[Personality and mental health differences of gifted high schools students compared to ordinary high schools students]

ABSTRACT

The study of personality characteristics of students has always been considered important to pedagogic system's specialists, consultants, psychologists and mental health professionals. Schools and their media have great impact on the development of the students' personality. The present study was designed to evaluate possible personality differences between students of gifted high schools and students of ordinary high schools. Two hundred students [97 gifted and 103 ordinary] in their third year of high school in Shiraz participated in this study. They were assessed using NEOPI-R [NEO Personality Inventory-Revised] and General Health Questionnare [GHQ-28]. The results show that students of gifted schools obtained higher scores on the openness to experiences domain of NEO PI-R and had lower scores in the agreeableness domain when compared to students of ordinary schools. Female subjects had higher scores in the agreeableness domain as compared to male subjects. The results show that students from gifted schools have better mental health condition when compared with students from ordinary high schools. The findings suggest that students attending gifted high schools have different personality characteristics and mental health conditions when compared with ordinary high school students