Personality

Personality: A person’s unique long-term pattern of thinking, emotion, and behavior; the consistency of who you are, have been, and will become

Character: Personal characteristics that have been judged or evaluated; desirable or undesirable qualities

Temperament: Hereditary aspects of personality, including sensitivity, moods, irritability, and distractibility

Personality traits: Stable qualities that a person shows in most situations

Behavioral genetics: Study of inherited behavioral traits

Personality type: People who have several traits in common

Personality Types and Other Concepts

Carl Jung, Swiss psychiatrist who was a Freudian disciple, believed that we are one of two personality types:

Introvert: Shy, reserved, self-centered person whose attention is focused inward

Extrovert: Bold, outgoing person whose attention is directed outward

Self-concept: Your ideas, perceptions, and feelings about who you are

Self-esteem: A positive evaluation of oneself

Personality Theories: An Overview

Personality theory: System of concepts, assumptions, ideas, and principles proposed to explain personality

Includes four perspectives:

Trait Theories

Attempt to learn what traits make up personality and how they relate to actual behavior

Psychodynamic Theories

Focus on the inner worki

ngs of personality, especially internal conflicts and struggles

Behavioristic and Social Learning Theories

Focus on external environment and on effects of conditioning and learning

Attribute difference in personality to socialization, expectations, and mental processes

Humanistic Theories

Focus on private, subjective experience and personal growth

Gordon Allport and Traits

Common traits: Characteristics shared by most members of a culture

Individual traits: Define a person’s unique personal qualities

Cardinal traits: So basic that all of a person’s activities can be traced back to the trait

Central traits: Core qualities of a personality

Secondary traits: Inconsistent or superficial aspects of a person (e.g., musical tastes)

Raymond Cattell and Traits

Surface traits: Features that make up the visible features of personality

Source traits: Underlying characteristics of a personality

Trait profile: Graph of the scores on several personality traits

The “Big Five” Personality Factors

Extroversion

Agreeableness

Conscientiousness

Neuroticism

Openness to experience

Traits and Situations

Trait-situation interactions: When external circumstances influence the expression of personality traits

Psychoanalytic Theory and
Sigmund Freud, M.D.

Freud was a Viennese physician who thought his patients’ problems were more emotional than physical

Freud began his work by using hypnosis and eventually switched to psychoanalysis

Freud had many followers: Jung and Adler, to name a few

Freud used cocaine and tobacco and died from oral cancer

More than 100 years later, his work is still influential and very controversial

Key Freudian Terms

Psyche: Freud’s term for the personality; contains id, ego, and superego

Libido: Energy

Eros: Life instinct

Thanatos: Death instinct

Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory: The Id

Innate biological instincts and urges; self-serving, irrational, and totally unconscious

Works via pleasure principle: Wishes to have its desires (pleasurable) satisfied NOW, without waiting and regardless of the consequences

Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory: The Ego

Executive; directs id energies

Partially conscious and partially unconscious

Works via reality principle: Delays action until it is practical and/or appropriate

Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory: The Superego

Judge or censor for thoughts and actions of the ego 

Superego comes from our parents or caregivers; guilt comes from the superego

Two parts

Conscience: Reflects actions for which a person has been punished

Ego ideal: Reflects behavior one’s parents approved of or rewarded

Freudian Dynamics of Personality and Anxieties

Ego is always caught in the middle of battles between superego’s desires for moral behavior and the id’s desires for immediate gratification

Neurotic anxiety: Caused by id impulses that the ego can barely control

Moral anxiety: Comes from threats of punishment from the superego

Freud: Levels of Awareness

Unconscious: Holds repressed memories and emotions and the id’s instinctual drives

Conscious: Everything you are aware of at a given moment including thoughts, perceptions, feelings, and memories

Preconscious: Material that can easily be brought into awareness

Freudian Personality Development

Develops in stages; everyone goes through same stages in same order

Majority of personality is formed before age 6

Erogenous zone: Area on body capable of producing pleasure

Fixation: Unresolved conflict or emotional hang-up caused by overindulgence or frustration

Freudian Personality Development: Oral Stage

Ages 0–1. Most of infants’ pleasure comes from stimulation of the mouth. If a child is overfed or frustrated, oral traits will develop

Oral dependent personality: Gullible, passive, and need lots of attention.

Fixations create oral-aggressive adults who like to argue and exploit others

Freudian Personality Development:  Anal Stage

Ages 1–3. Attention turns to process of elimination. Child can gain approval or express aggression by letting go or holding on. Ego develops. Harsh or lenient toilet training can make a child:

Anal retentive: Stubborn, stingy, orderly, and compulsively clean

Anal expulsive: Disorderly, messy, destructive, or cruel

Freudian Personality Development: Phallic Stage

Ages 3–6. Child now notices and is physically attracted to opposite sex parent

Adult traits: Vanity, exhibitionism, sensitive pride, and narcissism

Oedipus Conflict

For boys only. Boy feels rivalry with his father for his mother’s affection.

Boy feels threatened by father (castration anxiety).

To resolve, boy must identify with his father (i.e., become more like him and adopt his heterosexual beliefs)

Boy then forms a conscience

Electra Conflict

Girl loves her father and competes with her mother. Girl identifies with her mother more slowly because she already feels castrated

Freudian Personality Development: Latency and Genital Stages

Latency: Age 6–puberty. Psychosexual development is dormant. Same-sex friendships and play occur here

Genital stage: Puberty and later. Realization of full adult sexuality occurs here; sexual urges re-awaken

Compensation: Any attempt to overcome feelings of inadequacy or inferiority

Creative self: Humans create their personalities through choices and experiences

Carl Jung

Persona: Mask or public self presented to others

Personal unconscious: Individual’s own experiences are stored in here

The contents are unique to each individual

Collective unconscious: Unconscious ideas and images shared by all humans

Archetypes: Universal idea, image, or pattern found in the collective unconscious

Anima: Archetype representing female principle

Animus: Archetype representing male principle

Learning Theories

Behavioral personality theory: Model of personality that emphasizes learning and observable behavior

Learning theorist: Believes that learning shapes our behavior and explains personality

Situational determinants: External causes of our behaviors

Dollard and Miller’s Theory

Habit: Learned behavior pattern

Drive: Any stimulus strong enough to goad a person into action (like hunger)

Cue: Signals from the environment that guide responses

Response: Any behavior, either internal or observable; actions

Reward: Positive reinforcement

Social Learning Theory

An explanation of personality that combines learning principles, cognition, and the effects of social relationships

Psychological situation: How the person interprets or defines the situation

Expectancy: Anticipation that making a response will lead to reinforcement

Reinforcement value: Subjective value attached to a particular activity or reinforcer

Self-efficacy (Bandura): Belief in your capacity to produce a desired result

Social reinforcement: Praise, attention, approval, and/or affection from others

Miller and Dollard’s Critical Childhood Situations

Feeding

Toilet or cleanliness training

Sex training

Learning to express anger or aggression

Becoming Male or Female

Identification: Feeling emotionally connected to admired adults

Imitation: Desire to act like an admired person

Humanism

Approach that focuses on human experience, problems, potentials, and ideals

Human nature: Traits, qualities, potentials, and behavior patterns most characteristic of humans

Free choice: Ability to choose that is NOT controlled by genetics, learning, or unconscious forces

Subjective Experience

Private perceptions of reality

Abraham Maslow

Self-actualization: Process of fully developing personal potentials

Peak experiences: Temporary moments of self-actualization

Characteristics of Self-Actualizers

Efficient perceptions of reality

Comfortable acceptance of self, others, and nature

Spontaneity

Task centering

Autonomy

How to Become Self-Actualized
(Maslow, 1971)

Be willing to change

Take responsibility

Examine your motives

Experience honestly and directly

Make use of positive experiences

Be prepared to be different

Get involved

Assess your progress

Positive Psychology Personality Traits

Wisdom and knowledge

Courage

Humanity

Justice

Temperance

Transcendence

Characteristics of Self-Actualizers (cont)

Continued freshness of appreciation

Fellowship with humanity

Profound interpersonal relationships

Comfort with solitude

Non-hostile sense of humor

Peak experiences

Carl Rogers’ Self Theory

Fully functioning person: Lives in harmony with his/her deepest feelings and impulses

Self: Flexible and changing perception of one’s identity

Self-image: Total subjective perception of your body and personality

Incongruence: Exists when there is a discrepancy between one’s experiences and self-image

Ideal self: Idealized image of oneself (the person one would like to be)

Possible self: Collection of thoughts, beliefs, feelings, and images concerning the person one could become

Conditions of worth: Internal standards of evaluation

Positive self-regard: Thinking of oneself as a good, lovable, worthwhile person

Organismic valuing: Natural, undistorted, full-body reaction to an experience

Unconditional positive regard: Unshakable love and approval

Personality Assessment

I

nterview (personality): Face-to-face meeting designed to gain information about someone’s personality, current psychological state, or personal history

Two Interview Types

Unstructured interview: Conversation is informal, and topics are discussed as they arise

Structured interview: Follows a prearranged plan, using a series of planned questions

Limitations

Halo effect: Tendency to generalize a favorable or unfavorable first impression to unrelated details of personality (make a good first impression)

Direct Observation

Assessing behavior through direct surveillance

Other Types of Personality Assessments

Behavioral assessment: Recording the frequency of specific behaviors

Situational test: Real-life situations are simulated so that someone’s spontaneous reactions can be observed and recorded

Personality Questionnaire

Paper-and-pencil measure consisting of questions that reveal personality aspects

Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2): Widely used objective personality questionnaire

Reliability

Reliability: Does a test give close to the same score each time it is given to the same person?

Validity

Does the test measure what it claims to measure?

Projective Tests

Psychological tests that use ambiguous or unstructured stimuli; person needs to describe the stimuli or make up stories about them

Rorschach Technique

Developed by Swiss psychologist Hermann Rorschach; contains 10 standardized inkblots (the “inkblot” test)

Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

Developed by Henry Murray, personality theorist; projective device consisting of 20 drawings (black and white cards) of various situations; people must make up stories about the drawings

Shyness

Tendency to avoid others and feeling uneasiness and strain when socializing

Social anxiety: Feeling of apprehension in the presence of others

Evaluation fears: Fears of being inadequate, embarrassed, ridiculed, or rejected

Self-defeating bias: Distortion of thinking that impairs a person’s behavior

Self-Consciousness

Private self-consciousness: Attention to inner feelings, thoughts, and fantasies

Public self-consciousness: Intense awareness of oneself as a social object