Studied by 2 people
Mischel argued that traits were unstable form one situation to another
behaviour is shaped by personal dispositions PLUS specific cognitive and affective processes
objected idea that traits are predictors of behaviour
“if I am in this situation, then I do X; but if I am in that situation, then i do Y”
people intuitively think this, upheld by the study about the girl who is either friendly, teachers pet, etc. and people thought she would act differently to different people
accounts for variability across situations as well as stability of behaviour within a person
most sophisticated learning approach
apparent inconsistencies in behaviour are potentially predictable behaviours that reflect stable patterns of variation within a person
if-then profiles
if personality is a stable system that processes the information about the situations, external or internal, then it follows that as individuals encounter different situations, their behaviours should vary across the situations
if-then theory
assumes some temporal stability of personality, but behaviours vary
those successful waited for valuable, contingent rewards
those who failed took immediate, less valuable rewards
those who got no information made decisions based on their expectancies
psychological, social, and physiological aspects of people that cause them to interact with their environment in a relatively stable pattern of variation
encoding strategies
competencies and self-regulatory strategies
expectancies and beliefs
goals and values
affective responses
(cognitive-affective unit)
people’s ways of transforming stimulus inputs into information about themselves, other people, and the world
same person may encode similar events in different ways depending on the situation
children can change the way environmental events are experienced by focusing on different aspects of stimuli
(cognitive-affective unit)
competencies: people’s cognitive and behavioural construction of what they can and cannot do, based on their observations of the world, themselves, and others
self-regulatory strategies: techniques used to control one’s own behaviour through self-imposed goals and self-produced consequences
this aspect is more stable
apparent consistency of traits may be rooted in intelligence, which is stable over time
help to construe dispositions
influences personality relevant aspects of self
impacts psychological CAPS system
interacts with conditions throughout development and influence how person thinks, feels, and acts
wait: higher SAT scores, educational achievement, greater self-worth, better coping with stress
couldn’t resist: 30% more likely overweight, develop borderline personality disorder features
logical issues
research utility
how much info will we really gain from this?
