Fluid intelligence, personality traits and scholastic success: Empirical evidence in a sample of Italian high school students

The aim of the present study was to investigate the role of intelligence and personality traits in predicting scholastic success and, particularly, verify the existence of incremental validity of the personality variables compared to cognitive ability. A sample of 286 students were administered the Advanced Progressive Matrices and the Big Five Questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, correlations and hierarchical regressions were calculated. The results confirm the impact of intelligence and personality on scholastic success, underlining the role of personality traits. However, the principal predictor was found to be Conscientiousness, utilizing the end of the academic year GPA as an indicator of success, Intelligence, as an index of performance was indicated by the grade obtained on the State Exam. The results, therefore, suggest further study that carefully considers the differentiated indices of scholastic performance.