Personality What is your personality?

What are the ideas about personality? Psychoanalytic Humanistic Trait Social cognitive The self

What is the Psychoanalytic perspective? Sigmund Freud ◦ The mind is like an iceberg ◦ Conscious  (Above the water) ◦ Unconscious  Largely unaware  (Below the water)  Thoughts  Feelings  Memories

What happened?

How do we evaluate the unconscious? Projective tests ◦ Ambiguous stimuli that people “project” information onto  E.g. describe or tell a story Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) ◦ Patient makes up a story based on ambiguous pictures

What do you see?

Rorschach Test 10 inkblots - people discuss what they see in the inkblots Designed to identify people’s inner unconscious feelings Not successful in predicting behavior or diagnosis

What is Freud’s personality theory? Id = Pleasure principle ◦ Sex & violence ◦ Hedonistic Ego = Reality principle ◦ Mediates between Id and Superego Superego = conscience ◦ Pride and guilt ◦ Right & wrong ◦ Ideal standards

What are ego defense mechanisms? Repression ◦ Underlies all other defense mechanisms ◦ Keeps repressed urges (e.g. incest) from becoming conscious Regression ◦ Retreating to an earlier, more infantile stage of development Reaction formation ◦ Doing the opposite of what you actually feel ◦ Inadequate feelings become bravado ◦ “I hate him” becomes ” I love him” ◦ Makes unacceptable impulses more acceptable

Ego defense mechanisms (Cont.) Projection ◦ Projecting your unacceptable impulses to others ◦ E.g. “He is lying like everyone else.” Rationalization ◦ Thinking up socially acceptable reasons for your negative behavior. ◦ E.g. “I only steal from rich people” Displacement ◦ Diverts sexual or aggressive energies toward a more acceptable target.  E.g. Mad child kicks the pet.

Do you remember? Where is the unconscious in the iceberg? If you feel guilty, what part of Freud’s personality theory is operating? What are two methods attempting to measure the unconscious? What are the ego defense mechanisms?

What is the Humanistic Perspective? The self concept – “Who am I” ◦ A basic focus of the Humanistic perspective Maslow’s Self-actualization ◦ People strive for self-actualization  To be the best you can be ◦ After other needs are met for physiological, safety, love, and self-esteem

What is the Humanistic Perspective? Carl Rogers - Person Centered Perspective ◦ Unconditional positive regard  If we feel accepted, we will be more open and expressive.

What is the Trait Perspective? Traits = Characteristic behaviors or disposition Myers-Briggs type indicator ◦ Describes personalities in complimentary terms ◦ Extroversion or introversion ◦ Thinking or feeling

Trait Perspective (cont.) MMPI = Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory ◦ Most widely used personality inventory ◦ Used to identify emotional disorders

MMPI = Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory

Do you remember? What is Maslow’s “Self-actualization”? What is Carl Rogers’ “unconditional positive regard”? What is one of the main tests used to determine your personality traits? What is the most widely used inventory used to identify personality disorders?

What is the Social Cognitive Perspective? How does learning & thinking & society influence each other? Reciprocal Determinism ◦ Albert Bandura ◦ Behavior, internal personal factors, and the environment all operate to determine each other.

Reciprocal Determinism

What is your locus of control? Internal locus of control ◦ “I personally control my destiny.” External locus of control ◦ “Outside forces which I can not control determine my destiny.”

What is Learned Helplessness? Repeatedly faced with traumatic events over which people have no control, people feel helpless, hopeless, and depressed.

Exploring your“self concept” Benefits of positive self esteem: More persistent at tasks Less likely to use drugs and conform to group pressure Happier Self serving bias We like to perceive ourselves favorably We contribute successes to our own effort and failure to factors beyond our control.

Do you remember? What is an example of Bandura’s reciprocal determinism? Do you tend to have an internal or external locus of control? What is an example of learned helplessness with humans? What is an example of self serving bias in the stock market?