Big Five facets and aspects explained

What are facets?

Facets are the narrower characteristics below the aspects. There is no fixed list: lists of facets have usually been drawn up based on content and judgement, and there is no agreement on how many there are or what they should be called ^[2]. Different tests therefore use different breakdowns.

Some examples of facets you will often come across, in plain words:

• Openness: imagination, a feel for art, a taste for adventure, curiosity about ideas.
• Conscientiousness: orderliness, sense of duty, self-discipline, deliberation, drive to achieve.
• Extraversion: warmth, seeking company, assertiveness, activity, cheerfulness.
• Agreeableness: trust, sincerity, helpfulness, modesty, compassion.
• Emotional stability: calm, an even mood, confidence around others, control over impulses, steadiness under pressure.

This shows why two people with an Extraversion score of 65 can still come across differently. One easily takes charge in a meeting but would rather go home afterwards. The other knows everyone at the party but is happy to let someone else do the talking in a meeting.

Agreeableness works the same way. Someone can feel deeply for a friend who is going through a hard time, and still argue hard in a discussion instead of holding back. Compassion and politeness are two sides of the same trait, but they do not have to move together.

Do facets tell you more than the five traits?

Sometimes, for something very specific. When it comes to something like keeping appointments, a narrow characteristic such as sense of duty can say more than the whole of Conscientiousness, which also includes tidiness and drive to achieve. In a study of 40 kinds of behaviour, facets predicted that behaviour noticeably better than the five broad traits, even when the number of facets used was limited to the number of traits ^[3]. And facets within one trait often showed their own pattern across age groups ^[4].

Even single nuances, at the level of one question, turned out to be stable over time and were recognised by other raters. Researchers therefore see them as a real layer of personality, useful for a rich description and for very specific predictions ^[5].

There is another side too. Narrow measures are less stable than broad ones: in a large review, people's rank order at the facet level held up less well over time than at the level of the five traits ^[6]. On top of that, each narrow characteristic needs enough questions of its own to produce a reliable number; with few questions per characteristic, measurement error grows large.

All these findings are about groups of people. They do not mean your facets determine anything. A facet is a description, not an explanation and not a prediction for one person.

Why does DepthFive show only the five traits?

DepthFive reports only the five traits: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Emotional stability. There are three reasons.

First, the broad level has the strongest evidence. The five traits turn up again and again, in everyday language and in questionnaires, across raters and across cultures ^[1]. For facets there is no such agreement ^[2]. You can read more about that under is the Big Five scientific.

Second, DepthFive only wants to show numbers that really mean something. A facet score based on few questions carries a large measurement error, and a number that could shift a lot at the next measurement does not help you.

Third, the five traits already show a great deal, especially in combination. What 120 questions give you is therefore a more precise profile on the five traits, not a list of facet scores.

The free test of 20 questions gives you five percentiles, two comparisons and a Depth Pattern, with no email address or account. For a one-off €25 ($25, or £22 in the UK) you answer the remaining 100 questions and get a personal report based on all 120.