the item wording of the covariates and the descriptive statistics of these

covariates (see Table C.1) and the correlations between all the dependent variables and the

independent variables (Table C.2).

First, government approval was measured using one item asking “The current national

government is doing a good job”. This item was scored on a seven-point Likert-scale ranging

from “strongly disgree” (1) through “strongly agree” (7). Economic outlook was measured

using one item. Specifically, participants were asked: “Looking at the economic situation in

the Netherlands, do you think the situation will be better or worse twelve months from

now?” This item was scored on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from “much worse” (1)

through ”much better” (7).

Attitudes towards immigrants were scored using five items, such as “Immigrants are a

threat to the security of Dutch people.” Again, the items were scored on a seven-point

Likert-scale ranging from “strongly disgree” (1) through “strongly agree” (7). The items were

internally consitent (Cronbach α = 0.80). The items were scored to range on a scale from

positive attitudes towards immigrants (0) through ant-immigrants attitudes (1). National

identity was measured using four items, such as “I am proud to be a Dutch citizen”. The four

items were internally consistent (Cronbach α = 0.87) and we created a scale ranging from no

natioanl identity (0) through a high national identity (1).

Political knowledge was measured using five items tapping into knowledge about

politics. For instance, participants were asked to indicate “what is the name of the current

minister of foreign affairs”. Note that they could choose from five different options or signal

“”don’t know”. We created an additive scale ranging from no questions correct through all

questions correct (5). Lastly, political interest was measured using one item, namely “How

interested are you in politics”. Respondents answered on a seven-point Likert-scale ranging

from “not at all interested” (1) through “very much interested” (7).

Table C.1 Descriptive Statistics Control Variables M SD % Min Max

Government Approval 0.33 0.24 0 1

Economic Outlook 0.49 0.20 0 1

Political Interest 0.49 0.28 0 1

Political Knowledge 0.37 0.22 0 1

Anti-immigrant Attitudes 0.57 0.23 0 1

National Identity 0.69 0.22 0 1

Income 5.61 2.97 1 11

Education

No education 5.11

Preparatory secondary education 14.91

High school (first 3 years) 4.86

Secondary vocational education 34.58

Pre-university education 4.86

Some college 24.62

College 11.07

Gender

Men 49.15

Woman 50.85

Age 4.24 1.41 1 6

N = 1,174. Income is scored in 11 categories. Age is scored in six age categories.

Table C.2 Correlations between dependent variables and key independent variables

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

1. Widening -

2. Deepening 0.33* -

3. Trust 044* 0.51* -

4. Identity 0.34* 0.63* 0.63* -

5. Negative Affect towards the EU -0.36* -0.32* -0.57* -0.35* -

6. Openness 0.18* 0.07* 0.12* 0.05 -0.16* -

7. Conscientiousness 0.00 0.04 0.04 -0.01 -0.08* 0.07* -

8. Extraversion -0.07* 0.01 0.01 0.05 -0.01 0.21* 0.07* -

9. Agreeableness 0.07* -0.06* 0.05 -0.01 -0.07* 0.16* 0.27* 0.22* -

10. Neuroticism 0.02 0.01 -0.04 0.01 0.10* -0.16* -0.16* -0.20* -0.07* -

*p<0.05

Supplementary Material D – Split Widening to the EU dimension

The item tapping into the attitude towards admission of Iceland to the EU loaded somewhat

lower on the widening dimension (Table 2 in the paper) compared to the attitude towards

admission of Turkey and/or Montenegro. Accordingly, one might wonder to what extent the

correlates of including Iceland in the EU are different compared to Turkey and Montenegro.

We created two new independent variables. The first dimension taps into the admission of

Turkey and Montenegro (α = 0.76). The second dimension taps into the admission of Iceland.

The two dimensions are modestly correlated (r = 0.46).

Table D1 presents the results for two OLS regression models where we estimate the

same model as presented in Table 2 of the paper but instead we focus upon attitudes

towards admission of Turkey and Montenegro (column 1) and attitudes towards the

admission of Iceland (column 2). The only difference is reported with regard the trait

Extraversion. This means that the highly extraverted are only more opposed to the

introduction of Iceland but not the introduction of Turkey and Montenegro. When it comes

to the control variables, the anti-immigrant attitudes and national identity are strong

correlates of attitudes towards Turkey and Montenegro but not towards Iceland.

Table D.1 Attitudes towards widening the EU: Turkey and Montenegro as well as Iceland.

Turkey and Montenegro

(1)

Iceland

(2)

Openness 0.15* 0.14* (0.04) (0.06) Conscientiousness -0.03 0.03 (0.04) (0.05) Extraversion -0.05 -0.15* (0.04) (0.05) Agreeableness 0.11* 0.11* (0.04) (0.05) Neuroticism 0.12* 0.14* (0.04) (0.05) Sex 0.00 -0.04* (0.01) (0.02) Age 0.00 0.01 (0.01) (0.01) Education 0.01* 0.03* (0.00) (0.01) Income 0.00 0.00 (0.00) (0.00) Government Approval 0.21* 0.13* (0.03) (0.04) Economic Outlook 0.14* 0.23* (0.04) (0.05) Political Interest 0.03 0.01 (0.03) (0.04) Politcial Knowledge -0.04 0.15* (0.03) (0.04) Anti-immigrant attitudes -0.14* -0.05 (0.03) (0.04) National identity -0.12* -0.01 (0.03) (0.04) Constant 0.11 0.06 (0.06) (0.08)

N 1,174 1,174 R2 0.17 0.16

*p<0.05

Supplementary Material E – Indirect Associations

In this Supplementary Material we assess the indirect effects of personality traits on EU attitudes.

We start with the discussion of indirect associations by examining the associations between

the four political motivational control variables and the personality traits. In Table E.1, we

present the results of four OLS regression analyses where we regressed the political

motivational control variables on the personality traits.

Generally, our findings confirm that the personality traits, especially Openness, are

correlated with political interest and political knowledge (Gerber et al., 2011). We also

observe associations between attitudes towards immigrants and the traits

Conscientiousness and Neuroticism (Gallego and Pardos-Prado, 2014) but not Openness. We

also observe associations with national identification. Indeed, agreeableness is positively

associated with national identification (Duckitt and Sibley, 2014). But we find a positive

association with Extraversion and also association with Neuroticism and Conscientiousness.

The associations between the personality traits and the governmental approval and

economic evaluations have not received much attention in the literature and the personality

traits seem generally unrelated to these covariates.

Importantly, one could argue that the effects of personality traits are mediated by

the political motivational covariates. Mediation analyses has received considerable criticism

(Bullock et al., 2010; Imai et al., 2011). However, we estimated the direct, indirect and total

effects for each of the personality traits on the different EU attitudes in a series of structural

equation models. We expected the effects of the personality traits to be direct and not

mediated via the political motivational control variables. As can be seen in Table E.2 we find

indeed only direct associations between the personality traits and the EU attitudes. The are

no substantive indirect effects of the personality traits via the political motivational

variables. Importantly, we have excluded the specific indirect paths of each personality on a

EU attitude via all six political motivational variables. The effects of each path are non-

significant and available upon request.

In sum, we have observed that personality traits are predictors of the political

motivational variables. Yet, the effect of personality traits on the EU attitudes does not

travel via these political motivational variables.

Table E.1 Personality traits and political motivational covariates

Government Approval

Economic Outlook

Political Interest

Political Knowledge

Anti-immigrant Attitudes

National Identity

Openness -0.02 -0.00 0.18* 0.12* -0.07 -0.08 (0.05) (0.04) (0.05) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Conscientiousness 0.07 0.03 -0.01 0.03 0.08* 0.12* (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Extraversion -0.02 -0.06 0.10* 0.02 0.05 0.10* (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.03) Agreeableness -0.10* -0.06 0.15* 0.02 0.02 0.18* (0.04) (0.04) (0.05) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Neuroticism -0.08* -0.07* -0.09* -0.08* 0.08* -0.07* (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.03) (0.04) (0.03) Sex 0.02 -0.00 -0.09* -0.05* -0.04* -0.04* (0.01) (0.01) (0.02) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) Age -0.01 0.00 0.03* 0.02* -0.02* 0.00 (0.01) (0.00) (0.01) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) Education 0.02* 0.02* 0.02* 0.02* -0.03* -0.03* (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) Income 0.00 0.01* -0.01* -0.00 -0.00 -0.00 (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) Constant 0.27* 0.41* 0.24* 0.19* 0.75* 0.67* (0.06) (0.05) (0.06) (0.05) (0.05) (0.05)

N 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174 R2 0.05 0.05 0.12 0.09 0.06 0.11

Standard errors are reported in parentheses. Weights are applied. *p<0.05

Table E.2 Total, Direct and Indirect Effects of Personality Traits on the EU attitude dimensions Total Effect Direct

effect Indirect effect

Widening Openness 0.16* 0.15* 0.02 (0.06) (0.05) (0.03) Conscientiousness -0.01 -0.01 0.00* (0.07) (0.05) (0.03) Extraversion -0.11* -0.09* -0.03 (0.04) (0.04) (0.02) Agreeableness 0.07 0.11* -0.04 (0.06) (0.06) (0.03) Neuroticism 0.09 0.12 -0.03 (0.06) (0.05) (0.02) Deeping Openness 0.04 0.07 0.03 (0.04) (0.05) (0.02 Conscientiousness -0.01 0.11 -0.01 (0.03) (0.04) (0.02) Extraversion 0.06 0.06* -0.03 (0.03) (0.04) (0.02) Agreeableness -0.10* -0.14* -0.04 (0.04) (0.04) (0.03) Neuroticism 0.04 0.08 -0.02 (0.03) (0.04) (0.02) Trust Openness 0.04 0.02 0.02 (0.06) (0.04) (0.04) Conscientiousness 0.07 0.06 0.01 (0.06) (0.03) (0.04) Extraversion -0.02 0.02 -0.04 (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) Agreeableness -0.06 0.00 -0.06 (0.07) (0.04) (0.05) Neuroticism -0.02 0.03 -0.05 (0.06) (0.03) (0.04)

Identity Openness 0.00 -0.02 0.02 (0.05) (0.04) (0.03) Conscientiousness -0.02 0.02 0.00 (0.06) (0.05) (0.03) Extraversion 0.04 0.06# -0.02 (0.04) (0.03) (0.02) Agreeableness -0.06 -0.03 -0.03 (0.06) (0.04) (0.03) Neuroticism 0.01 0.04 -0.04 (0.05) (0.04) (0.02) Negative Affect Openness -0.06 -0.05 -0.01 (0.09) (0.06) (0.05) Conscientiousness -0.07 -0.07 -0.00 (0.09) (0.05) (0.04) Extraversion 0.06 0.00 0.05 (0.05) (0.04) (0.03) Agreeableness 0.07 0.01 0.08 (0.09) (0.06) (0.05) Neuroticism 0.11 0.07 0.04 (0.06) (0.04) (0.04)

Standard errors are reported in parentheses. *p<0.05

Supplementary Material F

We have considered the thoughtful observation that there could be interactions between

Big Five traits and education as well as other theoretically relevant predictors of EU

attitudes. The most likely interaction would be between personality traits and political

knowledge (Jost et al., 2009), education (Osborne & Sibley, 2012, 2013), and political

interest (Leone, Desimoni, & Chirumbolo, 2012). For all three variables the argument would

be that the more knowledgeable, educated, and interested voters would be better equipped

to align their Big Five traits with their EU attitudes.

In this supplementary material, we have explored this opportunity in a series of

subsequent models. We find, in line with the research by Osborne and Sibley (2012, 2013)

that there is indeed a significant interaction between the trait Openness and political

knowledge. There is a statistically significant marginal effect of Openness on the different EU

attitudes among the political knowledgeable compared to voters with lower levels of

political knowledge (see Figure F.1 through F.4). Yet, there were no consistent interactions

between any of the other Big Five traits and political knowledge. Likewise, we do not find

any evidence for the interaction between the Big Five traits and political interest or

education. The results of these models are not reported here but are available upon request

from the authors.

These expectations are not necessarily in line with the aforementioned literature. In this

study we want to refrain from post hoc explanations why there is a significant interaction

effect between Openness and political knowledge while the interactions between Openness

and education or interest are not present. Likewise, we do not want to provide a post hoc

explanation in the paper why we fail to find a consistent pattern between the other Big Five

traits and education, political knowledge or political interest. Future research should study

the interaction between personality and political sophistication in greater detail.

Table F.1 Personality X Political Knowledge

Widening Deepening Trust Identity Negative Affect

Openness 0.08 -0.02 -0.11 -0.22* 0.09 (0.08) (0.08) (0.06) (0.07) (0.08)

Conscientiousness 0.07 0.07 0.02 -0.07 -0.12

(0.07) (0.07) (0.05) (0.06) (0.07)

Extraversion 0.12 0.19* 0.12* 0.12 -0.06

(0.07) (0.07) (0.06) (0.06) (0.07)

Agreeableness 0.04 -0.19* -0.05 0.05 -0.04

(0.08) (0.08) (0.06) (0.07) (0.08)

Neuroticism 0.14* 0.09 0.09 0.05 0.19*

(0.06) (0.07) (0.05) (0.06) (0.07)

Openness * Knowledgde 0.15 0.24 0.33* 0.56* -0.36

(0.18) (0.19) (0.14) (0.16) (0.19)

Conscientiousness * Knowledgde -0.18 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.10

(0.15) (0.16) (0.12) (0.14) (0.16)

Extraversion* Knowledgde -0.56* -0.37* -0.27* -0.15 0.17

(0.16) (0.17) (0.13) (0.15) (0.17)

Agreeableness * Knowledgde 0.20 0.15 0.16 -0.24 0.10

(0.18) (0.19) (0.15) (0.16) (0.19)

Neuroticism * Knowledgde -0.03 -0.02 -0.16 -0.01 -0.32*

(0.15) (0.15) (0.12) (0.13) (0.15)

Sex -0.01 -0.00 0.02 0.03* -0.01

(0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01)

Age 0.00 0.01* -0.00 -0.00 -0.01

(0.00) (0.01) (0.00) (0.00) (0.01)

Education 0.02* -0.00 0.00 -0.00 -0.02*

(0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00)

Income -0.00 0.00 -0.00 0.00 0.00

(0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00) (0.00)

Government Approval 0.18* 0.19* 0.32* 0.19* -0.23* (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) Economic Outlook 0.16* 0.14* 0.30* 0.23* -0.35* (0.04) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04)

Political Interest 0.03 0.10* 0.09* 0.11* 0.02

(0.03) (0.03) (0.02) (0.02) (0.03)

Politcial Knowledge 0.24 -0.20 -0.27 -0.30 0.12

(0.19) (0.20) (0.16) (0.17) (0.20)

Anti-immigrant -0.11* -0.11* -0.14* -0.11* 0.14*

(0.03) (0.03) (0.02) (0.03) (0.03)

National identity -0.08* -0.16* -0.11* -0.06* 0.17*

(0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03)

Constant 0.00 0.19* 0.18* 0.22* 0.55*

(0.09) (0.09) (0.07) (0.08) (0.09)

N 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174 1,174

R2

0.21 0.16 0.41 0.21 0.31 F-test of interaction 2.92* 1.31 2.81* 2.88* 1.73

*p<0.05

Figure F.1. Marginal effect of Personality traits on attitudes towards Widening of the EU over the

range of Political Knowledge.

Figure F.2 Marginal effect of Openness on trust in the EU over the range of Political Knowledge.

Figure F.3 Marginal effect of Openness on identification with the EU over the range of Political

Knowledge.

Figure F.4 Marginal effect of Openness and Neuroticism on the Negative Affect experienced towards

the EU over the range of Political Knowledge.

-.1

0

.1

.2

.3

.4

Marg

inal e

ffect

of

Ope

nn

ess

0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Openness

0

4

8

12

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20

24

28

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-.6

-.4

-.2

0

.2

Marg

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ave

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0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

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Marginal Effect of Extraversion

0

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8

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.1

.2

.3

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0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Agreeableness

0

4

8

12

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28

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-.2

0

.2

.4

Marg

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ffect

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Ope

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0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Openness

0

4

8

12

16

20

24

28

Dis

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Kn

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-.4

-.2

0

.2

.4

.6

Marg

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ffect

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Ope

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ess

0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Openness

0

4

8

12

16

20

24

28

Dis

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Kn

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e

-.6

-.4

-.2

0

.2

Marg

inal e

ffect

of

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ess

0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Openness

0

4

8

12

16

20

24

28

Dis

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ution

Kn

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e

-.4

-.2

0

.2

.4

Marg

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Neu

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0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1Political Knowledge

1 Percent

Marginal Effect of Neuroticism

0

4

8

12

16

20

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Dis

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Kn

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