Understanding Personality: Projective Tests, Inventories, and Theories, Exams of Psychology

Download Understanding Personality: Projective Tests, Inventories, and Theories and more Exams Psychology in PDF only on Docsity! Chapter 14 Personality:Theory, Research, and Assessment Personality - Unique an consistent patterns of behavior. -Your personality is the pattern of traits that you possess -Theories differ in their emphasis. Freud's Psychoanalytic Theory - Focus on the influences of early childhood Emphasis on unconscious motives/conflicts Primary focus on sexual and aggressive urges Id - Pleasure principle -Activated by impulse, demands immediate satisfaction of needs Ego - Reality principle -Delays pleasure according to circumstances Superego - Child acquires values and standards. 2 parts... -Conscience-develops through punishment. -Ego ideal- develops through reward. Intraspsychic conflict between id, ego, and super ego leads to... - Anxiety and then reliance on defense mechanisms. Defense Mechanisms - Unconscious attempts to reduce anxiety. -Involve some degree of self deception and distortion of reality. Repression - Push unpleasant thoughts from consciousness. Rationalization - Come up with explanations that are easier to accept than the real reason. Projection - Attribute our unacceptable traits to someone else. Reaction Formation - Display opposite of real feelings. Regression - Revert to an earlier more infantile stage of development. Denial - Refuse to acknowledge the existence of anxiety provoking information. A well-researched, clinical questionnaire used to assess personality and psychological problems -Looks for signs of abnormal behavior -Used to screen for personality and psycho-social disorders in adults (i.e., over age 18) and adolescents age 14 to 18. Big 5 model of personality - Neuroticism Extroversion Openness to experience Agreeableness Conscientiousness Neuroticism (negative emotionality) - Worried vs. calm Insecure vs. secure Self-pitying vs. self-satisfied Extraversion (positive emotionality) - Sociable vs. retiring Fun-loving vs. sober Affectionate vs. reserved Openness in experience - Imaginative vs. down to earth Likes variety vs. likes routine Independent vs. conforming Agreeableness - Softhearted vs. ruthless, Trusting vs. suspicious, Helpful vs. uncooperative Conscientiousness (constraint) - Well organized vs disorganized Careful vs careless Self-disciplined vs weak willed Learning personality theory - Personality is based on operant conditioning and reinforcement. -Behavior is determined by the situation. -Focus on observable behavior. -Situational tests -Stress interviews Humanism and Personality - Capacity to grow and change -Self-concept or self-image -Actual vs. ideal self -Congruence or consistency -Self-serving bias Social cognitive theory - How person and situation interact. -Best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. -Locus of control -Internal -- External -Learned helplessness Eclectic Personality Theory - No one approach is followed exclusively. -Use different aspects of each theory -Whatever is appropriate for the situation. Personality: What is it and how can we study it? - Personality- peoples typical ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving. *relatively enduring predispositions that influence or behavior across many situations. Being raised together does not lead to much similarity in personality between parents and offspring from this study and having a shared environment is not as influential as genes on personality. Behavior-genetic studies: A note of caution - Researchers using twin and adoptive studies have found that genes influence a variety of behaviors that are often associate with personality traits. Identical twin correlations are considerably higher than fraternal twin correlations. Genes probably exert a highly indirect influence on certain personality traits-- like a tendency to experience deep emotion-- but the environment shapes how these traits play into our lives. There can be genetic influences on divorce, religiosity, political views, homosexuality, death penalty. The twin studies provide remarkably useful information concerning the heritability of personality traits but they tell us little about which genes are related to personality. Molecular Genetic Studies: Investigation that allows researchers to pinpoint genes associated with specific characteristics, including personality traits. *Gene codes for proteins that affect dopamine and serotonin *Neurotransmitters associated with certain personality traits *Low serotonin- more impulsive and aggressive. Psychoanalytical Theory: The controversial legacy of Sigmund Freud and his followers - Theoretical models to explain the development and workings of personality address three questions... 1. How do our personalities develop? 2. What are the core driving forces in our personalities, or more informally, what makes us tick? 3. What accounts for individual differences in personality? Sigmund Freud was one of the most famous psychologists who actually studied neurology and not psychology at first. He concluded that mental disorders are psychological rather than physiological. He developed a theoretical model to explain these disorders called psychoanalytic theory and accompanying treatment called psychoanalysis Freud's Psychoanalytic Theory - Rests on three core assumptions... 1. Psychic Determinism: Freudian's believe in psychic determinism: the assumption that all psychological events have a cause. We are not free to choose our actions, because were at the mercy of powerful inner forces that lie outside of our awareness. Dreams, neurotic symptoms, and Freudian slips of the tongue are all reflections of deep psychological conflict bubbling up to the surface. Many key influences on adult personality stem from early childhood experience. 2. Symbolic meaning: No action, no matter how trivial it may seem, is meaningless. All are attributable to preceding mental causes even if we can figure out what they are. Chalk is symbolic of something else, almost certainly something sexual in nature. 3. Unconscious motivation: We rarely understand what we do but we cook up explanations after the fact. The conscious component of the mind, the part of personality in which we are aware, is merely the tip of the iceberg, and the unconscious is of immensely greater importance in the causes of our personality than conscious. The Id, Ego, and Superego: The structure of personality - Freud hypothesized that the human psyche consists of three agencies or components: id, ego, and superego. The interplay among these three agencies give rise to our personalities and differences in the strength of these agencies account largely for individual differences in personality. How the psychic agencies interact: Most of the time the id, ego, and superego interact much like a chamber music trio playing perfectly in harmony. Sometimes they do collide, often with consequences for our psychological adjustment. Freud hypothesized that psychological distress results from conflict among these three agencies. You might fantasize about a romantic fling with your boys girl (id), but feel frightened about what would happen to you (ego) and stricken with pangs of guilt about hurting your friends feelings (superego) if you were foolish enough to act on your impulses. Internal psychological conflict is unavoidable which means we are all some what neurotic. *When neurotic conflict becomes extreme, the result may be mental illness. Dreams, Freud suggested, are the royal road to the unconscious mind because they not only reveal the inter-workings of our id in action, but also illustrate how ego and superego cooperate to keep the id's wished in check. All dreams are wish fulfillment's or expressions of the id's impulses. They dont always seem that way on the surface because wishes are disguised. When the superego perceives the id's wishes to be threatening, it commands the ego to plaster over these wishes with symbols. *Dream symbols are not universal and different symbols can mean different things to different dreamers Id - A reservoir of unconscious psychic energy that, according to Freud, strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives. The id operates on the pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification. *The word no is not in the id's vocab Ego - The largely conscious, "executive" part of personality that, according to Freud, mediates among the demands of the id, superego, and reality. The ego operates on the reality principle, satisfying the id's desires in ways that will realistically bring pleasure rather than pain. Superego - The part of personality that, according to Freud, represents internalized ideals and provides standards for judgment (the conscience) and for future aspirations. *Our sense of morality Personality structures (id, ego, superego) The importance of the unconscious Shaping of personality Anxiety and defense mechanisms Difference to Freud: Unlike Freud, emphasize the importance of the conscious mind's role in interpreting experience and in coping with the environment Emphasize social, not sexual, tensions as being crucial for forming personality Collective Unconscious (Jung) - Not unique to the individual, but rather shared by the entire human race. Residing within the collective unconcious are archetypes (overarching human tendencies) which are important for every person to become aware of so that they can become whole and individuated. These archetypes can be understood through studying philosophy, art, religion, mythology, and dreams Behavioral and social learning: Theories of personality - -BF SKinner Radical behaviorists like B.F. Skinner believe that differences in our personalities stem largely from differences in our learning histories. Radical behaviorists reject the notion that the first few years of our life are especially critical in personality development. Our personalities are bundles of habits acquired by classical and operant conditioning. They dont believe that personality causes behavior and they believe that personality consists of behaviors. These behaviors are both observable and observable such as thoughts and feelings. A radical behaviorist would strongly dispute the conclusion that certain people have many friends and attend many parties because they are extroverted. Behaviorist views of the causes of personality - Radical behaviorists view personality as under the control of two major influences (a) genetic factors and (b) contingencies in the environment. Behavioral views of determinism: -Radical behaviorists are determinists. They believe all our actions are products of preexisting casual influences. -Radical behaviorists believe that free will is an illusion. -We are convinced that were free to select our behaviors only because were usually oblivious to the situational factors that trigger them. Behavioral views of unconscious processing: -For Skinner, were unconscious of many things because were often unaware of immediate situational influences on our behavior. -There is no storehouse of inaccessible thoughts, memories, or impulses because the unconscious variables that play a role in causing behavior lie outside and not inside us. Social learning Theories of personality - Social learning theorists believe that Skinner had gone to far in his wholesale rejection of the influence of thoughts on behavior. Emphasized thinking as cause of personality. How we interpret our environments affects how we react to them; if we perceive others as threatening, well typically be hostile and suspicious in return. -Classical conditioning and operant conditioning are not automatic or reflexive processes; they're the products of cognition. (As we acquire information in classical and operant conditioning, were actively thinking about interpreting what the information means. Social learning views of determinism: Reciprocal determinism: A form of causation whereby personality and cognitive factors, behavior, and environmental variables mutually influence one another. Observational learning and personality: Much of learning occurs by watching others. We learn and develop are personality on what we see. Sense of perceived control: Locus of control- extent to which people believe that reinforcers and punishers lie inside or outside their locus of control. People with an internal locus of control believe that life events are due largely to their own efforts and personal characteristics. People with and external locus of control believe that life events are largely a product of chance and fate. Internals are less prone than externals to emotional upset following a stressful event. Humanistic Models of Personality - Humanists reject the strict determinism of psychoanalysts and behaviorists and embraced the notion of free will. Most humanists propose that the core motive in personality is self-actualization: the drive to develop our innate potential to the fullest possible extent. *View human nature as inherently constructive, so they see self-actualization as a worthy goal. Rogers model of personality: - According to Rodgers our personalities consist of 3 major components: Organism, self, and conditions of worth. The organism is our innate-- and substantially genetically influenced-- blueprint. Rodgers viewed the organisms as inherently positive and helpful toward others. The self is our self-concept, the set of beliefs about who we are. Conditions of worth are the expectations we place on ourselves for appropriate and inappropriate behavior. They arise in childhood when others make their acceptance of us dependent on certain behaviors but not others. Individual differences in personality stem largely from differences in the conditions of worth that people impose on us. *Conditions of worth result in incongruence between self and organism. This means that our personalities are inconsistent with our innate dispositions: Were no longer our genuine selves because were acting in ways that are inconsistent with our genuine potentialities. Maslow: The Characteristics of Self-Actualized People - Hard to accomplish self-actualization. Self-actualized people tend to be creative, spontaneous, and accepting of themselves and others. They are self confident, but not self centered. These people crave privacy because they have gotten over the need to be popular. Prone to peak experience or a transcendent moment of intense excitement and tranquility marked by a profound sense of connection to the world. Trait models of personality: Consistencies in our behavior -