ORIGINAL ARTICLE - NEUROSURGERY TRAINING Neurologists, neurosurgeons, and psychiatrists’ personality traits: a comparison Werner Surbeck 1 & Robin Samuel 2 & Derek Spieler 3,4 & Erich Seifritz 1,5 & Gabrielle Scantamburlo 6 & Martin N. Stienen 7,8 & Felix Scholtes 9,10 Received: 5 September 2019 /Accepted: 15 January 2020 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Austria, part of Springer Nature 2020 Abstract Background Clinicians in neuroscientific disciplines may present distinct personality profiles. Despite of potential relevance to clinical practice, this has not yet been studied. We therefore aimed to compare personality profiles of physicians working in the three main disciplines of clinical neuroscience, i.e., neurologists, neurosurgeons, and psychiatrists, between each other, across levels of training and to other specialties. Methods An online survey using the Ten-Item Personality Inventory (TIPI), an internationally validated measure of the five- factor model of personality dimensions, was distributed to board-certified physicians, residents, and medical students in several European countries and Canada. Differences in personality profiles were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance and canonical linear discriminant analysis on age- and sex-standardized z-scores of personality traits. Single personality traits were analyzed using robust t tests. Results Of the 5148 respondents who completed the survey, 723 indicated the specialties neurology, neurosurgery, or psychiatry. Compared to all other specialties, personality profiles of training and trained physicians in these three main clinical neuroscience disciplines (“NN&P”) significantly differed, with significantly higher scores in openness to experience. Within NN&P, there were significant differences in personality profiles, driven by lower neuroticism in neurosurgeons, higher conscientiousness in neurosurgeons and neurologists, and higher agreeableness in psychiatrists. Across levels of training, NN&P personality profiles did not differ significantly. Conclusion The distinct clinical neuroscience personality profile is characterized by higher levels of openness to experience compared to non-neuroscience specialties. Despite high variability within each discipline, moderate, but solid differences in the personality profiles of neurologists, neurosurgeons and psychiatrists exist. This article is part of the Topical Collection on Neurosurgery Training Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00701-020-04233-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Werner Surbeck surbeck.werner@gmail.com 1 Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric Hospital of the University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland 2 Research Unit INSIDE, University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg 3 Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center Freiburg, Albert-Ludwig University, Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany 4 Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Institute of Epidemiology, Mental Health Research Unit, Neuherberg, Germany 5 Neuroscience Center Zurich, University and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland 6 Department of Psychiatry, University Hospital of Liège, Liège, Belgium 7 Department of Neurosurgery, University Hospital of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland 8 Clinical Neuroscience Center, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland 9 Department of Neurosurgery, University Hospital of Liège, Liège, Belgium 10 Department of Neuroanatomy, Faculty of Medicine, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium Acta Neurochirurgica https://doi.org/10.1007/s00701-020-04233-9