









































26

Graduate Student Journal of Psychology
2023 Vol. 20

Copyright 2023 by the Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology
Teachers College, Columbia University

Predicting Satisfaction With Life and Affect Balance 
Using Trait Interactions 

There is robust support for the finding that subjective well-being (SWB) relates positively to extraversion, agree-
ableness, and conscientiousness; and negatively to neuroticism (Soto, 2015), but little research has examined 
how SWB can be predicted from interactions between traits. It was hypothesized that conscientiousness, extra-
version, and agreeableness would moderate the relationship between neuroticism and SWB, as measured by sat-
isfaction with life (SWL) and affect balance (AB). In Study 1, self-reports of the Big Five personality traits, SWL, 
and AB were collected via MTurk (N=1035). Hierarchical regression analyses were used to predict SWL and AB 
from interactions between traits. The relationship between neuroticism and SWL was moderated by conscien-
tiousness (b=.15, p=.02) and extraversion (b=11, p=.03), while the relationship between neuroticism and AB was 
moderated by conscientiousness (b=.09, p=.02) and agreeableness (b=.09, p=.03). Positive personality traits (de-
fined as extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness within this study) were positively related to SWB at 
high levels of neuroticism, but unrelated to SWB at low levels of neuroticism.  This was explored further us-
ing a student population in Study 2 (N=151), and the results were partially replicated. This study highlights 
the importance of considering more than one trait at a time when predicting important outcomes such as SWB.

 Keywords: Subjective well-being, Satisfaction with life, Positive and Negative Affect, Big Five personality traits,    
Trait interactions, Affect Balance

 On July 4th, 1776 the Continental Congress ap-
proved a document declaring that all people have the 
right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” 
(U.S. Declaration of Independence, 1776, para. 2). 
Similar wording was used earlier that same year in 
the Virginia Declaration of Rights which stated that 
everyone should be able to “[pursue] and [obtain] 
happiness and safety” (Virginia Declaration of Rights, 
1776, para. 1). Aristotle claimed that when we are 
pursuing “honor, pleasure, intellect, [and] in fact ev-
ery excellence” we are in reality using these pursuits 
to obtain happiness (Aristotle, ca. 350 B.C.E./1994). 
These and many other works throughout history, reli-
gion, philosophy, and science display a seemingly uni-
versal human desire to pursue and obtain happiness.
 The pursuit of happiness naturally leads to the 
question “What makes us happy?”. If we can identi-
fy some of the conditions under which an individu-
al is likely to be happy, we can work towards helping 
others achieve higher levels of happiness and general 
well-being. The term happiness has been notoriously 
difficult to operationalize (see Gilbert, 2007; Mogil-
ner et al., 2011; Myers & Diener, 1995), and so many 
researchers instead prefer to use the term well-being. 
In the current study, well-being is defined as an in-
dividual’s subjective evaluations of their overall life 
satisfaction and their experience of positive and neg-
ative emotions. This is a common conceptualization 
of well-being that is typically referred to as subjective 

well-being (SWB; Diener et al., 2018). SWB research 
typically uses self-report measures, which allow both 
affective and cognitive information to be gathered si-
multaneously (Andrews & Mckennell, 2005; Horley 
& Little, 1985; Larsen et al., 1985), and focuses on 
subjective self-perceptions about one’s own life instead 
of using an external frame of reference (Diener et al., 
1997; Diener et al., 2018). SWB can be broken down 
into three separate components: the presence of pos-
itive emotions or affect (PA), the absence of negative 
emotions or affect (NA), and general satisfaction with 
life (SWL; Diener et al., 2018). It is also common to 
create a single score of affect balance (AB) by subtract-
ing NA from PA (Gutiérrez et al., 2005). Structural 
equation modeling has been used to demonstrate that 
SWB can effectively be broken down into these three 
separate but related components (Arthaud-day et al., 
2005, Lee & Oguzoglu, 2007; Singh & Jha, 2008).
 In many ways, SWB can be conceptualized as a 
personality trait because it is relatively stable across sit-
uations and time, with situational and environmental 
factors only exerting a short-term impact (Diener et 
al., 1999). Several studies have shown that SWB often 
acts as a homeostatic process, with individuals readily 
returning to some SWB set point following a major life 
event that caused deviation from that set point (Cum-
mins et al., 2012; Headey & Wearing, 1989). Stable en-
vironmental factors such as daily hassles and job sat-
isfaction cannot fully account for the stability seen 

Jacob R. Gibson1, Chloe Pedersen-San Miguel2, & Tera D. Letzring2

 1 Corresponding author at: 204 W. Washington St. Lexington, VA. 24450. 
Email: jgibson@wlu.edu

2 Idaho State University; Pocatello, Idao



27

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

in SWB, so other factors must be involved (Koz-
ma et al., 2000). Affect in particular has long-term 
implications, with one study f inding that positive 
emotion in college (as measured from the intensity 
of an individual’s smile in pictures from their col-
lege yearbook) signif icantly predicted well-being 30 
years later (Harker & Keltner, 2001). Finally, like 
traits, SWB shows stability across situations such 
as work and recreation (Diener & Larsen, 1984) 
and also shows some state-like features that are sen-
sitive to situational factors (Kozma et al., 2000).
 The fact that SWB shows so many features that 
are similar to personality traits suggests that there 
may be a relationship between personality traits and 
SWB, which has been demonstrated in the literature 
(Gutiérrez et al., 2005). The most commonly used 
model of broad personality traits is the Five Factor 
Model, which includes the traits of extraversion (so-
ciability, assertiveness, energy level), agreeableness 
(compassion, respectfulness, trust), conscientious-
ness (organization, productiveness, responsibility), 
neuroticism/negative emotionality (anxiety, depres-
sion, emotional volatility), and openness to experi-
ence (also sometimes called intellect or open-mind-
edness; intellectual curiosity, aesthetic sensitivity, 
creative imagination; Goldberg, 1990; John et al., 
2008; Soto & John, 2017). The most empirically 
supported correlates of personality traits and SWB 
are between extraversion and PA, and between neu-
roticism and NA (Costa & McCrae, 1980). There is 
also some evidence that openness is related to higher 
PA (McCrae & Costa 1991). A meta-analysis of 148 
studies found that neuroticism consistently pre-
dicts lower SWL and higher NA, agreeableness and 
extraversion predict higher PA, and conscientious-
ness is the best predictor of higher SWL (DeNeve & 
Cooper, 1998). The authors argue that extraversion 
and agreeableness impact SWB by leading to more 
positive emotion, while conscientiousness leads 
individuals to set goals and work to achieve those 
goals, which leads to more SWL. Finally, McCrae 
and Costa (1991) argued that openness was a posi-
tive predictor of both PA and NA and that it led to 
more emotions overall. However, the meta-analysis 
by DeNeve et al. found openness to be the weakest 
predictor of SWB compared to the other traits. This 
may be due to DeNeve et al.’s use of an expanded 
definition with openness to include cognitive vari-

ables (e.g., belief in a just world, mental absorption, 
and rigidity) or to the fact that openness is still the 
least understood of the five factors (see DeYoung, 2015 
for an attempt to rectify this problem). For this rea-
son, openness was not included in the current study.
 Overall, the mechanisms behind the connection 
between SWB and personality traits are still not well 
understood. With regards to extraversion, it may be 
that extraversion is related to greater sociability which 
in turn is related to higher SWB (Bradburn, 1969; 
Okun et al., 1984), but there is research that suggests 
sociability cannot account completely for this relation-
ship (Harris et al., 2017) and that even if  extraverts 
are in nonsocial occupations, they still have higher 
SWB than introverts (Diener et al., 1984). There is 
also not a perfect relationship between extraversion 
and happiness. Indeed, research has found support 
for happy introverts who seem to not be significantly 
different in many of  their preferences (such as friend-
ship relations and introspective activities) from hap-
py extraverts, possibly due to extraversion playing a 
mediating role in how individuals pursue happiness 
(Hills & Argyle, 2001). Another possibility not men-
tioned or investigated in previous research is the idea 
that personality traits can interact with each other in 
how they influence SWB. For example, an agreeable 
extravert may act differently than a disagreeable ex-
travert and therefore have different levels of  SWB.
 A good place to start when investigating the 
moderating role of  various traits may be an exam-
ination of  the strong and consistent relationship be-
tween neuroticism and SWB. Neuroticism is essen-
tially a measure of  negative emotions such as fear, 
anger, sadness, and anxiety (Soto & John, 2017) and 
is sometimes referred to as negative emotionality. It 
may be no surprise that there is a strong negative re-
lationship between neuroticism and SWB, and other 
personality traits possibly serve moderating roles in 
the relationship between neuroticism and SWB. The 
current work builds on past research linking person-
ality and SWB and looks at the moderating role of  
extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness 
on the negative relationship between neuroticism and 
SWB. Neuroticism has been consistently linked with 
SWB and has been shown to have a negative rela-
tionship with SWL and PA and a positive relationship 
with NA. Conscientiousness, extraversion, and agree-
ableness all have positive relationships with well-being. 



28

GIBSON ET AL.

in SWB, so other factors must be involved (Koz-
ma et al., 2000). Affect in particular has long-term 
implications, with one study f inding that positive 
emotion in college (as measured from the intensity 
of an individual’s smile in pictures from their col-
lege yearbook) signif icantly predicted well-being 30 
years later (Harker & Keltner, 2001). Finally, like 
traits, SWB shows stability across situations such 
as work and recreation (Diener & Larsen, 1984) 
and also shows some state-like features that are sen-
sitive to situational factors (Kozma et al., 2000).
 The fact that SWB shows so many features that 
are similar to personality traits suggests that there 
may be a relationship between personality traits and 
SWB, which has been demonstrated in the literature 
(Gutiérrez et al., 2005). The most commonly used 
model of broad personality traits is the Five Factor 
Model, which includes the traits of extraversion (so-
ciability, assertiveness, energy level), agreeableness 
(compassion, respectfulness, trust), conscientious-
ness (organization, productiveness, responsibility), 
neuroticism/negative emotionality (anxiety, depres-
sion, emotional volatility), and openness to experi-
ence (also sometimes called intellect or open-mind-
edness; intellectual curiosity, aesthetic sensitivity, 
creative imagination; Goldberg, 1990; John et al., 
2008; Soto & John, 2017). The most empirically 
supported correlates of personality traits and SWB 
are between extraversion and PA, and between neu-
roticism and NA (Costa & McCrae, 1980). There is 
also some evidence that openness is related to higher 
PA (McCrae & Costa 1991). A meta-analysis of 148 
studies found that neuroticism consistently pre-
dicts lower SWL and higher NA, agreeableness and 
extraversion predict higher PA, and conscientious-
ness is the best predictor of higher SWL (DeNeve & 
Cooper, 1998). The authors argue that extraversion 
and agreeableness impact SWB by leading to more 
positive emotion, while conscientiousness leads 
individuals to set goals and work to achieve those 
goals, which leads to more SWL. Finally, McCrae 
and Costa (1991) argued that openness was a posi-
tive predictor of both PA and NA and that it led to 
more emotions overall. However, the meta-analysis 
by DeNeve et al. found openness to be the weakest 
predictor of SWB compared to the other traits. This 
may be due to DeNeve et al.’s use of an expanded 
definition with openness to include cognitive vari-

ables (e.g., belief in a just world, mental absorption, 
and rigidity) or to the fact that openness is still the 
least understood of the five factors (see DeYoung, 2015 
for an attempt to rectify this problem). For this rea-
son, openness was not included in the current study.
 Overall, the mechanisms behind the connection 
between SWB and personality traits are still not well 
understood. With regards to extraversion, it may be 
that extraversion is related to greater sociability which 
in turn is related to higher SWB (Bradburn, 1969; 
Okun et al., 1984), but there is research that suggests 
sociability cannot account completely for this relation-
ship (Harris et al., 2017) and that even if  extraverts 
are in nonsocial occupations, they still have higher 
SWB than introverts (Diener et al., 1984). There is 
also not a perfect relationship between extraversion 
and happiness. Indeed, research has found support 
for happy introverts who seem to not be significantly 
different in many of  their preferences (such as friend-
ship relations and introspective activities) from hap-
py extraverts, possibly due to extraversion playing a 
mediating role in how individuals pursue happiness 
(Hills & Argyle, 2001). Another possibility not men-
tioned or investigated in previous research is the idea 
that personality traits can interact with each other in 
how they influence SWB. For example, an agreeable 
extravert may act differently than a disagreeable ex-
travert and therefore have different levels of  SWB.
 A good place to start when investigating the 
moderating role of  various traits may be an exam-
ination of  the strong and consistent relationship be-
tween neuroticism and SWB. Neuroticism is essen-
tially a measure of  negative emotions such as fear, 
anger, sadness, and anxiety (Soto & John, 2017) and 
is sometimes referred to as negative emotionality. It 
may be no surprise that there is a strong negative re-
lationship between neuroticism and SWB, and other 
personality traits possibly serve moderating roles in 
the relationship between neuroticism and SWB. The 
current work builds on past research linking person-
ality and SWB and looks at the moderating role of  
extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness 
on the negative relationship between neuroticism and 
SWB. Neuroticism has been consistently linked with 
SWB and has been shown to have a negative rela-
tionship with SWL and PA and a positive relationship 
with NA. Conscientiousness, extraversion, and agree-
ableness all have positive relationships with well-being. 



29

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Considering this, the following was hypothesized.
Hypothesis 1: Neuroticism will have a negative rela-
tionship with SWB. 
Hypothesis 2: “Positive traits,” or conscientiousness, 
extraversion, and agreeableness, will moderate the neg-
ative relationship between neuroticism and SWB, with 
higher levels of each positive trait predicting a weaker 
relationship between neuroticism and SWB.

Study 11

Method2

Participants
 Data for study 1 were taken from three separate 
online studies that used Amazon’s Mechanical Turk 
(Mturk). Participation was voluntary through the 
MTurk website, and a 50-cent compensation was 
offered as payment for completing the study. Only 
those who correctly answered at least 80% of attention 
checks and completed at least 80% of the procedure 
received payment and were included in the data anal-
yses. This stipulation was clearly stated in the MTurk 
posting and the informed consent document. A to-
tal of 1150 participants were recruited for this study, 
and 120 participants did not pass at least 80% of the 
attention checks or were removed because of missing 
data. The final participants included 1035 individuals 
(69.57% female, 29.95% male, .004% non-binary gen-
der identity) from the United States between the ages 
of 18 and 78 (Mage = 37.28, SDage = 12.65). Race 
was 78.9% White, 7.2% Black/African American, 5.2% 
Asian, 8.0% other, and 0.6% no response. An a priori 
power analysis to determine the sample size for the cur-
rent analyses was not conducted because the data were 
collected for other purposes. A sensitivity analysis was 
used to determine how large of an effect could be de-
tected with the current sample size. G*power was set to 
“Linear multiple regression: Fixed model, R2 increase.” 
A power of .80 was selected with an alpha of .05. The 
sample size was set to match the current study and the 
number of predictors was set to 3 (neuroticism, [other 
trait of current interest], neuroticism * [trait of inter-
est] interaction). This resulted in an f2 of .011 reliably 
detectable by the current power level and sample size3.

1Study 1 was not pre-registered, but Study 2 was. This can be found at: https://osf.io/qyv3g/?view_only=74c6fc489bf94e15b-
d66eef34e6cc422
2 All R script and data for this study can be found at https://osf.io/n5jhv/?view_only=b8f1af679dad4fe281701928b5c4ac27
3 All effect sizes in this study were calculated using (R2AB - R2A)/(1- R2AB).

Measures 
 Big Five Inventory (BFI). The BFI is a 44-item 
measure made up of brief descriptions of behavior, 
thoughts, and feelings (John et al., 2008). Respon-
dents indicate the extent to which these items describe 
themselves on a 5-point scale, ranging from “Strongly 
disagree” to “Strongly agree.” The BFI has adequate in-
ternal reliability (α = .75-.80) and test-retest reliability 
over a period of three months (r = .80-.90; Rammstedt 
& John, 2005, 2007). It assesses the five major domains 
of personality: extraversion, agreeableness, openness, 
conscientiousness, and neuroticism. Within the current 
study, all domains had adequate reliability (α = .82-86).
 Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS). The 
SWLS is a 5-item measure of global cognitive judg-
ments of satisfaction with one’s life (Diener et al., 
1985). Responses are measured on a 7-point scale, 
ranging from “Strongly disagree” to “Strongly 
agree.” The SWLS has adequate internal reliabili-
ty (α = .87) and test-retest reliability over a period of 
two months (r = .82; Diener et al., 1985). Within the 
current study, the scale had high reliability (α = .94).
 Positive and Negative Affect Schedule 
(PANAS). The PANAS is a 20-item measure of both 
positive and negative affect (Watson et al., 1988). 
Items include words that correspond to positive or 
negative emotions. The trait version of the scale was 
used, which asks participants to “indicate to what ex-
tent you generally feel this way, that is, how you feel 
on the average.” Responses are on a 5-point scale rang-
ing from “Not at all” to “Extremely.” The PANAS has 
good internal reliability for both scales (PA α = .88; 
NA α = .77) and has demonstrated adequate reliability 
over a 2-month period (PA r = .68; NA r = .71; Wat-
son et al., 1988). Within the current study, the scale 
had high reliability (PA α = .94; NA α = .94). To com-
pute scores representative of Affect Balance, negative 
affect was subtracted from positive affect. Thus, nu-
merically positive scores indicate more positive affect 
than negative affect, while numerically negative scores 
indicate more negative affect than positive affect. 
Procedure
 For Study 1, participants responded to at least 
the three self-report measures described in the previ



30

GIBSON ET AL.

ous section. They also observed recorded interactions 
and provided personality judgments of the person in 
each video (these data were not used for this paper).
Analyses
 Hypothesis 1 Analysis. The relationship be-
tween Neuroticism and SWB was assessed in two 
ways. First, we examined Pearson’s correlation co-
efficient between Neuroticism and SWL, and 
Neuroticism and Affect Balance. Second, we ex-
amined regression models wherein Neuroticism 
predicted SWL and Affect Balance separately.
Most assumptions for correlational analysis were met 
in that variables appeared to have a linear relationship 
based on the examination of scatter plots and were 
normally distributed based on examination of histo-
grams, skewness, and kurtosis. When examining out-
liers, five outliers were identified for the variable of 
Affect Balance, with participants having lower Affect 
Balance scores than 1.5 times the interquartile range 
below the first quartile. However, no significant differ-
ences were found throughout the analysis when these 
outliers were excluded compared to when the outliers 
were included. Outliers did not appear to be due to 
measurement error and simply represented a few par-
ticipants with particularly negative affect. For both of 
these reasons, outliers were included in the analysis.
 Hypothesis 2 Analysis. Hierarchical regression 
analyses were conducted with SWL and AB as the 
dependent variables in separate analyses to examine 
how the positive personality traits of extraversion, 
agreeableness, and conscientiousness moderated the 
relationship between neuroticism and SWB (Baron 
& Kenny, 1986). Age was significantly correlated with 
affect balance. All analyses were computed with and 
without control for age, but this did not change the 
interpretation of results, so the more parsimonious 
(without age) model was used. The analyses assessed 
the incremental explanatory power of the variables 
in each block. The variables were entered into sepa-
rate hierarchical regression models in the following 
order: extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientious-
ness, respectively, as well as neuroticism, were entered 
in step 1. Two-way interaction terms (neuroticism 
x extraversion, neuroticism x agreeableness, neurot-
icism x conscientiousness) were entered in step 2. 
According to Baron and Kenny (1986), a significant 
moderator effect is indicated by significant incremen-
tal variance in the dependent variable after the inter-

action terms are added to the regression equation.
 Assumptions of multiple regression were not 
violated such that there appeared to be linear re-
lationships between independent and dependent 
variables when examining scatter plots, normality 
and homoscedasticity of residuals when examining 
Normal Q-Q and Residual vs Fitted plots respective-
ly, and independence of residuals, as checked using 
VIF values, which were well below acceptable levels.
Results 
 Descriptive statistics and correlations between 
the Big Five, SWLS, and AB are presented in Table 
1. Consistent with previous research, and in support 
of Hypothesis 1, neuroticism was negatively cor-
related with SWL (r(1033) = -.38, p < .001, 95% CI 
[-.43, -.33]) and AB (r(1033) = -.63, p <.001, 95% CI 
[-.67, -.60]). Additionally, neuroticism was negative-
ly correlated with the positive personality traits of 
extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. 
In further support of Hypothesis 1, simple linear re-
gressions found that for SWL, the overall regression 
was statistically significant (R2 = .14, F(1, 1043) = 
176.95, p < .001), and neuroticism significantly pre-
dicted SWL (b = -0.68, p < .001). And for AB, the 
overall regression was again statistically significant 
(R2 = .4, F(1, 1043) = 709.6, p < .001), with neuroti-
cism significantly predicting AB (b = -0.95, p < .001).
 Table 2 shows that, as expected from previous 
literature, in Step 1, positive personality traits sig-
nificantly predicted SWL, while neuroticism was a 
negative predictor of SWL. In Step 2, adding inter-
action terms revealed extraversion (b = .12, p = .02, 
f2 = .005, R2 change = .004) and conscientious-
ness (b = .15, p = .02, f2 = .006, R2 change = .005) 
to be significant moderators of neuroticism on SWL, 
while agreeableness was not a significant moder-
ator (b = .06, p = .31, f2 < .001, R2 change < .001). 
 Table 3 shows that, in Step 1, positive person-
ality traits significantly positively predicted AB 
while neuroticism negatively predicted AB. In Step 
2, adding interaction terms to the model revealed 
that agreeableness (b = .09, p = .02, f2 = .005, R2 
change = .003) and conscientiousness (b = .09, p = 
.02, f2 = .005, R2 change = .003) significantly mod-
erated the effect of neuroticism on AB, but extraver-
sion did not (b < .01, p = .92, f2 <.001, R2 change < 
.001). Thus, Hypothesis 2 was partially supported.
 To examine the interaction patterns, the interac-



31

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

tion effects were plotted by simple slopes of SWL and 
AB at high and low levels (±1SD from the mean) for 
Neuroticism and positive personality traits. The in-
teraction patterns for extraversion, conscientiousness, 
and agreeableness with the outcome variable SWL are 
depicted in Figures 1a, 1b, and 1c, respectively. Figure 
1a suggests that across all levels of neuroticism, higher 
extraversion is associated with higher SWL. However, 
the difference in SWL at high levels of neuroticism is 
much more pronounced than at low levels of neurot-
icism. Figure 1b illustrates a similar story, with higher 
conscientiousness predicting higher SWL across levels 
of neuroticism, but with larger differences between lev-
els of extraversion at high levels of neuroticism as op-
posed to low levels of neuroticism. Figure 1c shows a 
similar pattern in terms of higher neuroticism predict-
ing lower SWL, and lower levels of agreeableness pre-
dicting lower SWL. However, Figure 1c illustrates that 
agreeableness was not a significant moderator, such 
that individuals with both high and low levels of agree-
ableness have similar relationships between SWL and 
neuroticism. In other words, highly neurotic individu-
als may benefit more in terms of SWL from high levels 
of positive traits like extraversion and conscientious-
ness than individuals low in neuroticism, but this is not 
necessarily true for the positive trait of agreeableness.
 Figures 2a, 2b, and 2c show the moderating effect 
of extraversion, conscientiousness, and agreeableness 
on the relationships between neuroticism and AB, re-
spectively. Figures 2b and 2c show the significant inter-
action effect, again showing that higher conscientious-
ness and agreeableness are related to higher AB, with 
the difference in AB being more pronounced at higher 
levels of neuroticism.  On the other hand, Figure 2a 
shows that the level of neuroticism does not interact 
with the level of extraversion to influence AB, with 
the difference in AB at high and low levels of neurot-
icism being similar regardless of level of extraversion.
Discussion
 Overall, the findings for this study were a lit-
tle mixed. In some instances, positive personality 
traits seemed to moderate the relationship between 
neuroticism and SWB while in other instances 
they did not. It is possible that there is still a clear 
relationship between these variables, but more re-
search is needed to help investigate this further.

 

Study 2 - Replication
 Within the last decade, research in psychology has 
begun to increasingly stress the importance of replicat-
ing results. Several studies have been published that call 
into question some seminal research that is taught in 
many introductory psychology classes (Open, 2015). 
Although the debate over the replicability of many of 
these studies continues, what is clear is that attempting 
to replicate results is important. For this reason, Study 
2 attempted to replicate the results in Study 1 within 
a different sample and with different but conceptually 
similar measures. Many things can impact the likeli-
hood of a successful replication, including the a priori 
assumptions about what constitutes a successful rep-
lication (see Asendorpf et al., 2016, for a discussion 
on recommendations for increasing replication). The 
most conservative and straightforward method is to 
compare the key parameters of the replication attempt 
to those in the original study, focusing specifically on 
the replication of statistical significance and the corre-
sponding direction of effects. One main issue with de-
termining a replication in this manner is that it creates 
a dichotomy where small differences in p-values could 
lead to a conclusion that the original results were not 
replicated. This is especially true when replication 
studies have less power than the original study (Asen-
dorpf et al., 2016), and therefore have a smaller prob-
ability of finding a statistically significant effect of the 
same magnitude (which is the case within this study).
 Another way of determining the success of a repli-
cation is by looking at the overlap between confidence 
intervals (CI). If the parameters of interest from the 
replication study are contained within the CI of the 
original study, or if there is a significant overlap be-
tween the CIs of both studies, a case can be made for 
the replicability of the original results. This method 
is less conservative than relying on statistical signifi-
cance but is still sensitive to power differences between 
studies (Asendorpf et al., 2016). This means that if a 
replication study is powered differently from the orig-
inal study, results should be interpreted with caution. 
 The current study used all of these methods. 
When comparing parameters from the replication to 
the original study, if the direction of the effect is the 
same, CI’s overlap, the replication parameters are con-
tained within the CI of the original study, and both 
are statistically significant, a strong case for replication 
can be made. The fewer of these standards that a repli



32

GIBSON ET AL.

cation effect meets, the weaker the case for replication. 
All results should be interpreted with this in mind. 
Method
 Data from this study were taken from a separate un-
related study that examined the impact of prior informa-
tion on personality judgment accuracy (Gibson 2019).
Participants
 Participants were recruited using Idaho State 
University’s psychology department participant pool. 
Participation was voluntary, and participants were 
compensated with class credit. Only participants who 
correctly answered 80% of attention checks were in-
cluded in the data analysis. The final participants in-
cluded 151 individuals (this number was determined 
based on power analysis for the original study; Gibson 
2019); 73% female, 26% male, <1% other gender iden-
tity) between the ages of 18 and 46 (Mage = 21.44, 
SDage = 4.15). Self-identified ethnicity in the form 
of a free-response question was 80.9% White/Cauca-
sian (Non-Hispanic), 11.1% Hispanic/Latinx, 1.9% 
Asian, and 6.1% other. A sensitivity analysis was used 
to determine how large of an effect could be detected 
with the current sample size. G*power was set to “Lin-
ear multiple regression: Fixed model, R2 increase”. A 
power of .80 was selected with an alpha of .05. The 
sample size was set to match the current study and the 
number of predictors was set to 3 (neuroticism, [other 
trait of current interest], neuroticism * [trait of inter-
est] interaction). This resulted in an f2 of .074 reliably 
detectable by the current power level and sample size.
Measures
 The following measures, while not inclusive of all 
the measures completed by participants in this study, 
are the relevant measures used in the following analysis4.
 The Big Five Inventory-2 (BFI-2). The BFI-
2 is a 60-item measure made up of brief descriptions 
of behavior, thoughts, and feelings (Soto & John, 
2017). Respondents indicate the extent to which these 
items describe themselves on a 5-point scale, ranging 
from “Strongly disagree” to “Strongly agree.” The 
BFI-2 has adequate internal reliability (α = .84-.91). 
It assesses the five major domains of personality: ex-
traversion, agreeableness, open-mindedness, consci-
entiousness, and negative emotionality (previously 
labeled neuroticism). Within the current study, the 
Cronbach’s alpha reliabilities of each of the 12-item 

4 Participants also completed Ryff’s Psychological Well-being Scale and a measure of fixed and growth mindset of intelligence.

domain scales were highly reliable (Extraversion α = 
.82, Agreeableness α = .82, Conscientiousness α = .86, 
Emotional Stability α = .90, and Openness α = .80). 
 Satisfaction With Life Scale. Within this study, 
the Cronbach’s alpha reliability of the 5 items within the 
SWLS measure was found to be highly reliable (α = .85).
 Positive and Negative Affect Schedule. Within 
this study, the  Cronbach’s alpha reliability of the two 
scales was found to be highly reliable (PA α = .88, NA 
α = .83).
Procedure
 Participants were brought into a lab and asked 
to sit in front of a computer. After a short intro-
duction video, participants completed the informed 
consent form and provided personality information 
using the BFI-2 (Soto & John, 2017) via the self-re-
port form. Participants then watched video interac-
tions of other individuals and judged their personal-
ities, which is not relevant to the research question 
currently being explored. After completing this 
judgment portion, participants completed anoth-
er set of self-report measures, including the PANAS 
(Watson et al., 1988) and SWLS (Diener et al.,1985).
Analyses
 All analyses were performed in the same way as 
in Study 1. Assumptions for correlational analysis 
and multiple regression analysis were not violated.
Results
 Descriptive statistics and correlations between 
the Big Five domains, SWL, and AB are presented in 
Table 4. Consistent with previous research and Study 
1, neuroticism was negatively correlated with extra-
version, agreeableness, conscientiousness, SWL, and 
AB. Age was not related to either outcome, but gender 
was related to SWL such that males had higher levels 
of SWL than females. As in study 1, all models were 
run with and without a gender control and this result-
ed in no differences in interpretation of the results, so 
the more parsimonious model was used for results. 
 Table 5 shows that extraversion and conscien-
tiousness significantly predicted SWL, while neuroti-
cism was a negative predictor of SWL. In Step 2, add-
ing interaction terms revealed extraversion (b = .37, p 
= .02, f2 = .028, R2 change = .027) to be a significant 
moderator of neuroticism on SWL, while conscien-
tiousness (b = .31, p = .07, f2 = .022, R2 change =.015) 



33

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

and agreeableness (b = .24, p = .20 f2 = 011, R2 change 
= .008) were not statistically significant moderators. 
Table 6 shows that, surprisingly, in Step 1, only con-
scientiousness significantly positively predicted AB, 
while neuroticism negatively predicted AB. In Step 2, 
adding interaction terms to the models revealed that 
agreeableness (b = -.26, p = .04, f2 = .029, R2 change 
= .022) significantly moderated the effect of neuroti-
cism on AB, but extraversion (b = -.03, p = .79 f2 < 
.001, R2 change < .001) and conscientiousness (b 
= .01 p = .95 f2 < .001, R2 change < .001) did not.
 To examine the interaction patterns, the interac-
tion effects were plotted in the same way as in Study 
1. The interaction pattern for extraversion with the 
outcome variable SWL is depicted in Figure 3. Figure 
3 suggests that at high levels of neuroticism, higher 
extraversion is associated with higher SWL. However, 
the difference in SWL at low levels of neuroticism be-
tween levels of extraversion is negligible. This mirrors 
the patterns found in Study 1, with individuals high in 
neuroticism potentially benefiting more from possess-
ing the trait of high extraversion. Figure 4 displays the 
interaction pattern for agreeableness with the outcome 
of AB. This figure shows a distinctly different pattern 
than what was found in Study 1. At high levels of neu-
roticism, the difference in AB is negligible, whereas, 
at low levels of neuroticism, the difference in AB at 
different levels of agreeableness is more pronounced, 
with high agreeableness predicting higher AB. This 
suggests that for individuals high in neuroticism, AB is 
low despite the presence of high levels of agreeableness.
Discussion
 As mentioned earlier, evidence in support of rep-
lication can come in many forms, some more stringent 
than others. Within this study, multiple methods were 
used to examine how well Study 2 replicated the re-
sults found in Study 1, including 1) whether the effects 
were in the same direction in both studies, 2) wheth-
er the CIs overlapped, 3) whether the replication pa-
rameters were contained within the CI of the original 
study, and 4) whether statistical significance was pres-
ent across both studies. The more of these standards 
that a replication effect meets, the stronger the case 
for replication. Table 7 concisely depicts these results. 
 Based on these findings, replication of the results 
found in Study 1 is most clear when examining trait 
interactions that predict SWL. Predicting SWL, both 
the extraversion by neuroticism interaction and the 

agreeableness by neuroticism interaction met three 
of the four replication standards. A weaker, but still 
legitimate case can also be made for the conscientious-
ness by neuroticism interaction within SWL because 
both are in the same direction, and the CIs overlap. 
When trait interactions were used to predict AB, the 
extraversion by neuroticism and the agreeableness by 
neuroticism parameter estimates from Study 2 were 
in the opposite direction of those found in Study 1. 
This means that there is a fairly weak case (at least 
within this replication attempt) for the replicabili-
ty of these effects from Study 1. A stronger case can 
be made for the conscientiousness by neuroticism 
effect, which met 3 of the 4 criteria for replication. 

General Discussion
 People with different personalities can experience 
the same life events or situations and come away with 
vastly different positive or negative experiences (Mag-
nus et al., 1993). A long history of research linking SWB 
and personality has demonstrated how various person-
ality traits are related to our subjective sense of well-be-
ing. Neuroticism has consistently been shown to have 
a negative relationship with SWB, while extraversion, 
agreeableness, and conscientiousness have been shown 
to have positive relationships (Costa & McCrae, 1980; 
DeNeve & Copper, 1998; McCrae & Costa, 1991). 
The current studies explored how the relationships be-
tween neuroticism and SWB can be moderated by oth-
er traits. Significant interactions among the personality 
traits and their relationship to SWB have been demon-
strated and need to be considered and explored further 
in future research. As with previous studies, this study 
replicated results showing that neuroticism is inverse-
ly related to SWB through a negative correlation with 
both SWL and AB, while extraversion, agreeableness, 
and conscientiousness were positively related to SWB 
through a positive correlation with both SWL and AB. 
Neuroticism also showed a negative relationship with 
extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness.
 When interactions among traits were consid-
ered, the results from Study 1 indicated that only 
extraversion and consciousness moderated the rela-
tionship between neuroticism and SWL, and that 
conscientiousness and agreeableness moderated 
the relationship between neuroticism and AB. The 
meta-analysis by DeNeve and Copper (1998) theo 
rized that neuroticism causes people to experience



34

GIBSON ET AL.

less SWB overall. Our results show how this effect 
could be reduced through other personality traits. 
We found that the effect of positive personality traits 
on neuroticism was larger at higher levels of neuroti-
cism compared to lower levels of neuroticism. Thus, 
as neuroticism increases, the observed effect of posi-
tive personality traits such as extraversion, agreeable-
ness, and consciousness on the relationship between 
neuroticism and SWB becomes more pronounced.
 Study 2 was designed to examine the replicabili-
ty of the effects found in Study 1. The strongest case 
for replication can be made for the moderating effect 
of extraversion and the lack of moderation for agree-
ableness on the negative relationship between neurot-
icism and SWL. In both cases, three lines of evidence 
supported the results found in Study 1. There was also 
evidence for the moderating impact of conscientious-
ness. This suggests that, even in this different sample, 
the negative impact of neuroticism on SWL is less for 
individuals high in extraversion or consciousness, but 
is not significantly impacted by levels of agreeableness.  
 The impact of positive personality traits on neu-
roticism and AB relationships was mostly not repli-
cated. In some cases (extraversion by neuroticism and 
agreeableness by neuroticism), the effects were in the 
opposite direction. The effects of the interaction of 
conscientiousness by neuroticism on AB were mostly 
replicated. There could be a number of explanations 
for these findings. First, the sample in Study 2 was 
about 15% of the size of the sample in Study 1, so it 
did not have as much power to detect small effects. 
Study 1 could detect effects as small as f2 = .011, but 
Study 2 could only detect effects as small as f2 = .074. 
Study 2 also collected data only from college students 
and had less diverse demographics than Study 1. A 
smaller and more homogenous sample could make it 
more difficult to detect effects due to lower variabil-
ity. It is also important to keep in mind that college 
students differ from other adults in some important 
ways, such as being younger, and also differ from 
adults of the same age who have not gone to college 
in substantive ways such as a greater tendency to ratio-
nalize choices, higher levels of individualism, weaker 
motivations to conform, and less prosocial behaviors 
(Henrich et al., 2010). Future research on this topic 
would benefit from larger and more diverse samples to 
more directly examine how trait interactions are relat-
ed to well-being across different age groups and groups 

with different experiences (such as attending college).
 Another potentially important difference be-
tween the studies is that Study 1 used the original 
BFI to assess personality traits, while Study 2 used 
the BFI-2. This may have made a difference in the 
two studies, but the two measures have high con-
vergent validity and trait scores tend to be highly 
correlated between the two (Soto & John, 2017). 
For this reason, it is unlikely that this difference can 
account for the differences between the two studies. 
 Due to the larger sample size and greater diversity 
of the sample, Study 1 is a more reliable study and the 
results from Study 2 should be taken as only moder-
ate evidence for the replicability, or lack thereof, of the 
findings. Overall, there is some evidence that positive 
personality traits can attenuate the negative relation-
ship between neuroticism and SWB, specifically when 
it comes to SWL. Some of these differences could affect 
how personality is related to well-being, which would be 
a useful avenue for future research. Research also sug-
gests that SWB is only one part of a broader construct of 
overall well-being (Chen et al., 2013) and research may 
benefit by further investigating the relationship be-
tween personality traits and psychological well-being. 
 One of the major limitations of this paper is that 
both studies are correlational and all measures were 
completed at only one time point, which means that 
cause-and-effect relationships cannot be identified. 
Additionally, both studies suffer from self-selection 
bias. The types of individuals who decided to devote 
time to completing psychological surveys on Mturk, 
and those who chose to take psychology classes, may 
not represent the broader population. Future research 
should look at these effects in multiple groups and 
over longer periods of time to investigate the temporal 
validity of the results and causal directions of the re-
lationships between personality traits and well-being.
Conclusion
 This research contributes to a more nuanced under-
standing of the complex interactions between well-be-
ing and personality. Often personality traits are treated 
as if they operate alone, but individuals are complex. 
For example, an agreeable extravert will likely act dif-
ferently than an agreeable introvert, so it is important 
to examine how traits interact with each other to influ-
ence important psychological outcomes and behavior. 
The predictions made in this study that conscientious-
ness, extraversion, and agreeableness would moderate



35

the relationship between neuroticism and SWB were 
partially supported. Positive personality traits were 
generally positively related to SWB at high levels of 
neuroticism, but generally unrelated to SWB at low 
levels of neuroticism. This lends support to the idea 
that personality traits interact and highlights the im-
portance of considering more than one trait at a time 
when predicting important outcomes such as SWB. 

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Table 1

Descriptive Statistics and Zero-order Correlations for Study 1

Note. SWL = Satisfaction With Life, AB = Affect Balance, Ext = Extraversion, Agr = Agreeableness, 

Con = Conscientiousness, Neu = Neuroticism/Negative emotionality, Gen = Gender. N = 1035, val-

ues in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals. 

**p < .01, *p < .05, †For gender, Male = 0 and Female = 1, non-binary individuals were excluded from 

the correlation matrix (but included in all other analysis) so that results could be interpreted properly 

(N=1030 for gender correlations).



39

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Table 2

Hierarchical Regression Analyses Predicting Satisfaction with Life (SWL)

Note. N= 1035, values in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals.

***p < .001, **p < .01, *p < .05.  



40

GIBSON ET AL.

Table 3

Hierarchical Regression Analyses Predicting Affect Balance (AB)

Note. N= 1035, values in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals.

***p < .001, **p < .01, *p < .05.  



41

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Table 4

Descriptive Statistics and Zero-order Correlations 

Note. SWL = Satisfaction With Life, AB = Affect Balance, Ext = Extraversion, Agr = Agreeableness, 

Con = Conscientiousness, Neu = Neuroticism/Negative emotionality, Gen = Gender. N = 151, values 

in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals. 

**p < .01, *p < .05, †For gender, Male = 0 and Female = 1, non-binary individuals were excluded from 

the correlation matrix (but included in all other analysis) so that results could be interpreted properly 

(N=149 for gender correlations).



42

Table 5

Hierarchical Regression Analyses Predicting Satisfaction with Life (SWL)

Note. Values in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals.

***p < .001, **p < .01, *p < .05

GIBSON ET AL.



43

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Table 6

Hierarchical Regression Analyses Predicting Affect Balance (AB)

Note. Values in brackets are the 95% confidence intervals.

***p < .001, **p < .01, *p < .05



44

GIBSON ET AL.

Table 7

Lines of Evidence for the Replication in Study 2 of the Trait Interactions found in Study 1

Note. CI = 95% confidence interval, Ext = Extraversion, Agr = Agreeableness, Con = Conscientious-

ness, Neur = Neuroticism/Negative emotionality. An X in the Shared significance column means that 

either both were significant, or both were not significant.

*p < .05 in Study 1.



45

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Figure 1

The Moderating Effect of Positive Traits on the Relationship Between Neuroticism and Satisfaction With Life

Note. *significant interaction effects.



46

GIBSON ET AL.

Figure 2

The Moderating Effect of Positive Traits on the Relationship Between Neuroticism and Affect Balance 

Note. *significant interaction effects.



47

PREDICTING SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND AFFECT BALANCE

Figure 3

The Moderating Effect of Positive Traits on the Relationship Between Neuroticism and Satisfaction with Life

Note. *significant interaction effects.



48

GIBSON ET AL.

Figure 4

The Moderating Effect of Positive Traits on the Relationship Between Neuroticism and Affect Balance 

Note. *significant interaction effects.


