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EEG correlates of personality types

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Netherlands Journal of Psychology

Abstract

Evolutionary interpretation of brain oscillations and empirical evidence link delta oscillations with reward motivation and alpha with anxiety. It is hypothesised that a balance of activity in these two oscillatory systems underlies the dimension of behavioural control. Overcontrollers could be characterised as individuals with a relatively high activity of the alpha oscillatory system, undercontrollers as individuals with excessive activity of the delta oscillatory system, and resilients as individuals with balanced activity of these systems. This hypothesis was tested in a sample of 78 adolescents aged 10-16 years. The predictions were generally confirmed. Relative prevalence of alpha oscillations, particularly in the parietal zone, predicted overcontrolled prototype whereas relative prevalence of delta oscillations, mostly in the frontal region, predicted undercontrolled prototype. Resilients were characterised by balanced activity of alpha and delta oscillations. (Netherlands Journal of Psychology, 62, 81-90.)

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    Gennady G. Knyazev

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State Research Institute of Physiology, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, Novosibirsk, Russia

Correspondence to: Gennady G. Knyazev, Institute of Physiology, SB RAMS, Timakova str., 4, Novosibirsk, 630117, Russia. E-mail: G.G.Knyazev@iph.ma.nsc.ru

Submitted 24 March 2006; revision accepted 8 August 2006.

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Knyazev, G.G. EEG correlates of personality types. NEJP 62, 78–87 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03061054

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