Building trait complexes of individual differences: A study with higher education students

Interactions among the cross-domain variables of interests, personality, and perceived abilities were analyzed in a higher education sample (N = 312) from a Portuguese public University consisting of 48.9% female and 51.1% male students, aged between 18 and 30 years, and enrolled in various academic fields across STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and non-STEM domains. Three assessment instruments were used: the Personal Globe Inventory (PGI-PT) as a measure of interests; the Five-Factor Model Questionnaire – Brief Version (FFM-BV) to assess personality traits; and the Inventory of Work-Relevant Abilities (IWRA) to measure perceived abilities. First, five main factors were extracted through exploratory factor analyses, specifically: F1 (People), F2 (Data), F3 (Things), F4 (Ideas), and F5 (Human Interaction). Next, using discriminant analysis methods, we tested the discriminant capacity of these five identified factors in relation to STEM and non-STEM educational/professional choices.