Psych1001-Ch.12

Personality

the unique characteristics that account for enduring patterns of inner experience and outward behaviour

-An individuals characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling and behaving

-A collection of stable characteristics

-What makes you unique

Defining personality

so far we’ve looked at how psychologists study or theorize about many topics/process within individuals: thinking, memory, perception, intelligence, motivation, etc

-personality theories focus on the entire person, rather than just one aspect

-however, attempt to find general principles that can lead to a unique personality

Putting perspectives in perspective:

“Grand” Personality theories have been put forth

• attempt to present a cohesive framework for personality (structural elements, dynamics, development, etc)

• Largely speculative (interpretative)

• Great cultural acceptance at time (some ideas linger)

• Radically different perspectives

• Psychodynamic perspective: Sigmund Freud

• Humanistic perspective: Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers

Today, approach is more empirical and less speculative:

• Trait Perspective: Gordon Allport, Hans Eyzenck

• Situationist perspective

• Interactionist perspectives: Albert Bandura -More appreciation for situational influnces on expression of “personality” and how personality can determine situations

Psychoanalytic

• Freud

• Personality and behaviour is shaped by interacting unconscious (hidden internal) forces

• Emphasis on early experiences (childhood)

Psychodynamic

• Adler, Jung

• Called Neo-Freudians

• similar in some respects, differ in emphasis

Sigmund Freud

-Among most recognized names Psychology

-Cultural influence still felt

-University of Vienna (Austria) in 1873

-Medical Doctor (Psychiatry)

-Became interested in patients with conditions that defied neurological explanation: “glove anesthesia”-entire hand is numb (not arm)

-Began to think symptoms resulted from hidden (unconscious) forces of the mind

-Example: Unexplained blindness might result from unconscious desire to avoid seeing someone (who you despise)

Freuds view of the mind

• conscious

• preconscious

• unconscious

**Novel idea in psychology

conscious

the thoughts and feelings that we are aware of at any given moment

preconscious

holds memories or feelings that we aren’t consciously thinking about, but can be brought to consciousness

unconscious

holds memories or feelings that are so unpleasant or anxiety provoking that they are repressed

Freuds Forces of the mind:

• Id

• Super ego

• ego

Id

a hedonistic, self-satisfying element that operates entirely by the pleasure principle seeking immediate gratification for all it desires (sex, aggression, food, etc)

-mostly unconscious and provides energy that drives behaviour

Super Ego

Moral part of the mind. Only wants to do what is right. Learned conscience. Mostly unconscious

Ego

Executive (mediator) which tries to satisfy id and superego. Operates according to the Reality Principle. If it cannot strike a compromise, results in anxiety (manifested as pathology)

Psychosexual Stages and Personality

• Freud proposed that a Childs personality develops as they pass through several stages

• Named for the area of the body that id focuses on (called erogenous zones). e.g. oral, anal, etc

• Key conflicts associated with the body part/stage…e.g. weaning (independence) in oral stage, control in anal stage

• According to Freud, must resolve issues of each stage before moving on to the subsequent stage

fixation

Can get stuck at any stage (unresolved conflict or traumatic events), resulting in certain personalities e.g. overly dependent/needy “oral” personality

Oral stage

0-1

-forceful feeding, underfed, overfed

• oral passive: trusting, dependency

• oral aggressive: aggressive, dominating

Anal stage

1-3

-Toilet training, too harsh, too lax

• anal retentive: tidiness, obsessiveness, mean, stubborn

• anal expulsive: untidiness, generosity

Phallic stage

3-6

-Abnormal family set-up leading to unusual relationship with mother/father

• Vanity, self-obsession, sexual anxiety, inadequacy, inferiority, envy

Latency stage

6-puberty

-Libido dormant, sexual impulses repressed

• Focuses on academics, hobbies, friendships. Determines security, competency

Genital stage

puberty-adult

-Settling down in a loving one-to-one relationship with another

• Well adjusted, mature, able to love and be loved. Sexual instinct is directed to heterosexual pleasure

Anxiety and Defence Mechanisms

• Anxiety major theme of psychoanalysis. Anxiety constantly arising from internal conflicts between id and super ego (mostly)

• Anxiety is unbearable to the conscious mind

• Defence mechanisms-ex: repression, displacement, projection, rationalization, reaction formation, denial, regression

defence mechanisms

unconscious tactics used by ego to protect us from anxiety of knowing our unconscious desires

repression

keep unpleasant thoughts buried deeply in unconscious mind (most common defence)

Displacement

divert unacceptable impulses (desires) to a more acceptable target (e.g. angry at boss at work so lash out at spouse at home)

projection

attribute your undesirable qualities to others… If a person said: “He’s a stingy jerk.” Freud would say: “yes you must be”

rationalization

Contrives socially acceptable, self-justifying explanations to hide the true reasons for an action…’Its 5 O’clock somewhere.” Excuse to drink alcohol at 10:00am

reaction formation

Deny unacceptable impulses by emphasizing their opposite. Example: You are secretly a coward (shameful) so you act brave. You are really cheap, so you become excessively charitable

denial

Refuse to accept facts that would be unbearable. Don’t be ridiculous, I don’t have a drinking problem, period, end of conservation”

Regression

When faced with a threat, person retreats to an earlier (more comfortable) stage of development

-ex: throwing a tantrum when frustrated

Determinism

Freud believed nothing occurred by chance. All behaviour is caused by unconscious motives

Freudian slip

Even seemingly innocent mistakes in pronouncing words (slips of the tongue) reveal the unconscious

-"A Freudian slip is when you say one thing but secretly mean your mother”

“For seven and a half years I’ve worked alongside President Reagan. We’ve had some triumphs. Made some mistakes. We’ve had some sex…uh…setbacks”

-Former U.S. President George Herbert Walker Bush, 1988

free association

patient told to relax and say whatever came to mind. however trivial (or embarrassing)…Go On

-look for signs of ego defences (hesitations, etc)

Dream analysis

“Royal road to the unconscious”

Latent (hidden) versus manifest (obvious) content

If you dream about kicking a dog…

Therapist intercepts hidden meaning: The dog you kicked represents your mother whom you envied because she loved your father.

Evaluating Freud’s Theory

• Inadequate evidence

• small, limited sample-upper-class women from Vienna

• Lack of predictive validity

• conflict in a stage can lead to different outcomes…e.g. phallic can be either rigid or sexually promiscuous, depending on ego defences

• Cannot be tested by scientific methods

• unfalsifiable

• cannot observe unconscious mind directly

• No evidence for repression of traumatic memories

• Just opposite: traumatic events produce relentlessly intrusive memories (PTSD)

• Freud accused of disbelieving real memories of child abuse in women (denied of role of conscious mind)

• Also, today “less need to repress” (sexual behaviour viewed less as immoral), yet psychological disorders have not decreased (in fact are rising)

In Freud’s defense:

• first psychotherapy

• Led to interest in mind and health…some physical aliments many result from unidentified anxiety (“conversion” disorders)

• Some evidence for “ego defenses” (protect self-esteem?)

• Denial & projection

• First to suggest that adult relationships may be due to patterns of relationships with parents as children

Denial

Sometimes ignore information that is harmful to our self perception to maintain positive self-image

Projection

Tend to think others are like us

Neo-Freudians: All agreed:

1. Human behaviour is shaped by interacting, or dynamic, psychological forces (id, ego, superego)

2. Defense mechanisms

3. Believe that much of mental life is unconscious

4. Believe that childhood shapes personality

5. Believe that we struggle with inner conflicts

Most disagreed (downplayed) Freud’s fixation with sex

Karen Horney

Neo-Freudian

-emphasized early childhood experiences of isolation or helplessness which could lead to “basic” anxiety

Alfred Adler

Neo-Freudian

-thought feelings of mastery (control) were important (not only of bowels). Coined term “inferiority complex”-could be channeled into a drive for superiority

Carl Jung

Neo-Freudian

-Freud called Jung: “his adopted eldest son, his crown prince and successor”

-eventually Jung (publically) disagreed with Freud

-Why couldn’t unconscious contain positive stuff?

-developed concepts: “collective unconscious” ( a deeper unconscious universally assessable reservoir), “synchronicity” (meaningful coincidences), and “archetypes” (universal images and ideas common to all people)

-introduced the term persona: public mask (role you play): socially acceptable version of unconscious self

The humanistic perspective

Grew out discontentment with negative dark views of humanity put forth by Freud (and mechanistic approach of behaviourism)

-desire to study healthy normal individuals with healthy positive aspirations

-Maslow, Rogers

-personality arises from people striving to meet their needs

Maslow

Opposite of Freud

• Developed ideas by studying creative, healthy people, not troubled clinical ones

• Examples: Abraham Lincoln, Eleanor Roosevelt

• Common characteristics: strong sense of self and purpose in life, yet, open, caring, loving, accepting of others

• Fe, deep relationships (not many superficial)

• Moved by spiritual (peek experiences) in life

• In short, mature adult qualities

• Most likely to be self-actualized: Young likeable people who respected elders, were caring, and uneasy about cruelty of “the mob”

Carl Rogers

Believed people are basically good and naturally strive for self-actualization (unless thwarted by negative environment)

-emphasized self concept: How we view ourselves is critical. If we view ourselves in an accepting light, we act and see the world in an accepting way (promotes growth)

-if see ourselves in a negative way, we feel dissatisfied and unhappy

Client centered therapy

He thought many children form “conditions of worth”…believe they are loved only “conditionally” (if they meet parent’s expectations etc)

-he emphasized unconditional positive regard, an attitude of acceptance of others despite their failings

-people come to accept themselves and feel valued in a growth promoting environment: genuineness, acceptance and empathy (listening with a heart)

Evaluating the humanistic perspective

• influence felt in counseling, education, child-rearing, and management practices

• Set warm tone for patient (client) relationship

• Tendency for therapists to emphasize positive self-concept, employee empathy, to view people as basically good and capable of growth

• Contributed to the field of positive psychology

Evaluating the humanistic perspective criticisms

• concepts vague and subjective and lack scientific basis

• Naive: fails to appreciate the reality of our human capacity for evil

• May reinforce poor/maladaptive behaviour

Apple analogy

Many individual apples: All can be placed on a few dimensions: size, color, taste (sweetness/sourness)

-medium, red, sweet

-small, green, sour

-e.g. Granny-Smith

-another dimensions could be age

The Trait Perspective

less speculative, more empirical than “grand” theories

-personality, trait

-General dispositions that lead us to behave in predictable ways

-ex: Outgoing: Person is likely to have many friends, attend social gatherings, would not like to remain alone

personality

amounts to an individuals unique constellation of traits

trait

tendencies to behave in certain ways that remain relatively constant across situations

How many traits are possible?

According to Allport & Odbert (1936), about 4500 words in English language that describe characteristics of people

-eaxmples of traits: honest, dependable, moody, impulsive, punctual, outgoing, stable, humorous

Gordon Allport

First trait theorist.

-Met with Freud in 1919 (famous story of boy on train)

-Made Allport realized that “for all its merits, psychoanalysis may plunge too deep, and that psychologists would do well to give full recognition to manifest (conscious) motives before probing the unconsciousness”

-thought people are generally healthy and organized.

-believed persent more important than the past in defining ones personality

-first to suggest personality is a composite of individual traits

-maintained people have many specific traits (tendencies to respond in certain ways in certain situations). Ex: someone may be always on time for work (punctual)

-in a range of situations from home life to work

-Allport’s work was based on case studies (not empirical)

Big insight

certain traits seem to be tied together!

Ex: someone punctual is also likely to be organized, careful, meticulous, etc

Central traits

collections of related traits which predict behaviour across an even larger range of situations

Ex: someone with a central trait called “responsible” may be punctual, organized, careful, meticulous, etc…

Hans Eysenck and factor analysis

-strong advocate of statistical measures (empirical)

-devised tests to measure a large number of specific traits in large groups of people

-then used factor analysis to determine which specific traits seemed to cluster together

• he called each cluster a “super factor” (similar to “s” factors for intelligence)

• each super factor was viewed as a continuum (not discrete), and each person sits somewhere along each super factor dimension

• Important: there are no correlations between super factors… scoring high on one does not predict score on others

three super factors

Eysenck thought there was three super factors (dimensions) along which each person placed

• Extroversion/introversion

• Neuroticism/emotional stability

• Psychoticism(trusting)

extroversion/introversion

impulsive, sociable, assertive on the one extreme and shy, socially withdrawn, passive on the other

Neuroticism/emotional stability

extent to which person experiences negative emotions (temperamental, defensive, moody) on the on hand or is emotionally stable on the other (calm, even-tempered)

Psychoticism(trusting)

Extent to which someone is vulnerable to psychosis (lost of contact with reality, paranoid, delusional). Related to anti-social or non-conformist behaviour on one extreme, conforming on the other

The five factor model

• based on more recent empirical studies

• most trait theorists today subscribe to the five factor model which proposes five super factors (big five)

• Opens to experience/unimaginativeness

• Consciousness/irresponsibility

• Extraversion/introversion

• Agreeableness/disagreeableness

• Neuroticism/stability

Evaluating trait perspective: Strengths

• traits become increasingly stable especially across the adult years

• relatively stable across many situations

• certain traits have high predictive validity

• consciousness predicts success in work and longevity

• high agreeableness and low neuroticism predict success in interpersonal relationships

• there appears to be strong genetic contribution to personality traits

Evaluating trait perspective: Criticisms

• oversimplifies personality (reduce to a few dimensions)

• traits that are expressed can defined on the situation

• people may be punctual (conscientious) when it comes to school, but not with friends for an informal gathering

• portray personality as fixed rather than changeable

• certain traits change over lifespan (openness to experience is generally higher in teens than in persons in their 50s)… could reflect maturational (developmental) changes

person-situation controversy

The debate: what is the relative importance of personality traits (internal characteristics) and situations (external factors) in determining how we behave?

• trait theorists argue in favour of personality dominating

• others argue that the situations we are in determine our behaviour

• Ex: may be talkative with family (friends) but “introverted” in presence of boss (work) or strangers

• if personality is important, it should persist over time and situations

situationist position

Holds that characteristics of individuals are not important.

Ultimately all behaviour results from environmental factors

Interactionist perspective

-holds that both personality and situations are important in determining behaviour

-acknowledges the importance of situations, but suggest the situationist position is too extreme

• Not all people rect the same way in the same situations (many examples)

• Why not???

Bandura

(1986, 2001, 2005): personality is result of the interaction between person and social context

Reciprocal Determinism: 3 way interaction between: internal factors (thoughts and feelings), behaviour, and environmental factors (social situations)

Three ways individuals and environments interact:

1. Different people choose different environments

• traits may determine the music you listen to, TV you watch, friends you have, career path (job) you choose, etc

2. Our personality determines how we perceive and react to situations

• anxious people perceive world as dangerous and act defensively to an approaching stranger (for example)

3. Our personalities shape situations

• Our personality affects the responses of other. If we are compassionate, others may treat us kindly. If we are hostile, we may produce hostility in others

Projective tests

psychodynamic perspective

-tests involving interpretations of an ambiguous stimulus in order to access unconscious mind

Criticisms:

• subjective scoring

• low validity (and reliability) for both TAT and Rorsharch

• Rather than projecting, person may say what they think they should see

Thematic apperception test

asked to make up a story about an ambiguous scene (picture)

Rorschach (Inkblot) test

shown a series of 10 “inkblots” and asked to indicate what they look like to you

Personality inventories

Empirically derived

-paper-and-pencil questionnaires designed to assess various aspects of personality

Criticisms:

• accuracy of self-appraisal (see yourself in positive light)

• social desirability (lacks validity questions)

• misuse in employment/hiring decisions

Minnesota multiphase personality inventory 2 (MMPI-2)

• useful in assessing abnormal personality tendencies

• 576 questions (long test)

• several scales…questions shown to distinguish various clinical population (e.g. depression, schizophrenia)

• many questions for each scale (like intelligence tests)

• Note: includes validity items to account for response patterns that may compromise the test

• e.g. socially desirability responding

• e.g. I never get angry (if true, likely social desirability effect)

NEO personality inventory (NEO-PI-R)

• evaluates traits comprising the five superfactors

• 240 questions, self-rating (5 point scale)

• high consistency (.85-.9)

• derived from facial analysis (appears to be valid)

questionable tests

-Briggs Myers Typology test

-Magazine and online Personality tests

Nature0Nurture debate

big (long standing) question

-to what extent are the differences in personality due to variations in genetic make-up (nature) and to what extent are they due to variations in environmental factors (nurture)?

Minnesota Twin Studies

Identified and studied 59 pairs of identical twins separated at birth and raised in different families (compared to 47 fraternal twins raised in same families)

-Jim Lewis and Jim Springer among earliest studied

-Seperated at birth, re-united at age 39

Personality and the Brain

long history of interest in identifying brain areas or systems underlying personality traits

Phrenology (1800s)-Franz Joseph Gall

• Assumed personality traits are localized to specific regions of the brain

• Size of the Brian regions determined strength of trait

• Size of the brain could be inferred from bumps (protrusions) of the skull

• Personality could be assessed by examining skull bumps

Inaccurate! But his ideas about the localization of brain functions and the role of the brain in personality continue to influence neurological science

Brain regions currently implicated in personality

Amygdala

• reacts to threatening or stressful stimuli

• reactivity varies in people

• may explain introversion (avoid stressful social situations for example)

• may also contribute to neuroticism (emotional instability)

Reticular activating system

• brain-imaging procedures show that extraverts may seek stimulation because their brain arousal levels are relatively low

neurotransmitters

Dopamine

• associated with pleasure and overall levels of activity (motivation)…openness?

Serotonin

• low levels have been linked to impulsivity and aggression (neuroticism?)

Keep in mind (brain)

• likely complex bi-directional interactions between genetic differences in brain systems and environmental influence on those areas of the brain

• Recall Reciprocal Determinism. For example, temperamental differences early on may lead to different behavioural tendencies. These may alter the environmental experiences that then shape your personality

• Note: Temperaments (even if genetically determined) may be changed. Recall enrichment effects overcoming genetic differences in rat learning studies (Tryon)

Personality disorder

an inflexible pattern of inner experience and outward behaviour that causes distress or difficulty with daily functioning

-Four key features (symptoms):

• rigid, extreme and distorted thinking patterns (thoughts)

• problematic emotional response patterns (feelings)

• impulse control problems (behaviour)

• significant interpersonal problems (behaviour)

-prevalence: 9-13% population

-note: difficult to treat (personalities are enduring/hard to change)

Borderline personality disorder

severe instability of mood and self-concept, impulsive and self-destructive

e.g. may engage in impulsive, dangerous activities (e.g. self-mutilation, indiscriminate sexual behaviour, substance abuse)

Histrionic personality disorder

extreme attention seeking behaviour

Narcissistic personality disorder

self-absorbed and self-inflated

Antisocial personality disorder

A disturbing disorder in which the person exhibits a callous disregard for others. (deceive and exploit any and everyone). No remorse for wrongdoing, even toward friends and family

-Formerly called sociopaths or psychopaths

-May be aggressive and ruthless (serial killer) or a charming deceiver (con-artist), or both…

• Ted Bundy: Shortly before his execution, confessed to 30 homicides in seven states between 1974 and 1978

UNderstadnign antisocial personality disorder

PET scans of 41 murderers revealed reduced activity in the frontal lobes. In other study, repeat offenders had 11% less frontal lobe tissue

-Environmental influences:

• Genes didn’t change but rate of murders and violence rose in U.S. from 1960 to mid 1990s: twice as many murders, four times as many rapes and robberies, 5 times assault

• Desensitization effects of watching violence?

• Australia colonized by criminals (crime rates no higher than in Britain, from which they were expelled)