Unit 10
Personality - A pattern of enduring, distinctive thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that characterize the way a person adapts to the world
Psychodynamic Perspectives - Theoretical views emphasizing that personality is primarily unconscious (beyond awareness
Psychoanalysis - Freud’s approach to personality from his work with hysteria
Hysteria - Physical symptoms that have no physical cause
Id - The part of the person that Freud called the “it,” consisting of unconscious drives; the individual’s reservoir of sexual energy
Pleasure Principle - Freud’s concept that the id always seeks pleasure and immediate gratification
Ego - The Freudian structure of personality that deals with the demands of reality
Superego - The Freudian structure of personality that serves as the harsh internal judge of the individual’s behavior; what is often referred to as conscience
Defense Mechanisms - Tactics the ego uses to reduce anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality
Denial - The defense mechanism where the Ego refuses to acknowledge a reality
Displacement - Defense mechanism where an unacceptable impulse is directed at a less threatening target (Replace your want with something similar and more acceptable)
Sublimation - A special form of displacement in which the person expresses an unconscious wish in a socially acceptable way (boxer wanting to beat someone up)
Projection - Defense mechanism in which we see impulses that we fear in ourselves and project them at others (personal shortcomings are other peoples faults)
Reaction Formation - A defense mechanism in which a person’s conscious experiences is exactly the opposite of true desires
Repression - The most powerful defense mechanism which pushes unacceptable impulses into the unconscious mind
Oedipus Complex - According to Freud, a boy’s intense desire to replace his father and enjoy the affections of his mother
Collective Unconscious - Jung’s term for the impersonal, deepest layer of the unconscious mind, shared by all human beings because of their common ancestral past
Archetypes - Jung’s term for emotionally laden ideas and images in the collective unconscious that have rich and symbolic meaning for all people
Individual Psychology - Adler’s view that people are motivated by purposes and goals and that perfection, not pleasure, is thus the key motivator in human life
10.2
Humanistic Perspectives - Theoretical views stressing a person’s capacity for personal growth and positive human qualities
Unconditional Positive Regard - Rogers’s construct referring to the individual’s need to be accepted, valued, and treated positively regardless of their behavior
Conditions of Worth - The standards that the individual must live up to in order to receive positive regard from others
10.3
Trait Theories - Theoretical views stressing that personality consists of broad, enduring dispositions (traits) that tend to lead to characteristic responses
The Big Five Factors of Personality - The five broad traits that are thought to describe the main dimensions of personality: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (emotional instability)
Neuroticism - Feeling negative emotion more often than positive emotion in one’s daily life
Extraversion - People more likely to engage in social activity
Openness to Experience - Related to liberal values, open-mindedness, tolerance, creativity, and the capacity to experience awe
Agreeableness - Related to generosity and altruism, to reports of religious faith, and more satisfying romantic relationships
Conscientiousness - A key predictor in positive outcomes which captures people's strong desire to achieve
Subjective Well-Being - A person’s assessment of their own level of positive affect relative to negative affect, and an evaluation of their life in general
10.4
Social Cognitive Perspectives - Theoretical views emphasizing conscious awareness, beliefs, expectations, and goals
Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory - Behavior, environment, and person/cognitive factors are all important in understanding personality
Reciprocal Determinism - Describes the way behavior, environment, and person/cognitive factors interact to create personality
Self-Efficacy - The belief that one can master a situation and produce positive change
Cross-Situational Consistency - Mischel pointed out that personality traits had not been shown to be the same throughout different situations
Situationism - A person will look at a situation then react accordingly
Cognitive Affective Processing Systems - Mischel’s theoretical model for describing that individuals’ thoughts and emotions about themselves and the world affect their behavior and become linked in ways that matter to that behavior
10.5
Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory - A theory proposed by Jeffrey Gray identifying two biological systems linked to learning associations between behaviors and rewards or punishers. The behavioral activation system is sensitive to learning about rewards. The behavioral inhibition system is sensitive to learning about punishers
Behavioral Genetics - The study of the inherited underpinnings of behavioral characteristics
Observational Learning - When a person learns from watching and imitating another’s behavior
10.6
Self-Report Test - Also called an objective test or an inventory, a method of measuring personality characteristics that directly asks people whether specific items describe their personality traits
Social Desirability - When a person responds in a way that would make them look better or please their employer
Empirically Keyed Test - A type of self-report test that presents many questionnaire items to two groups that are known to be different in some central way (First asking groups of smokers and non smokers then using those answers to see if someone is likely to smoke)
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) - The most widely used and researched empirically keyed self-report personality test
Neuroticism Extraversion Openness Personality Inventory - A self reported test geared for the five-factor model of personality
Face Validity - The extent to which a test item appears to fit the particular trait it is measuring
Projective Test - A personality assessment test that presents individuals with an ambiguous stimulus and asks them to describe it or tell a story about it—to project their own meaning onto the stimulus
Rorschach Inkblot Test - A famous projective test that uses an individual’s perception of inkblots to determine their personality
Thematic Apperception Test - A projective test that is designed to elicit stories that reveal something about an individual’s personality