Personality Psychology Psych 105 PDF

PERSONALITY PSYCH 105: Individual and Social Behavior Michael Sharp, Ph.D.  WHAT IS PERSONALITY? ▪Personality as: ▪ Consistent ▪ Internal ▪ Informative ▪ Cohesive ▪Individual differences  WHAT IS PERSONALITY? ▪ Personality psychology prioritizes the individual and individual differences vs....

PERSONALITY PSYCH 105: Individual and Social Behavior Michael Sharp, Ph.D.  WHAT IS PERSONALITY? ▪Personality as: ▪ Consistent ▪ Internal ▪ Informative ▪ Cohesive ▪Individual differences  WHAT IS PERSONALITY? ▪ Personality psychology prioritizes the individual and individual differences vs. more universal generalizations ▪ Defines, categorizes, assessing relationships, and provides causes ▪ “Where all psychology comes and meets” ▪ Trait ▪ Biological ▪ Psychodynamic ▪ Humanistic-existential ▪ Social-cognitive MEASURING PERSONALITY  PROJECTIVE TESTS ▪Rooted in psychoanalytic theory ▪ Projection theory ▪ Rorschach Inkblot Test and Thematic Apperception Test ▪Used mostly in therapy ▪Reliability and validity for personality assessment is mixed, largely weak if existing  THE TRAIT APPROACH ▪ Traits as a way to describe people ▪ There are thousands of ways to describe people, is there a more manageable way? ▪ Essential trait approach ▪ Lexical criterion hypothesis ▪ Use of factor analysis ▪ The Big Five is the dominant model  THE BIG FIVE Openness Conscientiousness Extraversion Agreeableness Neuroticism Ideas (curious) Competence (efficient) Gregariousness (sociable) Trust (forgiving) Anxiety (tense) Straightforwardness (not Angry hostility Fantasy (imaginative) Order (organized) Assertiveness (forceful) demanding) (irritable) Depression (not Aesthetics (artistic) Dutifulness (not careless) Activity (energetic) Altruism (warm) contented) Achievement striving Excitement-seeking Self-consciousness Feelings (excitable) (thorough) (adventurous) Compliance (not stubborn) (shy) Positive emotions/cheerfulness Impulsiveness Values (unconventional) Self-discipline (not lazy) (enthusiastic) Modesty (not a show-off) (moody) Deliberation (not Tender-mindedness Vulnerability (not impulsive) Warmth (outgoing) (sympathetic) self-confident)  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ The dynamic interplay of inner forces as a causal factor for behavior ▪ Developed by Sigmund Freud ▪ Psychic energy: Generated by instinctual drives, this energy powers the mind and constantly presses for either direct or indirect release ▪ Psychic determinism ▪ Freud divided mental states into three differing levels: ▪ Conscious, preconscious, and unconscious ▪ Freud divided personality into three differing structures: ▪ Id, superego, and ego THE FREUDIAN ICEBERG  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Id: The primitive and unconscious part of the personality that contains the instincts ▪ Pleasure principle: The drive for instant need gratification that is characteristic of the id  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Ego: The “executive” of the personality that is partly conscious and that mediates among the impulses of the id, the prohibitions of the superego, and the dictates of reality ▪ Reality principle: The ego’s tendency to take reality into account and to act in a rational fashion in satisfying its needs  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Superego: The moral arm of the personality that internalizes the standards and values of society and serves as the person’s conscience  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Tension from the id vs. ego/superego result in anxiety ▪ We don’t always address this anxiety in the most appropriate manner ▪ The use of defense mechanisms are displays of many ostensibly irrational human behaviors  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Repression: An active defensive process through which anxiety-arousing impulses or memories are pushed into the unconscious mind. ▪ Denial: A person refuses to acknowledge anxiety-arousing aspects of the environment. The denial may involve either the emotions connected with the event or the event itself. ▪ Intellectualization: The emotion connected with an upsetting event is repressed, and the situation is dealt with as an intellectually interesting event. ▪ Rationalization: A person constructs a false but plausible explanation or excuse for an anxiety-arousing behaviour or event that has already occurred.  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Projection: An unacceptable impulse is repressed, and then attributed to (projected onto) other people. ▪ Reaction formation: An anxiety-arousing impulse is repressed, and its psychic energy finds release in an exaggerated expression of the opposite behaviour. ▪ Displacement: An unacceptable or dangerous impulse is repressed, and then directed at a safer substitute target. ▪ Sublimation: A repressed impulse is released in the form of a socially acceptable or even admired behaviour.  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH Stage Description The stage in which experience centres on the pleasures and frustrations associated Oral with the mouth, sucking, and being fed The stage in which experience is dominated by the pleasures and frustrations Anal associated with the anus, retention and expulsion of feces and urine, and toilet training The stage in which experience is dominated by the pleasure, conflict, and frustration Phallic associated with the phallic–genital region, as well as coping with powerful incestuous feelings of love, hate, jealousy, and conflict The stage in which the primary focus is on the further development of intellectual, Latency creative, interpersonal, and athletic skills The time for the coming together of the mature adult personality with a capacity to Genital love, work, and relate to others in a mutually satisfying and reciprocal manner  THE PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH ▪ Freud opposed experiments, preferred case studies and clinical observations ▪ Empirically studying psychodynamic theories is difficult ▪ Operationalizing psychodynamic concepts ▪ Falsifiability ▪ Support for the role of unconscious processes on behavior ▪ However, these generally differ from Freud’s framework  THE HUMANISTIC-EXISTENTIAL APPROACH ▪ Humanistic psychologists focuses more on the positives of human experience ▪ Existential psychologists focus on concepts such as mortality and responsibility of freedom ▪ Our tendency towards self-actualization as a primary factor of our personalities ▪ May help determine our goals/dreams ▪ Ease difficulties of pursuing our goals shape our personalities ▪ Obstacles may lead to maladaptive personality characteristics ▪ Our actions may not coincide with our potentials, desires, etc.  FLOW ▪ Have you ever “been in the zone” or totally absorbed in what you are doing? ▪ Flow as the realization of our potential and personality development ▪ Require optimal difficulty ▪ Relationships with openness and neuroticism  THE HUMANISTIC-EXISTENTIAL APPROACH ▪ The existential approach sees personality as, at least partially, a defense against angst and death anxiety ▪ Terror management argues that people “deny death” via cultural worldviews and self-esteem ▪ Terror management theory argues that we have a drive towards survival but an awareness of death ▪ Personality as a “character shield” ▪ Neuroticism could be understood as a poor ability to cope with death anxiety  THE HUMANISTIC-EXISTENTIAL APPROACH ▪ Rogers: Behavioris a reaction to immediate conscious experience of self and environment ▪ The forces that direct our behavior are directed toward self-actualization ▪ We have a need for self-consistency and congruence ▪ Self-consistency ▪ Congruence ▪ Lack of self-consistency or congruence is threatening ▪ Well-adjusted individuals modify self-concept so experiences are congruent with the self, others deny/distort experiences ▪ To be fully functioning persons  THE HUMANISTIC-EXISTENTIAL ▪ APPROACH Rogers: We have a need for positive regard ▪ Essential for healthy development ▪ Unconditional vs. conditional positive regard ▪ We also have a need for positive self-regard ▪ A lack of unconditional positive regard may lead one to develop conditions of worth, which determine our (dis)approval of ourselves ▪ Conditions of worth: Internalized standards of self-worth fostered by conditional positive regard from others ▪ The tyranny of conditions of worth  THE SOCIAL-COGNITIVE APPROACH ▪Builds on the behaviorist perspective ▪ Reincorporates inner mental states ▪Considers the interaction of personality and situational/environmental factors in behavior ▪Considers how people construct situations ▪Considers goals and expectancies  PERSON-SITUATION DEBATE ▪ Walter Mischel questioned the efficacy of personality in predicting behavior ▪.3 correlation between traits and behaviors ▪ However, several issues with Mischel’s investigation ▪ Single traits may not be as predictive ▪ Relative vs. Absolute consistency and situations ▪ Situational factors similarly predictive ▪ Certain situations may be more powerful than others ▪ Self-monitoring as a personality trait ▪ Overall, we should consider interactionism  KELLY AND PERSONAL CONSTRUCTS ▪For Kelly, to understand someone’s personality, you must know their personal constructs ▪ Our primary goal is to make sense of the world and find personal meaning in it ▪ We do not perceive or understand things the same as other people ▪Assessing personal constructs  EXPECTANCIES AND JULIAN ROTTER ▪People have individualized goals, which often take into consideration one’s situation and roles ▪Outcome expectancies help translate goals in behavior ▪Internal vs. External locus of control  BANDURA AND SOCIAL LEARNING ▪ Bandura observed much of what we learn, we do so socially ▪ Bobo doll ▪ Bandura argued that humans are active agents in their own lives ▪ Self-efficacy predicts goal achievement  BANDURA AND SOCIAL LEARNING ▪Effective goal setting: ▪ Specific, behavioral, and measurable goals ▪ Performance (vs outcome) based goals ▪ Difficult but realistic goals ▪ Positive, not negative goals ▪ Short- and long-term goals ▪ Definite time spans for achievement  THE SELF ▪ How we understand our self can both cause and be a cause of aspects of our personality ▪ The self-concept as the cognitive understanding of ourselves ▪ Self-schemas help us understand ourselves and the world around us ▪ Self-relevance increases memory ▪ Informed by the perceptions of the “generalized other” ▪ Evidence contrary to our self-concept can be threatening ▪ Self-verification and the need to confirm the self-concept  THE SELF ▪We often act in ways to preserve our self- esteem ▪ Self-esteem as the affective aspect of self perception ▪Self-esteem also influences our behavior ▪Those with high self-esteem generally have more positive outcomes ▪ The problem with narcissism  THE SELF ▪Self-esteem as a vital need? ▪Sociometer theory ▪Terror management theory ▪The need for self-enhancement ▪Self-serving bias ▪ Depression ▪Self-handicapping