Relationship between meaning in life and the big five personality traits in young adults and the elderly

The questionnaire NEO-FFI was correlated with two different meaningfulness measures: Reker's Personal Meaning Index (PMI) and Halama's Life Meaningfulness Scale (LMS). NEO-FFI and PMI were administered to two groups of subjects: university students (N = 82, mean age 21.13) and elderly people (N = 107, mean age 62.20), and NEO-FFI together with LMS was administered to two groups of similar age (N = 149, mean age 21.56, N = 67, mean age 57.3). Correlation coefficients for extraversion and meaningfulness ranged from 0.29 to 0.42, and for neuroticism and meaningfulness from -0.39 to -0.60. A close relationship was also identified between meaningfulness and conscientiousness (correlations from 0.31 to 0.57). Small but significant correlations of individual dimensions of meaningfulness measures with openness in the sample of the elderly, and with agreeableness in the sample of university students were also found.