Stephen Abram in his talk at Computer in Libraries 2004, pointed us towards an interesting October 2003 study, Five personality dimensions and their influence on information behaviour by Jannica Heinstrom, Abo Akademi University, Finland.

Dimension of Personality & Level of Trait

Neuroticism —-> Hi Level Sensitive, Nervous vs Low Level Secure, Confident

Extraversion —> Hi Level Outgoing, Energetic vs Low Level Shy, Withdrawn

Openness —–> Hi Level Inventive, Curious vs Low Level Cautious, Conservative

Agreeableness -> Hi Level Friendly, Compassionate vs Low Competitive, Outspoken

Conscientiousness –>Hi Efficient, organized vs Low Level Easy-going, Careless

How does personality influence searching behaviour?

Sample Conclusions

Neuroticism was related to preference for confirming information, concern over time spent on searching, difficulties with relevance judgement, and insecurity with database searching.

Extraversion was related to informal information retrieval as well as preference for thought provoking documents over documents which confirmed previous ideas.

Openness to experience was related to broad information seeking, incidental information acquisition, critical information judgement, preference of thought provoking documents instead of documents which confirmed previous results.

Check out the link for more details.