Finnish twins reared apart. III: Personality factors

Abstract

This study is based on data from 165 adult twin pairs separated at 10 years or less. Information on personality factors: extraversion (E) and neuroticism (N) (EPI scale short from), life satisfaction (LS) (Allardt) and stress of daily activities (SDA) was obtained as part of the questionnaire study carried out in the entire Finnish Twin Cohort in 1975. Later in 1979 a questionnaire sent to the twins reared apart yielded a scale (range 7-30 points) measuring the environmental dissimilarities after separation (reliability 0.83). The effect of separation on personality factors by analysis of variance of individual data was studied. Sex, zygosity and age-at-separation were included in the models. The overall explanatory rates were low (2.1-4.4%). The definitive study group was formed by selecting those pairs with a dissimilarity score greater than 15. The following intraclass correlations were obtained.