Study Examines How Personality Types Cluster in Neighborhoods

Richard Florida shares news of a new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) that explores how people characterized by specific personality traits tend to cluster in neighborhoods clustering. The study characterized individuals according to five basic personality traits defined by the classic five-factor model: openness to experience, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and emotional stability (or lack of neuroticism). 

To provide some insight into the study's findings, Florida shares maps from the study that show the clustering of the five personality types across metro London.

According to Florida, "[the] most clustered personality trait the researchers found was 'openness to experience'...which is concentrated in the center of London. Openness to experience, according to a wide body of psychological studies, is associated with creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship. This type is concentrated in higher density neighborhoods, with higher housing prices, more ethnic and religious diversity and higher crime rates. Meanwhile...there are fewer people open to experience in metro London’s suburbs."

Florida goes on to provide more analysis of the study's findings while also summing up some of the implications of the study, including the importance of the idea that psychological forces shape neighborhoods and metropolitan areas along with the more well-understood forces of economics.