  In the present study we asked whether it is possible to decode personality
traits from resting state EEG data. EEG was recorded from a large sample of
subjects (N = 309) who had answered questionnaires measuring personality trait
scores of the 5 dimensions as well as the 10 subordinate aspects of the Big
Five. Machine learning algorithms were used to build a classifier to predict
each personality trait from power spectra of the resting state EEG data. The
results indicate that the five dimensions as well as their subordinate aspects
could not be predicted from the resting state EEG data. Finally, to demonstrate
that this result is not due to systematic algorithmic or implementation
mistakes the same methods were used to successfully classify whether the
subject had eyes open or eyes closed and whether the subject was male or
female. These results indicate that the extraction of personality traits from
the power spectra of resting state EEG is extremely noisy, if possible at all.
