THE CRITERION VALIDITY OF BROAD FACTOR SCALES VERSUS SPECIFIC FACET SCALES

We compared the validities of two Big Five personality factor scales w ith these of two lower-level facet scales that constituted each factor scale, with respect to self-report behavior criteria. Results demonst rated that the factor scales yielded significantly and substantially l ower validities than did their constituent facet scales. These finding s support our claim that separate scale scores should be reported rout inely for the individual personality facets that define a broad factor , particularly when those facets do not correlate highly and when crit eria of interest relate substantively to certain facets within the fac tor scale but not to others. (C) 1995 Academic Press, Inc.