Assessing six factors in Spain: Validation of the HEXACO-100 in relation to the Five Factor Model and other conceptually relevant criteria

• Published in: Personality and individual differences 2015-04, Vol.76, p.75-81
• Main Authors: Romero, Estrella, Villar, Paula, López-Romero, Laura
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Empathy; Five Factor Model; Forgiveness; HEXACO model; Psychopathy; Well-being
• ISSN: 0191-8869; 1873-3549
• DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2014.11.056

•The Spanish HEXACO-100 offers appropriate psychometric properties at the domain level.•Although all of the scales demonstrate good test–retest reliability, the alphas of the facets tend to be low.•The factor structure, correlations between domains and relationships with the NEO PI-R support the original model.•Relationships with psychopathy, forgiveness, empathy and well-being support the validity of the domains.•The HEXACO-100 is found to be particularly useful in predicting interpersonal criteria. The recent popularity of the HEXACO model has led to the examination of different instruments based on this model in a variety of contexts and languages. This study examines the psychometric properties of the HEXACO-100 in the Spanish language. A sample of 876 Spanish adults were administered the HEXACO-100 as well as the NEO PI-R and self-reported measures of psychopathy, forgiveness, empathy and well-being. The results support the test–retest reliability of the scales of the HEXACO-100 and the alpha reliability of the domains. An analysis of factor structure, correlations between the domains and correlations with the NEO PI-R support the validity of the six factors. Relationships with psychopathy, forgiveness and empathy are in accordance with suppositions of the original model and highlight the difference between Honesty–Humility and Agreeableness. The results also indicate that the HEXACO-100 outperforms the NEO PI-R in terms of predicting specific dimensions of psychopathy, forgiveness and empathy; however there are no substantial advantages found in the prediction of well-being. Overall, results support the usefulness of the Spanish HEXACO-100 in capturing the original domains of the model and support its usefulness in the study of interpersonal criteria.