Student-teacher agreement on personality traits and social competencies during early adolescence: A longitudinal study

Marek Blatný; Veronika Koutná; Martin Jelínek; Petr Květon; Alexander T. Vazsonyi

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0351394

Student-teacher agreement on personality traits and social competencies during early adolescence: A longitudinal study

Marek Blatný
, Veronika Koutná
, Martin Jelínek
, Petr Květon
, Alexander T. Vazsonyi

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

The present study sought to validate existing knowledge on inter-rater agreement on personality traits and social competencies. Based on longitudinal data, the study aimed to determine whether the agreement between student and teacher reports changes over time. The research sample consisted of a total of 296 early adolescents (181 females, 115 males, average age in the first wave of the two-year study period was 12.37 years). The personality traits and social competencies of students were rated by class teachers (N = 28, 75% females). Personality traits were measured by the Big Five Inventory and social competencies by the Social Skills Improvement System. The main findings of the study are as follows: 1) the highest agreement between student and teacher ratings of personality traits and social competencies was found for characteristics that were high in observability; 2) there was greater agreement between student and teacher ratings of social competencies for girls; 3) high temporal stability was found for personality traits and social competencies for both students and teachers; there were no substantial changes in the agreement of student and teacher ratings over time. Attention to hidden or difficult-to-assess student characteristics may prevent developmental, school, and social/interpersonal problems in adolescents.

Original language	English
Article number	e0351394
Journal	PLoS ONE
Volume	21
Issue number	6 June
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0351394
State	Published - Jun 2026

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2026 Blatný et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funding

Funding: This work was supported by the John I. and Patricia J. Buster Endowment to the last author and the Masaryk University Brno for the preparation of the article (MUNI/A/1519/2023) to the first author. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. This work was supported by the John I. and Patricia J. Buster Endowment to the last author and the Masaryk University Brno for the preparation of the article (MUNI/A/1519/2023) to the first author. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Funders	Funder number
Masaryk University Brno
John I. and Patricia J. Buster Endowment
Masarykova Univerzita	MUNI/A/1519/2023

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General

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10.1371/journal.pone.0351394

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abstract = "The present study sought to validate existing knowledge on inter-rater agreement on personality traits and social competencies. Based on longitudinal data, the study aimed to determine whether the agreement between student and teacher reports changes over time. The research sample consisted of a total of 296 early adolescents (181 females, 115 males, average age in the first wave of the two-year study period was 12.37 years). The personality traits and social competencies of students were rated by class teachers (N = 28, 75\% females). Personality traits were measured by the Big Five Inventory and social competencies by the Social Skills Improvement System. The main findings of the study are as follows: 1) the highest agreement between student and teacher ratings of personality traits and social competencies was found for characteristics that were high in observability; 2) there was greater agreement between student and teacher ratings of social competencies for girls; 3) high temporal stability was found for personality traits and social competencies for both students and teachers; there were no substantial changes in the agreement of student and teacher ratings over time. Attention to hidden or difficult-to-assess student characteristics may prevent developmental, school, and social/interpersonal problems in adolescents.",

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Student-teacher agreement on personality traits and social competencies during early adolescence: A longitudinal study

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Funding

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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