Multilingualism and Personality in Indian Young Adults: An Exploratory Study

Multilingualism is a norm in India. While rigorous research has found multilingualism to be related to personality, the extent of this influence remains to be seen in India. Through this study, we aim to investigate the relationship, if any exists, between multilingualism and personality traits for Indian young adults. The study was conducted on 218 young adults in the age range of 18-25 who filled out an online personality test. We used the Dimensional Personality Inventory (DPI) to measure the personality traits of Activity-Passivity, Enthusiastic-Non-enthusiastic, Suspicious-Trusting, Assertive-Submissive, Depressive-Non-Depressive, Emotional-Instability-Emotional Stability. The study considered bilinguals as a comparison group. Correlational analysis revealed that the number of languages had a statistically significant relationship with Suspiciousness, Depression, and Emotional instability scores. The study failed to find any statistically significant correlations between the number of languages and Activity, Enthusiasm, or Assertiveness scores. ANOVA analysis revealed a statistically significant interaction effect between the factors of age, bilingualism/multilingualism, gender, and scores (F= 2.998, p < 0.05). Thus, there is some evidence that multilingualism is significantly related to an individual’s Suspiciousness, Depression, and Emotional Instability, but for Activity, Assertiveness, and Enthusiasm the interaction among age, gender, and number of languages was found to be inconsequential.