Exam 2 personality

week 8

Defining personality pathology:

The learning objective is to define personality disorders

Defining Personality Disorders

1. usual (i.e. abnormal)

   1. unusual of someone’s thinking, feeling, and behaving

      1. unusual also differs based on culture

   2. the pattern of thinking must be unusual given the circumstances

2. problematic

   1. could only be problematic for the individual

      1. called intra-personal problems (i.e. phobias, depression, anxiety)

3. Impact social relations

   1. people are social beings and social relationships are important to our lives

   2. personality pathology is defined as a pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving that degrades social relationships

4. stable over time

   1. mood disorders are stable over time but personality disorders aren’t stable over time and continue to become increasingly dysfunctional over one life span

      1. depression or anxiety disorder: mood disorder

         1. not necessarily to prevail over one’s adult years

5. sometimes people view it as who they are as a person

   1. is a part of the person’s identity

   2. An example of this could be called ego-syntonic

      1. I’m not narcissistic I’m just confident

1. configurations of traits that are socially undesirable

   1. these traits have degraded interpersonal relations

   2. some kind of configuration of personality traits, patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving

2. any trait when taken to an extreme can be pathological

Typological Approach:

learning objective: describe 6 types of personality disorders

A typological approach to pathology as we move towards a dimensional approach, what is said is the in which these disorders present themselves might be Schizotypal Antisocial disorder

1. Schizotypal

   1. Thematic description: Some people are unconventional, Quirky, Odd, Eccentric, Superstitious, Weird Theories

      1. odd belief, hard to connect with these people

   2. regards interpersonal relationships:

   3. more seen in men (correlational)

      1. unsure if this is a result of biological (Y chromosome), social roles, or researcher basis

2. Narcissistic

   1. Thematic description:

      1. Some people have inflated self-esteem

      2. Make great first impressions

      3. Annoying in the long run

      4. Dysfunction in how they navigate their lives

         1. Rules are for others: often dehumanize other

         2. overclaiming their incompetence

         3. Sensitive to ego threats

         4. Ego-syntonic

         5. Exploitive

         6. manifestation

            1. most beautiful

            2. most powerful

            3. expect praise

3. Antisocial

   1. Thematic description:

      1. Some people are dishonest: disregard social norms

         1. Behaviors

            1. Heartless, Drug Abuse, Risky Sex

            2. Lie, cheat, steal, reckless, impulsive

      2. Life outcomes: degradation of social relation

         1. Divorce

         2. Addiction

         3. Imprisonment

         4. Suicide

         5. linked to poverty

            1. social system have systematically prevented people from thriving in their life maybe an additive response is to refute social norm

         6. seen in men

4. Borderline

   1. Thematic description:

      1. People are different from day to day

      2. People have a coherent stable identity

      3. Instability

      4. Chaotic: swing wildly between these pattern

      5. Bad Target

   2. Life outcomes:

      1. Self Harm

         1. treatment to self harm: Alternative forces

      2. Self-mutilation

      3. Suicide (8-10%)

      4. Women

5. Avoidant

   1. Thematic description:

      1. Everyone feels inadequate

      2. We fail, get rejected, and it sucks so we avoid it

   2. Life outcomes:

      1. Avoid everyday

         1. example. not submitting any assignment not coming to class because you do not want to be seen withdrawing from the special world

      2. Expect the worse

6. Obsessive-Compulsive

   1. Thematic description:

      1. It is nice to live in an orderly clean world

      2. Some people like structure, order, cleanliness

      3. Rituals: behaviors

      4. Lack big picture: pattern of thinking

      5. Workaholics (unproductive)

   2. Life outcomes:

      1. Hoarding

      2. Ego-syntonic

Dimensional Approach

learning objectives:

• Compare and Contrast Dimensional Approaches

• Explain the Diagnosis of Personality Pathology

Organizing Personality Disorders

• DSM-V

  • American Psychological Association

    • Make diagnosis objective

    • Insurance

    • Traditional vs Research-Based

      • typological approach and dimensional

• ICD-11

  • World Health Organization

  • Usable for non-specialists: only has a dimensional approach

  • make diagnosis objective

  • Insurance

Bad Five personality disorder

• DSM (alternate)

  • Negative Affectivity

  • Detachment

  • Antagonism

  • Disinhibition

  • Psychoticism

• ICD-11

  • Negative Affectivity

  • Detachment

  • Dissociality

  • Disinhibition

  • Anankastia

Diagnosis

1. DSM – V (alternate)

   1. Assess clients “ personality functioning”

      1. (i.e., rate overall severity)

   2. Assess if at least 1 of the six defined disorders is present

   3. Assess each of the five maladaptive trait

2. ICD – 11

   1. Assess degree of personality dysfunction

      1. Mild → moderate→ Severe

   2. Can be qualified by description of domain traits

Week 9

mean level approach

learning objective: two ways to test if personality changes

Ways of testing stability vs change

research design:

• cross-sectional: collecting personality data of two different age groups at the same time

  • A con of this research method is these two groups share a difference in life narratives: invalid test as the interest is to see if thinking, feeling, and behaving change between a particular person

• Longitudinal design: asserting the same individual at differing periods there are two analytic approaches

  • mean level: test whether or not the same mean of some trait shifts overtime for a particular person

    • Maturity Principle – people mature in predictable ways

  • mean level: steps— measure person two different periods, compare periods through subtraction, convert to effect size, determine the extent of change

    • example time twos mean levels are subjected from time ones if the converted effect size is greater than zero there is a change

      • > 0 (increase)

      • = (stable)

      • < (decreased)

  • Mean level approach to the big 5

    • Extraversion: Increase until middle age, then stabilize

    • Negative emotionality: Decrease until middle age, then stabilize

    • Agreeableness: Steadily increase across the lifespan

    • Conscientiousness: Steadily increase across the lifespan

    • Openness: Initial Increases, stability, later decreases

  • rank order: measure the effective size of a personality trait group by the rank of a group

    • Analytic Approach: Rank Order step below

      • measure people across two periods

      • correlated personality of people across those points

      • the observations is given along a diagonal and show change or stability

        • r>0 (more stability)

          • positivity skewed

        • r<0 (more change)

          • negative skewed

      • Continuity Principle: Personality is increasingly stable

      • Plasticity Principle: You can always change

      • we can see rank of individual can be stable but their mean level can change

Drivers of personality change and stability

• environmental (nurture): prolonged periods in an environment can shape our personalities

  • Social Investment Principle: Changes in roles can change our personalities

    • Examples of this include having a baby, finding a partner, or starting a career as these new roles bring expectations of thinking, feeling, and behaving

      • staying in a pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving, moles our personality to a degree

• biological (nature): personality is partially grounded in biological systems as the frontal lobe processes emotion corresponds with negative emotionality

  • our biological systems’: chemical, electrical, structural, and brain structures are responsible for informing our conciseness of what is being felt

    • Brain development & decline: changes in the biological systems throughout aging correspond to changes in personality

      • getting older leads to failings in our dopaminergic system and loss of perceptual capacities

    • some examples of biology impacting personality are

      • prozac: is a serotonin reuptake that acts on the serotonin system

        • with prolonged use changes in the biological system that underpins psychological experiences

      • alcohol: consumed regularly impacts our biological system which has bearings on personality

        • alcohol is a depressant that affects chemical messages to the thinking, feeling, and behaving

      • psilocybin: increases activities in the serotonergic system

• transactional: the driver of personality change and stability through a combination of biological and environmental

  • Active – People can choose their environments

    • example→ which university you would like to attend

  • Reactive – People experience environments differently

    • example→ to a party, for an introvert vs extrovert one is more like to get over stimulated

  • Evocative – People change their environments

    • example→ going to a club and seeing your professor

• Can we change our own personality?

  • steps to change personality below

    • Want to change

    • belief that is it Possible to change

      • Self-regulated leads to Behavioral Change

        • New behaviors become habitual

          • Trait Change

  • Goal setting

    • I’m going to be more studious

    • I’m going to get out more

    • If a friend invites me to lunch, then I will

      join the

  • Implementation Intentions

  • If… Then...

  • If I am assigned homework, then I will complete it that night

create 40 different multiple choice question at a university-level exam with the following notes