Personality psychology

Omnibus inventory

Tests that assess multiple traits and multiple sub-scales

One-trait test

Measures one trait (?)

Quality of data gathered

Psychometricss

How the study was conducted

Research design

Strength of a study’s findings

Effect size

The stability of a study’s results

Replication

Bad research

Harms participants, doesn’t disclose methods and findings, and is used for exploitation or repression

Open science

Principles that increase the goodness of study results

Psychometric questions that determine generalizability

are the data reliable and are the data valid?

Reliability

Gives close to the same result every time 1 same person takes it

Data most commonly collected by personality tests

S data

Funder’s first law

Each strength is a weakness in some way

Key forms of stability

Personality development, rank order consistency, mean level stability

Rank order consistency

Maintenance of an individual position within group

Mean level stability

Constancy of level in population

Personality change 2 defining qualities

Internal and enduring

Internal personality change

Changes are internal to a person, not changes in external surrounding

Enduring personality changes

Changes are enduring over time, not temporary

Temperament

Individual differences that emerge very early in life, are heritable

Temperament differences

Positive emotionality, negative emotionality, effortful control

Temperament factors

Smiling, activity level, laughter, fear, distress to limitations, soothability, and duration of orienting

Heterotypic continuity

Effects of fundamental tendencies change with age

Person-environment transactions

When people respond to, seek out, and create environments that are compatible with, and may magnify, their personality traits

Active person-environment transaction

Person seeks out compatible environments and avoids incompatible ones

Active person-environment transaction example

Aggressive person goes to bar with frequent fights. Introvert avoids social gatherings

Reactive person-environment transaction

Different people respond differently to the same situation

Evocative person-environment transaction

Aspects of an individual’s personality leads to behavior that changes the situations he or she experiences

Evocative person-environment transaction

Conscientious person tells group “it’s time to get to work;” disagreeable person starts arguments over minor matters

Reactive person-environment transaction example

Extrovert finds parties enjoyable, introvert finds parties unbearable

Cumulative continuity principle

Consistency of personality increases as we age. Environmental also becomes more stable as we age, like settling down. Stability increases not because we stop changing, but because changes become more directionally consistent. Psychological maturity

Psychological maturity

Self control, interpersonal sensitivity, emotional stability

Cross sectional study

Different groups compared at the same time

Longitudinal study

Same group compared over time

Cohort effect on studies

May contribute to age differences in cross-sectional studies

Cohort effect

Tendency for a research finding to be limited to one group, or cohort, of people. Such as all people living during a particular era or in a particular location

Cohort effect slide 10

Changes over time that are attributable to living in different time periods rather than “true” change.

Causes of personality development slide 11

Physical development and changes in strength, increases in intelligence and linguistic abilities, hormone level changes, changes in social roles and responsibilities

Author layer of self

Life narratives

Agent layer of self

Goals and values

Actor layer of self

Traits and roles

3 aspects of personality development

Actor, agent, and narrator

Actor

Learning new skills for new roles

Agent

Plan for the future and strive for outcomes

Author

Narrative you can tell

“Tell me your life story”

Narrative identity

Four potential methods of change

1. Psychotherapy and drug use. 2. General interventions. 3. Targeted interventions. 4. Behaviors and life experiences

Desire for change is typically and usually in the socially desirable direction

Usually from exploration to emotional well-being

Psychotherapy and psychiatric drugs

Can produce long-term behavior change

General interventions

Usually aimed at important outcomes

Targeted interventions

Address certain personality traits

Targeted interventions increasing self control

Relaxation, learning to think differently about temptations and frustrations, mindfulness meditation, set realistic goals that are compatible with personal values

Behaviors and life experiences

Could be positive like exercise, starting college or a job, beginning a relationship, or negative like trying drugs and onset of chronic disease

mental illness effects on personality

Tumors, Alzheimer’s, strokes, and various surgical procedures

MEG

Records magnetic fields produced by neuronal activity in the brain

PET

Small radio isotopes are injected into blood. These make glucose glow

Anterior cingulate gyrus

Emotions

percent of brain active

all, to some degree

1 problem with imaging technique

cant differentiate inhibitory and excitatory activity

MRI

Taking pictures of the brain in slices

fMRI

detecting blood flow

left and right brain

do have differences and are somewhat indicative of certain personality traits

higher right brain activity

correlation with negativity

higher left brain activity

correlated with higher positivity

hormones differ from neurotransmitters because

they are slower and free flowing in the blood

type A

competitive, hostile, impatient (associated with heart disease)

Somatic marker hypothesis

the idea that somatic experiences in the body are necessary for emotional understanding and decision making

Somatic

bodily markers

dopamine correlations

bipolar disorder, extraversion, and impulsivity

behavioral activation system BAS

Activates the behavioral activation system, controlled by dopamine

overactive BAS

impulsivity

Behavioral inhibition system BIS

Provides the orienting response to novel situations and also responds to things that are punishing

overactive BIS

anxiety

opennes to experience correlated with

overactive BAS

Capgras delusion

Damage to the anterior cingulate where we no longer “feel” close to our loved ones

Heritablity

Proportion of people in a group who have traits determined by their genes. Cannot be applied to a single individual

Nature or nurture

Always both

Adaptation

Inherited solutions to the hostile forces of nature

self esteem

need to establish relationships and belong

sociometer

the degree to which a person is accepted by others

bullying

when someone from higher social status singles out someone with a lower status and seeks to maintain their spot.

the need to belong

sharing food,

external threats to the group prmote

social bonding

emotional adaptation

they signal fitness affordance. They guide others t

machiavallian apes

humans

manipulation hypothesis

using emotions to exploit others

emotions evolved because

they are information

broaden and build hypothesis

happy moods increase receptiveness and openness to new opportunities

making better decisions during dreary weather

because it makes us feel worse and more realistic. sunny weather causes happy feelings and happy feelings are easier to take advantage of.

trait that determines higher status in hierarchy

Extraversion

eagly and wood

Traits are determined by society and not evolution

Freud studying hysteria

he became fascinated by people who were unable to move their arms because of issues with their mind, not with their physical brain or body

Freuds instincts

we have strong innate forces that provide all the energy to the “psychic system” which was his word for the mind

Frueds 3 part of the mind

Conscious, preconscious, unconscious

preconscious

something you have to think about but is actually in your mind

unconscious

where most of your personality lies

libido

freuds psychic energy. can go to id ego or superego

ego depletion

psychic energy can be depleted by efforts towards self control leaving less energy for subsequent situations. Theres not much leftover when its deplected, theres supposed to be a fixed about between id ego and superego

resevoir of libido

the Id

the science of Freuds theory

it was unscientific. he used case studies. he wrote about himself.

thanatos

frueds death instinct