AP Psychology Unit 8 -> Personality

Personality

Personality

• A person’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting

• Our sense of “self”

Objective Tests (MMPI)

• Typically written & scored in a standardized way

• Yes/no questions

Objective Tests (MMPI-2)

• True/false/cannot say questions

• Checks for consistency

• Useful in diagnosing psychiatric disorders

Projective Tests

Unlimited # of responses to ambiguous stimuli

Thematic Appreciation Test (TAT)

• involves describing scenes to learn more about a person’s emotions, interpretation, and personality

Rationalization

• Substituting a more acceptable but false reason for one’s behavior

• Ex: “The teacher hates me, that’s why I failed”

Denial

• Refusing to acknowledge an intolerable reality

• Ex: “I’m gonna pass my test even though I didn’t study or do any of my hw”

Repression

• Forgetting situations that would cause painful emotions

• Ex: Being afraid of cats but doesn’t remember why (reason is that they were scratched by a cat in their childhood)

Regression

Retreating to an earlier developmental level involving less mature responses

Ex: When you’re sick you want to be taken care of like a child

Projection

• Seeing one’s personality traits, attitudes, or faults in others but not in oneself

• Ex: You tell your friend that they suck at video games but in reality you also suck

Displacement

• Shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward more acceptable or less threatening object or person

• Ex: You’re really mad at your teacher but you take it out on your dog when you get home

Sublimation

• People re-channel their unacceptable impulses into socially approved activities

• Ex: You’re pissed that you got a 55% on the math test, but you use that anger towards your basketball game

Reaction Formation

• Modifying an anxiety-causing impulse by performing in ways opposite to one’s true feelings

• Ex: You hate a certain person but to their face you act like their best friend

ID

• Freud -Unconscious desires

• Operates under pleasure principle

• Present at birth

Ego

• Operates in conscious and preconscious

• Controls thinking and reasoning

• Guided by the reality principle

Superego

• Moral watchdog

• Compares egos’ actions with the go ideal

Anal Stage

• Freud; ages 1.5 - 3.5

• Pleasure center in anus and elimination

• Concerned with toilet training

• Fixation:

  • Anal Retentive

  • Anal Expulsive

Phallic Stage

• Freud; ages 3.5 - 6

• Pleasure center in genitals

• Jealousy of same sex parent

Oedipus Complex

• Boys sexual desire for their mother

• Wish to replace father

Electra Complex

• Girls sexual desire for their father

• Wish to replace mother

Penis Envy

Women’s envy of not having a penis

Latency Stage

• Freud; ages 6-12

• Lost interest towards opposite sex

• “Cootie” period

Genital Stage

• Freud; (around time of puberty)

• Full adult sexuality

Reality Principle

• The ego satisfies the id without compromising values of the superego

Personal unconscious

• Own repressed thoughts and feelings

Collective Unconscious

• Common collection of knowledge & experiences humans share as a species

• Ex: Many people are afraid of snakes & spiders

Archetyupes

Universal patterns that symbolize basic human motivations, values, and personalities

Karen Horney

• Gives women a voice in personality

• Discredits Freud’s views that women have weak superegos and suffer from penis envy

• Created womb envy to replace Freud’s penis envy

Basic Anxiety

• Feelings of loneliness & isolation from childhood that leads to feelings of insecurity later in life

Compliant

• Neurotic trend

• Submitting to what others want (“Moving towards”)

Agressive

• Neurotic trend

• Hostile to others (“Moving against”)

Detached

• Neurotic trend

• Withdraw from others (“moving away”)

Alfred Alder

• Believes problems stem from tensions in childhood social situations & feelings of inferiority

• Developed birth order theory

Birth order theory

• The order in which a child is born shapes their personality

Social Self

• Rogers; How others perceive you

Inner Self (Self concept)

• Rogers; Mental pictures of yourself that you carry around

Abraham Maslow

• Created Hierarchy of Needs

Self-Actualization (Top of pyramid)

Esteem

Love/Belonging

Safety

Physiological (Bottom of pyramid)

Carl Rogers

• Unconditional positive regard

  • Significant others value you for who you are

• Fully Functioning person

  • Mind and body are 1

  • Open to all feelings and experiences

  • Therapy leads to personal completion & perfection

Martin Seligman

• Created learned helplessness

Julian Rotter

• Locus of control

  • External → Other people control your stuff

  • Internal → You control your own stuff

Self-Efficacy

• Belief in our own abilities to be successful

Traits

• Relatively stable and consistent personality characteristics

Openness Trait

• Imagination, feelings, actions, ideas

Conscientiousness Trait

• Competence, self-discipline, thoughtfulness, goal-driven

Extroversion Trait

• Sociability, assertiveness, emotional expression

Agreeableness Trait

• Cooperative, trustworthy, good-natured

Neuroticism

• Tendency towards unstable emotions

Anal Retentive

• Paying such attention to detail that it becomes an obsession

• Toilet train → obsessed with being neat

Anal Expulsive

• A person who exhibits cruelty, emotional outbursts, disorganization, etc.

• Toilet Train → Very messy