Relationship between morningness-eveningness and temperament and character dimensions in adolescents

In this study, we used the Temperament Character Inventory (TCI) in adolescents and looked at the relationship with morningness-eveningness. Three hundred and forty-six German pupils participated in this study and filled in the Composite Scale of Morningness (CSM) to measure circadian preference and the TCI in a special adaptation for adolescents. In correlational analyses, morning oriented adolescents scored higher on persistence (PS) and cooperation (C), while evening oriented pupils scored higher in novelty seeking (NS). Based on chronotype comparisons, evening types scored higher in NS than neither-types and morning types and neither types scored higher than morning types. PS was lowest in evening types and highest in morning types. Morning types scored highest in C, and evening types lowest. Evening types scored higher on Self-Transcendence (ST) than neither types. There was an interaction between chronotype and gender in reward dependence (RD). In morning types, boys scored higher, while in evening types, girls scored higher in RD. In neither-types, girls also scored higher than boys. As a conclusion, the paper contributes to the knowledge about the relationship between circadian typology and personality in adolescents. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.