Is there such thing as an addictive personality? Stephen Bright, Edith Cowan University Most of us know somebody who tends to get over-involved in certain behaviours, and the saying often goes that they must have an “addictive personality”. But is there such a thing? The idea of an addictive personality is more pop-psychology than scientific. What is personality? To understand why the idea of an addictive personality is flawed, it’s important to first understand what psychologists mean when referring to personality. Personality is comprised of broad, measurable, stable, individual traits that predict behaviour. So by definition, engaging in excessive behaviours cannot be considered a personality trait. Read more: Everyone’s different: what parts of the brain make our personalities so unique? Though, there are personality traits that are associated with addiction. Neuroticism is one of the “big five” personality dimensions. These are the five core traits that drive behaviour. They include openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion/introversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. People who score high in neuroticism tend to be easily emotionally aroused. They are also more likely to engage in a number of excessive behaviours, including: over-eating, excessive online gaming, social media over-use and substance dependence. People who are highly neurotic might…