psy 214 individual differences- the big five personality dimensions

what is personality?

Allport - personality is a psychological construct used to determine the way in which we act and interact with others. This makes us unique. It refers to characteristic’s patterns of thought, feelings and behaviours.

what are the main theories of personality and example

these are type vs trait theories

A trait theory is a personality trait refers to psychological classification of different levels or degrees that people display with specific and individual traits

for example: introversion and extraversion are part of a continuous dimension, with many people in the middle

A type theory of personality type refers to the psychological classification of different types of people

For example:there are two types of people, introverts and extroverts.

trait theory assumptions

Personality characteristics are relatively stable over time; and stable across situations e.g. Extravert? Extravert behaviour in a variety of situations

Measures of individual traits may differ in different contexts

background of development of traits/ why did the 5 five emerge

the lexical hypothesis (Galton)was the start of the development of the trait theory and looked at the association between personality and language. as w encode personality into everyday language, Important individual differences become encoded as single terms. therefore, the number of words that refer to each trait = dependence on the importance of the trait

By studying a language, we can develop a taxonomy of personality traits. the Taxonomy of traits can used to develop patterns of behaviour

example:• Gordon Allport

• Found nearly 18,000 words referring to personality traits, e.g., trustworthy, shy, arrogant.-develop understanding of personality. He reduced to around 4,500 words

factor analysis-this took the lexical approach and condensed the list of words relating to traits into 171 terms through facto analysis. This is sorting a large data set into a working set of factors through mathematical propositions

Raymond Cattel went on to recognise a difference between surface traits and source traits, using factor analysis he identifies 16 major source traits and developed a measure of personality: 16 PF personality factors questionnaire.

^applied in workplace psychology and recruitment.

Eysenck-personality is partially heritable when everyone else was saying it was all down to the environment. Applied principles of FA-recognised super traits. He argued number of different traits alluded to the same thing=super trait

these were:

Psychoticism

Extroversion

Neuroticism

what are psychopathic traits?

these are genetic and environmental contributions to variance in the personality trait dimension of psychopathy (Lilienfeld, S. O., & Andrews, B. P., 1996)

for example Jacobwitz 2006 identified a dark triad of personality; Machiavellianism, Narcissism and Psychopathy. this showed face emotion regulation difficulties due to failed impulse control

44 thieves’ study -affectionless psychopathy

What is the big five model for personality?

this is the proposal that three super traits are not enough,16 is too many.

hypothesis that five factors represent the basic structure of personality

• The best way to construe personality is in terms of five major traits: the Big Five (costa and Mcrae,1992)

what are the big five ?

Openness to experience- open to fantasies, aesthetics, feelings, as well as novel actions, ideas, and values

^willingness to try new things

Conscientiousness-competent, methodical--preferring order and structure, dutiful, motivated to achieve goals, disciplined, and deliberate or considered

^self-discipline and self-control

Extraversion-gregarious, assertive, warm, positive, and active, as well as seek excitement.

^how well social relationship are, how we interact with others

Agreeableness-trust in other individuals, straightforward and honest communication, altruistic and cooperative behaviour, compliance rather than defiance, modesty and humility, as well as tender, sympathetic attitudes

^trait that’s characterised by how people related to each other, social interactions

Neuroticism- - anxiety, depression, and hostility as well as feel self conscious, act impulsively, and experience a sense of vulnerability, unable to accommodate aversive events.

^individuals levels of emotional stability and levels of adjustment

example of personality of low and high scores of the big five factor model

Extroversion- Low= loner, quiet High=talkative, affectionate

Neuroticism- Low=Calm, even-tempered High=temperamental, emotional

Conscientiousness- Low=lazy, late High=hard-working, organised

Agreeableness- Low=irritable, critical High=Trusting, good natured

OTE- Low=uncreative, conventional High=Creative, curious

personality types on behaviour

Kammrath et al 2015- explored the association between personality and assertiveness. In general, people assume that introverted and agreeable people are not assertive. They have lower assertiveness ability

Assertive behaviour=positively associated with trait extraversion and negatively associated with trait agreeableness

The effect of placebos on pain depends on personality (Pecina et al., 2012). Specifically, agreeableness has been shown to increase the magnitude of placebo effects. Perhaps, agreeable people may be more open to advice or information and may be less defensive

is the big five factor model theoretical

No it is a derived data hypothesis

how has the big five been used to explain social correlates/the study of social inequality.

A correlation checks to see if two sets of numbers are related; in other words, are the two sets of numbers corresponding in some way

Openness to experience -social correlate

Colbert et al (2013) leadership qualities include specific personality traits such as openness to new experiences. This trait was important to leadership qualities

Looked at the effect of emergence and the effect of openness and found 4 of the five factors were related to the effectiveness of leadership. N not related

Barry and Hansen (1996) found that OTE is associated with more disclosure in social interaction (engagement). they also found that positive and negative effect and found trait positive effect was associated with the evaluation of the quality of interaction and positive effect was related to openness to experience in particular

Conscientiousness -social correlate

McCrae and Costa 1988- adults in high C experience affection from parents during childhood which has an impact on future relationships

Attachments made in infancy inform personality etc ad effect later relationships/future relationships

Bogg and Roberts -  greater integration of conscientiousness into public health, epidemiological, and medical research, with the ultimate aim of understanding how facilitating more optimal trait standing might foster better health. Those who are highly conscientious might recover better to treatments due to optimal trait from treatment adherence and recovery

Extroversion-social correlate

Lucas 2016- found that extroversion was associated with pleasant affect and sociability, this was shown in the reward sensitivity theory. He found that there was greater social activity with positive effect of extraversion, personality and emotion

Eisenkraft and Eifenbein (2010) - members of 48 work groups, each of which comprised four or five individuals, completed a measure of the five-factor model.

It was found that Participants who reported elevated levels of extraversion--or low levels of agreeableness-- were more like to elicit negative emotions in their colleagues

Agreeableness-social correlate

Witt et al (2002) Agreeableness associated with improved job performance through improved cooperation and social affiliation. Found there were both interactive effects of agreeableness and conscientiousness In terms of job performance

Liu et al (2018) Anger promotes negative interpersonal relationships moderated by agreeableness. When people feel angry , it has an impact on interpersonal relationships due to heightened levels of anger leading to those individuals engaging in destructive relationship behaviours

BUT personality traits of individuals experiencing anger also important

Neuroticism -social correlate

Neuroticism: Those who are neurotic are also affected in terms of health

Though stressful life events, especially personal and interpersonal problems, neuroticism showed strong association with depressive severity, independently from current depressive state (Mandelli et al, 2014)

Denissen & Penke (2008) Neurotic individuals react with heightened sensitivity to threatening social cues. Could have health implications in terms of response to stress

effectiveness of the big five an an approach to explaining and measuring personality

advantages of Big Five x4

1.One major point in favour of the Big Five is that various researchers working independently have come up with a five-factor structure for personality

for example Costa and McCrae: The same factor structure is found across different languages, racial groups, and ages.-good concordance rate

Some evidence supports the cross-cultural replicability of the Big Five (e.g., Egger et al., 2003)

Arrival of the NEO Personality Inventory and the revised NEO-PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992; McCrae & Costa, 2004) has greatly bolstered FFM studies

Big Five factors are robust (Goldberg, 1993)- personality structure

2.The Big Five have Predictive Validity

They predict a wide range of real-world behaviour and outcomes in school, work, marriage, parenting, crime, economics, and politics.

for example:

Conscientiousness predicts how faithful you are to your husband or wife (high = more faithful).

Openness to experience predicts likelihood of changing your job (high = more likely).

Extraversion predicts eye contact and lifetime number of sexual partner (high = more, on average).

3.Costa & McCrae - The Big Five traits are quite stable across the lifespan. They change a bit, but by around thirty years of age, people’s personalities are relatively resistant to change

4.The Approach is atheoretical.

• The Big Five traits are derived from the data.

• Minimises researcher bias; avoid negative impact on data

Researcher bias is confirmation bias

Limitations of the big five

Curtis, Windsor, & Soubelet (2015) Positive associations between:- openness and cognitive ability, and Conscientiousness with slower rates of cognitive decline.

The Approach is atheoretical.

• The Big Five traits are derived from the data.

• Lack of explanatory power!

However, it would be great if, having discovered these traits, we could now find a theory to explain why the structure of personality falls into these five clusters.

5.Not All Encompassing

Some argue that the Big Five leaves out many important personality traits:For example, some argue that it does not include evaluative traits, like moral/immoral. If these are included, you get a six-factor model. Example: The HEXACO model adds Honesty- Humility to the Big Five .Others argue that the Big 5 leaves out: masculinity-femininity; religiosity; sense of humour; etc

Paunonan and Jackson (2000) provided hard evidence that many personality traits lie beyond the putative Big Five dimensions

Saucier and Goldberg (2001) reported many difficulties with the proposed Big Five personality dimensions

Boyle et al. (1995) pointed to some questionable methodological decisions (factor analysis)

Evidence that ongoing changes to personality structure occur across the whole lifespan (e.g., see Cattell et al., 2002; Fraley & Roberts, 2005; Roberts et al., 2006a,b)

Mischel argued that personality traits are not stable across situations, and that behaviour is a product of the situation rather than the person. So, for instance, someone may be extraverted if the situation calls for extraversion, and introverted if it calls for introversion.

personality is only one variable among many influencing behaviours. And there is certainly a danger in relying too heavily on personality measures

Consider some applications of the Big Five and link personality traits to emotion regulation strategies

The five-factor model not only helps people better understand how they compare to others and to put names to their characteristics. It’s also used to explore relationships between personality and many other life indicators.

for example knowing personality can help regulate emotions and create emotion regulation strategies