Theories of personality

anatomy, physiology, genetics, evolution

How heritable is extraversion?

biological approach

conceptualization, measurement, and consequences of individual differences; personality development and change

What characteristics of individuals predict longevity?

trait approach

conscious awareness and experience; free will; humanistic psychology; cross-cultural psychology

How do people from different cultures differ in how they approach conflict resolution in the workplace?

phenomenological approach

behaviorism; social learning theory; cognitive personality psychology

How do situational rewards and incentives impact our decision?

learning and cognitive approach

unconscious mind; internal mental conflict

How does internal conflict impact one’s behavior?

psychanalytic apprach

Psychological triad -

People characteristic patterns of thought, emotion, and behavior together with the psychological mechanisms, hidden or not, behind those patterns

What does Funder mean when he says that personality is coherent?

Each aspect of ones personality stems from and depends on the other aspects

How people feel, think, and behave are parts of what?

the psychological triad

What has the highest level of specificity in explaining personality?

trait approach

Dr. Martin is interested in testing the impact withholding a reward has on the studying behavior of students

learning / cognitive approaches

Dr. Webb is interested in studying what evolved psychological processes influence the choices people make during the dating process.

biological approach

Dr. Choi is interested in assessing the unconscious motivations of people who are pursuing a career in social work and have suffered from childhood neglect.

psychoanalytic approach

Dr. Michaels is interested in whether people in romantic relationships are more agreeable than people who are single.

trait approach

why do personality psychologists have focused on developing distinct theories instead of One Big Theory (OBT) when trying to explain the whole person?

-OBT would likely not do well at explaining specific personality processes.

As of now, there has not been an acceptable OBT.

Each distinct theory offers a different perspective on personality.

Certain fields of psychology are more or less conceptually related to personality psychology. The fields of psychology in order from most to least related to personality psychology.

-clinical psychology

industrial organized psychology

-neuroscience

narcissism -

effective at public persuasiveness

ability to respond flexibly to changing circumstances

shiftiness

ability to remain steadfastly committed to important principles

stubborness

A researcher who is interested in applying the trait approach to study personality would utilize ?

-measurement of individual differences

-personality development

-consequences of individual differences

-personality change

The learning and cognitive approach to personality psychology focuses on which of the focal topics?

-cognitive personality psychology

-social learning theory

-behaviorism

Each approach to personality psychology focuses on

what it can explain well and ignores what it cannot explain. For example, behaviorism is good at changing behavior because it ignores free will.

three parts of the psychological triad?

• They consist of emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.

• They are not always consistent at all times.

Personality psychology tries to understand the whole person, which is an impossible task. Personality psychologists organize their pursuit of understanding people around basic approaches, such as?

which seeks to answer questions about personality based on certain kinds of observations and patterns. The most widely used of these approaches is the trait approach.

Personality psychology utilizes several basic approaches to understand different components of human psychology.

advantage of personality psychology

Personality psychology appreciates the uniqueness of the individual.

advantage of personality psychology

Which of the following is a term describing a broad, systematic method of using certain kinds of observations and patterns to understand individual variation of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors?

personality

Why is the trait approach considered to be the largest and most dominant approach in contemporary psychology?

it helps organize the other approaches because individual differences are the basis for each of the other basic approaches

Personality psychology emphasizes how

people are different from one another, whereas subfields such as cognitive and social psychology emphasize how people are the same.