Honesty-humility in contemporary students: manipulations of self-image by inflated IQ estimations.

The HEXACO model offers a complement to the Big Five model, including a sixth factor, Honesty-Humility, and its four facets (Sincerity, Fairness, Greed-avoidance, and Modesty). The four facets of Honesty-Humility and three indicators of intelligence (one performance-based cognitive ability test, one self-estimated academic potential, and one self-report of previous IQ test results) were assessed in students entering higher education (N = 187). A significant negative correlation was observed between Honesty-Humility and self-reported intelligence (r = -.37), most evident in the Modesty facet. These results may be interpreted as tendencies of exaggeration, using a theoretical frame of psychological image-management, concluding that the Honesty-Humility trait captures students' self-ambitions, particularly within the context of an individualistic, competitive culture such as Sweden.