Exam 4, Self and Personality, and Personality Theories

Focuses on individual differences rather than commonalities.
Covers the "self" side of the chapter on Tuesday and the personality side on Thursday.

Basic question: Who am I? What makes me who I am?
Self Schema: Information about how you view yourself.
- Includes memories, core beliefs, and generalizations about yourself.
- Not information about the worldview.
Activity: Write down as many words as you can to describe who you are.
Terms People Used:
- College student (role).
- Driven (personal characteristic).
- Blonde (physical characteristic).
- Goal-oriented.
- Daughter (relation to family).

Self Schema Illustration:
- Circle representing "myself."
- Terms within the circle are considered core (e.g., black, male, psychologist, professor).
- Terms connected but outside the circle are less central (e.g., family background).
Examples:
- Being black, a man, professor, and psychologist are core to the instructor's identity.
- Family background (St. Kitts origin) is connected but less central.
- Brother or uncle.
Terms can be:
- Within the core circle.
- Connected with solid lines (important but not central).
- Tangentially related.
- Not connected at all (e.g., being tall for basketball).
Characteristics:
- Physical descriptions (skin tone, gender).
- Profession (college student, professor).
- Ethnicity.
- Roles in relation to others.

Deals with the parts of the self-schema that we activate.
We activate parts most relevant to our current context.
Examples:
- Living in New York City, being from The Bronx becomes more relevant.
- Relative to New York State, being from New York City is distinctive.
- Comparing oneself to someone from Mississippi, being from New York matters.
- Compared against other countries, one is more likely to think of themselves as American.

Deals with how we feel about ourselves; how we value ourselves.
Theories suggest self-esteem mirrors how others evaluate us.
High evaluations lead to high self-esteem, and low evaluations lead to low self-esteem.
Disconnected from actual worth or contributions to the world.

Treating yourself with the same care, acceptance, and kindness you would give to a friend feeling down.
Components:
- Mindfulness: Recognizing when you're feeling overwhelmed and giving yourself some grace.
- Self-Kindness: Treating yourself kindly regardless of current performance.
- Connectedness: Getting a chance to really understand yourself and understanding everybody else.

Raising self-esteem is often emphasized, but research shows it's only weakly related to good outcomes later in life.
Studies:
- Measure self-esteem and teacher reports in sixth grade and again in seventh grade.
- Look for predictions between these measures.
- Does self-esteem in grade six predict teacher reports in grade seven?
- Do teacher reports in grade six predict self-esteem in grade seven?
Results:
- Academic success and social connections in grade six predict higher self-esteem in grade seven.
- Attempts to raise self-esteem to improve later performance do not work.
Downside:
- Overemphasizing self-esteem can lead to narcissism.

Consists of narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism.
Narcissism:
- Grandiosity, entitlement, superiority, need for admiration.
- Often rooted in deep feelings of inferiority.
- Protect their constructed self, they can never admit to being wrong, which is why they lie or blame others.
Machiavellianism:
- Unprincipled, cold, cynical view of others.
- Like money, power, and winning, and they use manipulation to get what they want or exploit others.
- Believe it's better to be feared than liked.
- Offend others as a strategy to control them.
Psychopathy:
- Cold, scary, impulsive, enjoy mental thrills.
- Lack emotional bonds or compassion.
- Don't feel remorse or guilt.
Men score higher on all three traits than women.
Overlap: All three are empirically distinct, yet they do overlap.
Genetic Components: Twin studies show that narcissism and psychopathy have substantial genetic components.
Big Five Personality Traits (OCEAN):
- Narcissists and psychopaths are often open to new ideas and extroverted.
- Psychopaths and Machiavellians have low conscientiousness.
- All three have low agreeableness.
- Psychopaths are hardly neurotic.

We tend to have beliefs about ourselves that are good but don't necessarily match reality
Above-Average Effect: Tend to believe we are above average in most traits.
Illusion of Control: Believe we can change circumstances with enough information.
Optimistic Bias: Believe things will work out well in the long run.

Developing self-esteem is a reflection of what you think other people believe about you.
Downward Comparison: Looking at someone further behind increases self-esteem.
Upward Comparison: Looking at someone further ahead lowers self-esteem.
Social Media: Often leads to upward comparisons, negatively impacting self-esteem.

Cultures vary in their emphasis on collectivism versus individualism.
Independent View of Self (Individualist Cultures):
- Focuses on uniqueness, separate from others.
- Values individual goals and achievements.
Interdependent View of Self (Collectivist Cultures):
- Emphasizes relationships and group goals.
- Sees the self as interconnected with others.

Vary in terms of where they think our personalities come from and what they think our personalities comprise.
Personality:
- Typical patterns of thought, emotion, and behavior.
- Stable across different situations.
- Samuel L. Jackson as an example: He's playing three different characters here in three different universes, and there's some aspects of Samuel L. Jackson that's gonna pop up in every single one of those characters. Regardless of who he's playing, there's some aspects of who he is that shines through in all of them. You'd expect that if you're talking about somebody's personality.

Sigmund Freud's theory that personalities are based on unconscious conflicts.
Levels of Consciousness:
- Conscious.
- Preconscious: Not conscious now, but readily brought to mind.
- Unconscious.
Psychic Structures:
- Id: Most primitive, entirely unconscious, seeks immediate gratification.
- Ego: Tries to find a balance between the id and superego.
- Superego: Develops based on parental and societal values (conscience).

Developed by Anna Freud to give the what it wants while hiding that from the Supreme Court
Way to give the id what it wants while hiding it from the superego.
Examples:
- Displacement: Redirecting impulses to a safer target.
- Repression: Pushing thoughts out of mind.
- Regression: Returning to an earlier stage of development.
Evaluation:
- Positive: Focused on childhood experiences.
- Negative: Claims are often unfalsifiable and some claims are easily falsifiable.

Emphasizes that people are born naturally good and aim to become the best version of themselves.
Carl Rogers: Basic human needs for self-actualization and positive regard.
- Unconditional Positive Regard: Leads to reaching idealized self.
- Conditional Positive Regard: Prevents becoming who you want to be. Pushdown aspects of yourself that your parents feel unhappy about and therefore never get to become who you want to be.