Psychology of Personality: Chapter 13

What three components define emotions?

emotions are associated with distinct subjective feelings or affects, accompanied by bodily changes, and accompanied by distinct action tendencies

What are action tendencies?

increases in the probabilities of certain behaviors

Emotions are associated with…

distinct subjective feelings or affects

Emotions are accompanied by…

bodily changes, mostly in the nervous system

Emotions are accompanied by distinct…

action tendencies

Why are psychologists interested in emotions?

People differ in emotional reactions, event to the same event, so emotions are useful in making distinctions among individuals

What did Charles Darwin propose in his 1872 book, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals?

a functional analysis of emotions and emotional expressions.

What did Charles Darwin’s functional analysis focus on?

the “why” of emotions and expressions, in particular in terms of whether they increase the fitness of individuals.

What did Charles Darwin conclude about how emotion increase the fitness of individuals?

Emotional expressions rapidly communicate information from one animal or human about what is likely to happen?

What does “Emotional states are transitory” mean?

Emotions have a specific cause, and that cause typically originates outside of the person (something happens in the environment)

What is the definition of an emotional trait?

A pattern of emotional reactions that a person consistently experiences across a variety of life situations

What two ways do emotion researchers think about emotions?

Categorical approach to emotion and dimensional approach to emotion

Researchers who think primary emotions are the key to answering the question “What is the best way to think about emotions?” use the ____ approach

categorical approach

Emotional researchers who take the categorical approach have attempted to…

reduce the complexity of emotions by searching for the primary emotions that underlie the great variety of emotional terms.

What is the lack of consensus in the categorical approach attibutable to?

Different criteria used for defining an emotion as primary.

What does the categorical approach focus on?

Identifying a small number of primary and distinct emotions

What did Ekman (1992a) require in a primary emotion?

Primary emotions must have a distinct facial expression that is recognized across cultures. Ex: smiling being universally associated with happiness

What emotions are included in Ekman’s list of primary emotions?

disgust, joy, sadness, suprise, anger, and fear

What does Izard (1977) suggest about primary emotions?

Emotions are understood to guide behaviors by motivating a person to take specific adaptive actions.

What approach to emotional is based on empirical research rather than theoretical critieria?

dimensional approach

How do researchers gather data in the dimensional approach to emotion?

They have People rate themselves on a variety of emotions, and the researcher applies statistical techniques to identify dimensions underlying the ratings.

What is the consensus among researchers on the basic dimensions that underlie self-ratings of affect?

people categorize emotions using just two primary dimensions: how pleasant or unpleasant emotion is and how high or low on arousal the emotion is. This is referred to as the model of emotion

What is seen as the fundamental dimensions of emotion?

the two dimensions of pleasantness and arousal

What defines a common dimension?

Emotions that occur together, which are experienced as similar to each other

Content

a specific kind of emotion that a person experiences.

Style

how an emotion is experienced.

Example of content

saying someone is cheerful is saying omething about the content of that person’s emotional life

Example of style

saying that someone is high on mood variability is to say something about the style of that person’s emotional life, that his or her emotions change frequently

Content and style have…

trait like properties (stable over time and situations and meaningful for making distinctions among people)

Content of emotional life

the typical emotions a person is likely to experience over time

Example of content of emotional life

someone who is characterized as angry or hot-tempered should have an emotional life that contains frequent bouts of anger, irritability, and hostiility

How did Aristotle define happiness?

Happiness was the supreme good, and the goal of life was to attain happiness, which is done by living a virtuous life and being a morally good person.

Eudaimonia

The creation of a life of meaning and purpose, as the route to happiness.

What did Jean-Jacques Rousseau speculate about happiness?

The road to happiness lies in the satisfaction of one’s desires and the hedonistic pursuit of pleasure.

What did William James teach about happiness?

Happiness was the ratio of one’s accomplishment to one’s aspiration, and could be achieved by accomplishing more in life or lowering one’s aspirations.

Why do researchers have to rely on self-reports to measure happiness?

Happiness is a subjective quality, depending on an individual’s own judgment of his or her life.

Two definitions of happiness in two complementary ways

satisfaction component and hedonic component

Satisfaction component

Judgment that one's life has purpose and meaning, known
as the life

Hedonic component

Predominance or ratio of positive emotions to negative emotions

Self–report and non–self–report measures of happiness
correlate with…

self–report scores on social desirability.

Part of being happy is to have…

positive illusions about the self

Positive illusions

an inflated view of one's own characteristics as a good,
able, and desirable person.

Happiness leads to, or at least comes before…

positive outcomes in many areas of life, including fulfilling and productive work, satisfying relationships, and superior
mental and physical health and longevity.

The situation with some outcomes of happiness might be
more complex and involve…

reciprocal causality

Reciprocal casuality

the idea that causality can flow in both directions.

What two studies are most useful in assessing causal direction?

longitudinal and experimental

How are people measured in longitudinal studies?

People are measured on at least two occasions separate in time

Explanation of longitudinal experiment

If happiness precedes success in life, then we have some evidence that the causal direction might go from happiness to the outcome.

How are people measured in experimental studies?

Happiness is manipulated (people are put in a good mood) for half the sample (the other half is the control group), and some outcome is measured.

Explanation of experimental studies

If the outcome is higher in the group undergoing happiness induction than in the control group, then we have some evidence that causal direction might go from happiness ot the outcome.

What did Lyubomirsky and colleagues (2005) find in longitudinal studies?

Longitudinal studies provided evidence that happiness leads to, or at least comes before, positive outcomes in many areas of life, including fulfilling and productive work, satisfying relationships, and better mental and physical health and longevity

What did Lyubomirsky and colleagues (2005) find in experimental studies?

Experimental studies provide evidence that happiness can lead to several positive outcomes, including being more helpful and altruistic, wanting to be with others, an increase in self-esteem and liking of others, a better functioning immune system, and more effective conflict resolution.

What do we know about happy people in regard to sex and age?

There are no sex or age differences in overall happiness, global well-being, and life satisfaction across cultures and countries.

What do we know about happy people in regard to ethnicity?

Ethnic group membership is unrelated to subjective well-being

What do we know about happy people in regard to national differences?

People in poorer countries are less happy and differences in the economic development of nations may be a key source of differences in the subjective well–being of countries

What do we know about happy people in regard to a country’s standard of living?

Wealthier countries have higher levels of life satisfaction than poorer countries, but national wealth is confounded with many variables that influence well–being, such as health care services and education

How do researchers address problems associated with national wealth?

By looking at the relationship between income and happiness within countries.

In very poor countries, economic status predicts happiness, however…

once people can afford necessities, increasing financial status isn’t related to well–being.

How can poverty be associated with many problems, yet income is unrelated to happiness?

The notion of a threshold of income, below which a person is unlikely to be happy; once a person is above this threshold, more income doesn’t produce more happiness

The absence of health and wealth bring misery but…

The presence of health and wealth does not guarantee
happiness will follow.

Easterlin paradox

At any point in time, happiness varies with income across nations, but over time within a country, happiness does not trend upward with increases in income

What did Paul Costa and Robert McCrae conclude about demographic variables in regard to personality and wellbeing?

Demographic variables, such as gender, age, ethnicity, and income, accounted for only 10-15% of the variation in happiness

What did Paul Costa and Robert McCrae propose about personality and well-being?

personality traits might have something to do with disposing certain people to be happy

What two personality traits out the Big Five influence happiness?

extraversion (postitvely) and neuroticism (negatively)

Indirect model of the relationship between personality and well-being

Personality causes a person to create a certain lifestyle,
and the lifestyle causes an emotional reaction

Direct model of the relationship between personality and well-being

Personality causes emotional reactions

What did reseach by Larsen et al. to asses the direct model propose about extraversion?

The beest predictor of responsiveness to positive mood
induction is extraversion.

What did reseach by Larsen et al. to asses the direct model propose about neuroticism?

The best predictor of responsiveness to negative mood
induction is neuroticism

Based on research by Larsen et al. to assess the direct model, it is easy to…

put an extravert into a good mood and a high–neuroticism person into a bad mood

Research by Larsen et al. to assess the direct model suggests…

personality has a direct effect on emotions.

People high on neuroticism are…

moody, touchy, irritable, anxious, unstable, pessimistic, and complaining.

Eysenck’s biological theory

Neuroticism is due to the tendency of the limbic system in the brain to become easily activated.

What is the Limbic system responsible for?

emotion and the fight-or-flight reaction

What did Eysenck’s argue in favor of a biological basis for neuroticism

Neuroticism is highly stable over time, a major dimension of personality, and neuroticism shows high levels of heritability.

What did Esenck suggest about individuals high on the neuroticism dimension?

They tend to overreact to unpleasant events, such as frustrations or problems, and that they take longer to return to a normal state after being upset.

Cognitive theory about neuroticism

caused by styles of information processing such as attending, thinking, and remembering

High neurotic people recalled more…

negative information about themselves, but not others

People high in neuroticism have richer networks of association surrounding….

memories of negative emotion and unpleasant material is more accessible to these individuals

Individuals high in neuroticism are more likely to recall instances of illnesses and bodily complaints because…

The chronic stress associated with neuroticism can lead to depletion of the immune system

Matthew’s attentional theory states that…

high–neuroticism people pay more attention to threats and unpleasant information in their environment

Diathesis-stress model suggests that…

there is a preexisting vulnerability, or diathesis, that is present among people who late become depressed and that a stressful life evnt can trigger depression among those with diathesis.

Aaron Becks cognitive theory of depression

Certain cognitive style as a preexisting condition can make
people vulnerable to depression, and this vulnerability lies in a particular cognitive schema

Cognitive schema

a way of processing incoming information, organizing and interpreting the events of daily life

According to Beck, cognitive schema

distorts the incoming information in a negative way that makes a person vulnerable to depression

According to Beck, the depressive cognitive shcema influences…

the cognitive triad

Cognitive triad

Information about the self, world, and future

Overgeneralizng distortion

taking one instance and generalizing to many or all other instances.

Example of overgeneralizing distortion

After doing poorly on an exam, one may think “I am a total failure”

What are Beck’s other cognitive distortions?

arbitrary inferences, personalizing, and catastrophizing

Arbitrary inferences

jumping to a negative conclusion, even when the evidence does not support it

Personalizing

assuming that everything is your fault

Catastrophizing

thinking that the worst will always happen

According to Beck’s influential theory, what is depression the result of?

Depression is the result of applying cognitive distortions to the information from daily life.

According to the neurotransmitter theory of depression, depressed person may feel slowed down because…

this emotional problem may be the result of neurotransmitter imbalance at the synapses of the nervous system.

What neurotransmitters are most involved in depression?

norepinephrine, serotonin, and to a lesser degree, dopamine

What position did personality psychologists begin with in regard to hostility?

Some people are characteristically more hostile than others
in response to the same kinds of situations, such as frustration.

hostility

Tendency to respond to everyday frustrations with
anger and aggression, and become easily irritated, and to act in a rude, critical, antagonistic, and uncooperative manner in everyday interactions

Affect intensity

a description of persons who are either high or low on this dimension

How does Larsen (2009) describe high affect intensity individual?

High affect intensity people experience emotions strongly
and are emotionally reactive and variable.

How does Larsen (2009) describe low affect intensity individual?

Low affect intensity people experience emotions only
mildly and with only gradual fluctuations and minor
reactions.