CHAPTER 13 - PERSONALITY

v What is personality? Definition: a person's unique & relatively stable thoughts, feelings, & actions.

v Different theories of personality meet different goals of psychology. Describe & predict, explain.

Personality Theories

v Trait Theories

Ø How do traits shape our personalities & behavior? Trait - behavioral characteristic that a person shows in most situations. Ex: are you social, kind, funny? Describe & predict.

Ø Gordon Allport -identified 18,000 traits in the English language. Trait theorists research: how do you bring this list down to size? How do they relate? Use factor analysis to determine how they relate.

Ø The Big Five - The Five Factor Model - refer to page 452. According to this model, everyone can be described on these five factors. How can you remember them: use the mnemonic OCEAN.

§ Extroversion: how out-going are you, sociable.

§ Neuroticism - emotional, moody, anxious.

§ Conscientiousness: meticulous, diligent

§ Agreeableness - friendliness

§ Openness to experience - are you open to new things?

Ø Evaluating Trait Theories - The Pros and Cons

§ Lack of explanation - Trait theories offer no causal explanation.

§ Stability vs. change - which traits stabilize, which change?

§ Situational determinants - is our behavior more governed by situation?

· Mischel - behavior is determined externally by the environment, not internal traits.

v PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY & FREUD

v Freud's Psychoanalystic Theory: The Power of the Unconscious

Ø Psyche - analogous to personality.. Psychoanalysis - form of therapy Freud developed to make the unconscious conscious.

Ø Levels of Consciousness

§ Conscious: this consists of everything that you are aware of at a particular

§ Unconscious: the stuff we aren't aware of - it is repressed out of our awareness. Can reveal itself through Freudian slips or slips of the tongue.

§ Preconscious: lies in between the conscious & the unconscious. Not aware of it currently, but you could be.

Ø The Structure of Personality

§ Id - primitive, instinctual part of personality. Houses biological urges. Operates on the pleasure principle. I want it now!

§ Ego - decision-making part of personality. Operates on reality principle wants to satisfy id, but when & where it is appropriate.

§ Superego - the moral component - social standards about right & wrong. Operates on Morality principle.

Ø The Dynamics of Personality

§ When id or superego get to be too much for ego to handle, anxiety results. To protect itself, ego employs ego defense mechanisms - Table 13.2 on page 458.

Ø Psychosexual Stages of Development

v Personality development

Ø Proceed through psychosexual stages

Ø In each stage, there is a different erogenous zone

§ E.Z. – a source of pleasure (different than how most ppl usu think about it)

Ø If don’t resolve a conflict in a stage, can become fixated, or stuck

v Psychosexual Stages

Ø Oral stage

§ Until age 1, approximately

§ Pleasure is derived from the mouth (therefore, it’s the E.Z.)

§ 2 fixations

· Child is overindulged – oral dependent – gullible

§ Oral aggressive – biting, sarcastic - may turn into a nail biter

v Anal stage

Ø Apprx ages 1-3

Ø Attention is on the process of feces elimination

Ø The e.z. is the anus

§ Child can gain approval or rebel by expelling at either an appropriate time or an inappropriate time, respectively

· 2 fixations

¨ anal retentive – stingy, clean, tight, orderly

¨ anal expulsive – too lenient potty training; messy, disorderly

§ Phallic stage

· E.Z. – genitals – learns that genital stimulation results in pleasure

Ø Child is interested in the opposite sex parent

§ Oedipus complex - in little boys, boy develops rivalry w/ father, but develops castration anxiety. The little boy represses the rivalry w/ father & the conflict is over.

v Latency stage

Ø 6 until puberty - dormant stage in psychosexual development

v Genital stage

Ø Sexual energies re-emerge

Ø In the end, able to form adult, loving relationships

PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORIES

Jung

v Personal unconscious – your “stuff” – your memories, feelings, etc. pretty analogous to the Freudian conceptualization of the unconscious

v Collective unconscious – the evolutionary residue that all humans share – inherit it from our ancestral past, experiences of humans over multitudes of generates accumulate to form this

v Archetypes – thought forms w/ universal meaning

Ø Anima & animus

Karen Horney

v Anxiety doesn’t come from this id/ego/superego conflict business. Oh no! Basic anxiety is the result of feeling isolated and alone in the world.

v Settle into a mode of interacting: moving toward ppl, moving away from ppl, moving against ppl

Alfred Adler

v Adler concetrated on social urges, we use compensation to overcome our inferiority complexes.

Evaluating Psychoanalytic Theories: Criticisms & Enduring Influence

Page 464.

HUMANISTIC THEORIES

Carl Rogers: The Self-Concept Theory of Personality

v Mental Health, Congruence, and Self-Esteem

Ø Congruence - your beliefs & experiences match your experiences in life pretty well. Incongruence - there is a mismatch btw these things --->poor mental health.

Ø unconditional positive regard

Ø Your book has a wonderful discussion of Rogers's theory on pages 466-467

v Abraham Maslow: The Search for Self-Actualization

Ø Self-actualization - tendency to live up to your full potential - to be all that you can be.

Ø Evaluating Humanistic Theories: Three Major Criticisms - page 468

THE SOCIAL COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE

Bandura's & Rotter's Approaches: Social Learning Plus Cognitive Processes

v Bandura - self-efficacy - learned beliefs that one is capable of producing desired results, such as mastering new skills & achieving personal goals.

v reciprocal determinism - thoughts, behaviors, and environment all interact

v Rotter's Locus of Control - stressed role of cognition in personality & behavior. Cognitive expectancies - your expectancy about a behavior & the reinforcement value assigned to the result.

Three Major Contributors: The Brain, Neurochemisty & Genetics

The Brain & Neurochemistry

Brain structures & neurochemicals associated with personality. Changes in those things ----> personality changes.

Genetics

Behavioral genetics - studies do we inherit personality? It appears that parts of personality can be inherited - study through twin studies.

PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT

v How Do We Measure Personality: Do You See What I See?

Ø Interviews - ask a person about his/her personality, behaviors, etc. Interviews can be either structured or unstructured.

Ø Observation - You can do direct observation. Go into an environment & observe the person in his/her interactions.

Ø Objective Tests - client answers True or False to a statements about her likes, dislikes, and beliefs. Ex: Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2. Over 500 questions!

Ø Projective Tests - the person projects unconscious information onto ambiguous stimuli.

§ The Rorschach Inkblot Test - pg 447

§ Thematic Apperception Test - pg 447