Conscientiousness and agreeableness as predictors of rating leniency.

The authors studied the relationship between the Big Five personality factors and rating elevation among 111 students making peer evaluations. It was hypothesized that Conscientiousness (C) scores would be negatively correlated with rating level and that Agreeableness (A) scores would be positively correlated with rating level. We further predicted that individuals who were low on C and high on A would produce the most elevated ratings. As predicted, A scores were positively related to rating level (.33, p < .01) and C scores were negatively correlated with rating level (-.37, p < .01). Using the strong hypothesis test (P. Bobko, 1986), the authors found that ratings by low C and high A individuals were more elevated than all other groups of students combined (p < .01).