Personality

Defining Some Terms Personality = Psychologists define personality as the reasonably stable patterns of emotions, thoughts, and behavior that distinguish one person from another. Temperament = Hereditary aspects of personality, including sensitivity, moods, irritability, and adaptability Personality Trait = Stable qualities that a person shows in most situations Personality Type = People who have several traits in common

Are we good or bad?

Some more theories… Freud = Psychodynamic theory relates personality to the interplay of conflicting forces within the individual (id, ego, superego). Neo-Freudians = Were psychologists who adopted some parts of Freud’s theory and modified other parts, such as Carl Jung (collective unconscious) and Alfred Adler (inferiority complex). Learning approach = Often the experiences from which we learn are those of other people in our environment. Humanistic Psychology = Personality depends on what people believe and how they perceive and understand the world, such as Maslow (self-actualization).

Is your personality stable? Stable across time? Look at your own personality. Are you a different person today than 5 years ago? If so, how? Do you think you will be a different person 5 year from now? If so, how?

Is your personality stable? Stable across time? The origins of personality –Age – in general, the older a person is, the more consistent his or her personality is over time. –Age – the increased consistency as people age can be observed cross-culturally. –Historical era – researchers have found that anxiety levels appear to be increasing over the past few generations.

Is your personality stable? Stable across different situations? Person Variables and Situational Variables in Social–Cognitive Theory According to social–cognitive theory, person variables and situational variables interact to influence behavior.

Is your personality stable? Stable because of heredity?

How do we measure Personality? How do we measure if different across time? How do we measure if different across situations?

How do we measure Personality? Self-report? –Do people know their own personality? Other-report? –Correlate with how others see you? Do we ever know people? –How are you at reading people?

Personality Assessment Standardized personality tests –“Standardized” means created by having very large representative sample of people take the test and find average answer. –Types: Objective Projective Implicit

Personality Assessment Standardized personality tests –Objective personality tests: The most widely used of these tests is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) (a series of 567 true-false questions) Measures personality & clinical conditions

Personality Assessment Standardized personality tests –Projective techniques Rorschach Technique: Developed by Swiss psychologist Hermann Rorschach; contains 10 standardized inkblots (the “inkblot” test) Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): consisting of 20 drawings of various situations; people must make up stories about the people in it

Personality Assessment Standardized personality tests –Implicit personality tests: Try to measure aspects of personality that may be beyond a person’s awareness. Emotional Troop Test Implicit Association Test –This test measures whether the subject responds faster to the categories that combine a particular topic with pleasant or unpleasant words. –One advantage of this technique is that it is hard for people to “fake good” or malinger while doing this procedure.

Personality Traits Personality traits and states –A trait is a consistent, long-lasting tendency in behavior, such as sociability, shyness or assertiveness. –A state is a temporary activation of particular behavior. The search for broad personality traits –The idea that people have consistent personality characteristics that can be measured and studies is called the trait approach to personality. –Psychologists have studied many familiar personality traits.

Personality Traits The Big Five personality traits –Neuroticism the tendency to experience unpleasant emotions very easily. –Extraversion the tendency to seek stimulation and enjoy the company of other people. –Agreeableness the tendency to be compassionate rather than antagonistic towards others. –Conscientiousness the tendency to show self-discipline, to be reliable, and to strive for competence and achievement. –Openness to new experience the tendency to enjoy new experiences and new ideas.

According to the five-factor model, basic differences in personality can be “boiled down” to the dimensions shown here. The five-factor model answers these essential questions about a person: Is she or he extroverted or introverted? Agreeable or difficult? Conscientious or irresponsible? Emotionally stable or unstable? Smart or unintelligent? These questions cover a large measure of what we might want to know about someone’s personality.

Twin studies of personality

Personality Traits The search for broad personality traits –Criticisms of the Big Five description: It was based on a study of the English language, not on observations of human behavior. There are too few traits included. There are too many traits included. It has limited applicability cross-culturally. Do you agree with the “Big Five”? Does it describe you?

Personality Traits There are more than 5: –The 16 source traits The profiles shown here are group averages for airline pilots, creative artists, and writers. Notice the similarity between artists and writers and the difference between these two groups and pilots. There are less than 5: –Neuroticism, Extraversion, Agreeableness