Unit X Personality the units leading up to this one have discussed our similarities how we all develop perceive learn remember think and feel this unit will look at how we are individuals Personality your characteristic pattern of thinking feeling and acting ID: 622639
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Slide1
Personality
Unit XSlide2
Personality
the units leading up to this one have discussed our similarities
how we all develop, perceive, learn, remember, think, and feel
this unit will look at how we are individuals
Personality- your characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting
if your personality is distinctive and consistent, you are often said to have a strong personalitySlide3
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory proposed that childhood sexuality and unconscious motivations influence personality
Freud's current influence in psychological science has diminished but he is still one of the most well known psychologists in history
he became interested in psychology after seeing patients whose disorders made no neurological sense
Freud "discovered" something he called the unconsciousSlide4Slide5
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
the unconscious mind
by looking at someone's life, he started to think that blindness or deafness, with no obvious physiological cause, may be caused by not wanting to see or hear something that aroused intense anxiety
Freud first believed that hypnosis may be the key to entering someone's unconscious, but he found his patients to contain an uneven capacity for hypnosis
free association- a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassingSlide6
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
The Unconscious Mind
Freud believed that free association allowed him to trace a line back into someone's memory, producing a chain of thought leading into the patient's unconscious
once he could get into someone's unconscious he could retrieve and release painful unconscious memories often from childhood
he called this method
psychoanalysis
attributes our thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflictsSlide7
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
The Unconscious Mind
Freud believed the mind was like an iceberg with most of it hidden
our conscious awareness is the part of the iceberg that floats above the surface
below the surface is the
unconscious
a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories
information processing of which we are unaware
some of the unconscious thoughts we store temporarily in a preconscious area, from which we can retrieve them into conscious awarenessSlide8
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
The Unconscious Mind
Freud focused much of his research on the things we repress
repress- forcibly block from our consciousness because they would be too unsettling to acknowledge
Freud believed these feelings and ideas influence us
Freud did not believe anything was accidental in our behaviors
he believed free association was a way into the unconscious along with looking at someone's dreams and slips of the tongueSlide9
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
The Unconscious mind
Freud believed the manifest content of a dream was a censored expression of the dreamer's unconscious wishes
manifest content- remembered content of the dream
by analyzing dreams, Freud felt he could reveal the nature of their inner conflicts and release their inner tensionsSlide10
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Freud believed our personality comes from a conflict between our aggressive, pleasure-seeking biological impulses and the internalized social restraints against them
personality is the result of our efforts to resolve this conflict
people figure out ways to express these impulses in ways that bring satisfaction without bringing guilt or punishment Slide11
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Freud believed there were three interacting systems that worked to resolve this conflict
Id- located in the unconscious mind that strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives
operates on the pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification
newborn baby acts mainly on the urges of the Id
people that would rather party that think about their future Slide12
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Ego- largely found in the conscious mind and it is the executive part of personality that mediates among the demands of the id, superego, and reality
operates on the reality principle
tries to satisfy the id's desires in ways that will realistically bring pleasure rather than pain
around 4 or 5 a child's ego recognizes the demands of the newly emerging superegoSlide13
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Superego- represents internalized ideals and provides standards for judgment and for future aspirations
the voice of the conscience
forces the ego to consider the real and the ideal
focuses on how we ought to act
strives for perfection
someone with a strong superego may be virtuous but guilt-riddenSlide14
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
the ego struggles to mediate between the id and superego
a student that is sexually attracted to someone may satisfy both id and superego by joining a volunteer organization to which the desired person belongsSlide15Slide16Slide17Slide18
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Freud believed that personality forms during life's first few years
Freud's patients seemed to have problems rooted from early childhood
children pass through a series of psychosexual stages during which the id's pleasure seeking energies focus on distinct pleasure-sensitive areas of the body called erogenous zonesSlide19Slide20Slide21
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
during the phallic stage boys develop both unconscious sexual desires for their mother and jealousy and hatred for their father whom they consider to be a rival
because of these feelings boys feel guilt and a fear of punishment possibly by castration from their fathers
these feelings are called the
Oedipus Complex
some psychoanalysts believed that girls experience something called the
Electra ComplexSlide22
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Freud believed that children cope with these feelings by repressing them and identifying with the rival parent
he believed this was an
identification
process
children incorporate their parents' values into their developing superegos
gives us a sense of our gender identity as either a male or female
maladaptive behavior in the adult results from conflicts unresolved during earlier psychosexual stagesSlide23
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
if an earlier stage is not resolved a person can become fixated on something
fixation- a lingering focus of pleasure-seeking energies at an earlier psychosexual stage, where conflicts were unresolved
people who were either orally overindulged or deprived by early weaning might fixate at the oral stage
a oral fixation my show in the form of passive dependence like a nursing infant or by using excessive sarcasm
smoking or constantly eating may occur as well Slide24
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
those that never resolve the anal conflict between the desire to eliminate at will and potty training may be messy and disorganize which is anal expulsive or they my be controlling and compulsively neat which is anal retentiveSlide25
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
sometimes our ego fears losing control of the inner war between the id and the superego
this fear leads to anxiety and a lack of understanding of why we are feeling anxious
the ego will protect itself using
defense mechanisms
the ego's protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting realitySlide26
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Repression- the basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness
underlies all other defense mechanisms
this why we do not remember our childhood lust for our opposite sex parent
repression is incomplete as repressed thoughts can seep out during our dreams or slips of the tongueSlide27
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Regression- an individual faced with anxiety retreats to a more infantile psychosexual stage, where some psychic energy remains fixated
on the first day of school, a child may go back to sucking their thumb
homesick college students long for home
Reaction formation- the ego unconsciously switches unacceptable impulses into their opposites
I hate him becomes I love him
timidity becomes daringSlide28
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Projection- people disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others
"He
doesnt
trust me" may be a projection of "I don’t trust him“
the thief thinks everyone else is a thief
Rationalization- offers self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening unconscious reasons for one's actions
drinkers say they drink with friends to be social
students who fail may say "All work and no play makes a person dull" Slide29
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Displacement- shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person
students that are upset over an exam may snap at a roommate
defense mechanisms work by reducing anxiety by disguising out threatening impulses
the defends itself against disease and the ego defends itself against anxietySlide30
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Denial is often seen as a defense mechanism as well
refusing to admit that something unpleasant is happeningSlide31Slide32
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
in order to evaluate personality according to Freud's perspective, the researcher needs to find a path to the person's unconscious
psychoanalysts dismiss objective assessment tools
agree-disagree or true-false tests
only look at the conscious mind
Projective tests- a personality test that provides ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one's inner dynamicsSlide33
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Projective tests
provide an ambiguous stimulus then ask the test taker to describe it or tell a story about it
the stimulus has no real meaning so any description is a projection of the person's interests or conflictsSlide34
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Thematic Apperception Test(TAT)- a projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the stories they make up about ambiguous scenes
developed by Henry Murray
can assess achievement motivationSlide35
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Rorschach inkblot test- a set of 10 inkblots that seek to identify people's inner feelings by analyzing their interpretations of the blots
most widely used projective test
developed by Hermann Rorschach
if you see predatory animals in the inkblot, the examiner may infer you have aggressive tendenciesSlide36Slide37
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
many scientists believe the Rorschach test is not reliable or valid
no universally accepted system for scoring or interpreting the test
two raters may not agree at all on their interpretations for the same test taker
not very good at predicting behavior or at discriminating between groups
who is suicidal and who is not?Slide38
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
even with all the critics, the Rorschach is said to be used at least occasionally by 82 percent of clinicians
the biggest complaint of the test is that the test can diagnose many normal adults as pathological
TAT and draw a person test are respected a little moreSlide39
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Freud's writings were controversial but very popular
Neo-Freudians- psychoanalysts that accepted Freud's basic ideas of the id, ego, superego, unconscious, personality being shaped in childhood, and the use of defense mechanisms
placed more emphasis on the conscious mind
doubted that sex and
and
agression
were all-consuming motivationsSlide40
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Alfred Adler and Karen Horney
Neo-Freudians
agreed that childhood was important
believed childhood social, not sexual, tensions were crucial for personality formation
Adler studied feelings of inferiority during childhood
Horney studied childhood anxiety
Horney challenged Freud's belief that women have weak superegos and suffer from penis envy Slide41
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Carl Jung
Neo-Freudian
Freud's disciple turned dissenter
believed the unconscious contained more than our repressed thoughts and feelings
Collective unconscious- concept of a shared, inherited reservoir of memory traces from our species' historySlide42Slide43
Psychoanalytic perspective and personality
Psychodynamic Theory
emerged after Freud's death
do not talk about ids and egos and do not talk about the psychosexual stages
do agree with Freud that much of our mental life is unconscious, that childhood shapes our personality, and that we do struggle with inner conflicts between our wishes, fears, and values Slide44
Humanistic Perspective
by 1960 people were getting tired of Freud's negativity of people
Freud studied mostly "sick" people to develop his theories
Humanistic Psychologists wanted to look at ways "healthy" people strive for self-determination and self-realization
Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers were two humanistic psychologists that studied a person's potentialSlide45
Humanistic Perspective
Maslow says we are motivated by our hierarchy of needs that has a goal of self-actualization
Maslow studied healthy, creative people
studied people like Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, and Eleanor Roosevelt to develop his idea of self-actualization
each shared certain characteristicsSlide46
Humanistic Perspective
Carl Rogers agreed with most of Maslow's ideas
Rogers believed that people are basically good
unless thwarted by an environment that inhibits growth, we are like an acorn that is primed for growth and fulfillment
a growth promoting environment requires three things:
genuineness, acceptance, and empathy
genuine- being open with your own feelings, dropping your facades, and being transparent and self-disclosingSlide47
Humanistic Perspective
Acceptance- offering unconditional positive regard to other people
an attitude of total acceptance toward another person
you accept someone even with their faults
Empathy- sharing and mirroring our feelings and reflecting our meanings
he believed we rarely listen and understand others
these three things nurture proper growthSlide48
Humanistic Perspective
Rogers and Maslow believed a central feature of a person's personality is their
self-concept
all our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, "Who am I?"
positive self-concept leads to a positive view of the world
the goal of therapists, parents, and teachers should be to help others develop a positive self-conceptSlide49
Humanistic Perspective
humanistic psychologists would often use questionnaires to evaluate a person's self-concept
Carl Rogers believed that when someone's ideal for themselves and the actual self are nearly alike, the self-concept is positive
believed that any standardized assessment of personality is depersonalizing
believed that interviews and personal conversation provide a good understanding of a person's unique experiencesSlide50
Humanistic Perspective
humanistic psychologists are like Freud in that their impact is waning but has been pervasive
their ideas have influenced counseling, education, child-rearing, and management
many people believe in Rogers and Maslow's that self-concept is the key to happiness and success, acceptance and empathy help nurture positive feelings about oneself, and that people are basically good and capable of self-improvementSlide51
Humanistic Perspective
Critics have the following problems with Humanism
concepts are vague and subjective
does not use scientific descriptions
use's Maslow's personal values and ideals
the ideas promoted by Humanism can lead to self-indulgence, selfishness, and an erosion of moral restraints
fails to appreciate the reality of our human capacity for evilSlide52
Humanistic Perspective
Humanists defend Humanism by saying:
a secure,
nondefensive
self-acceptance is actually the first step toward loving others and does not cause self-indulgenceSlide53
Humanistic Perspective
humanistic psychologists debate among themselves about whether people are basically good
action requires enough realism to fuel concern and enough optimism to provide hope
humanism provides the hope but not the realism
Rogers did not find that this evil is inherent in human nature
evil springs not from human nature but from toxic cultural influencesSlide54
The Trait Perspective
Gordon
Allport
developed this perspective after interviewing Freud
he
would try to describe personality in terms of fundamental
traits
traits- people's characteristic behaviors and
conscious motives
he was not concerned with explaining individual traits but was interested in describing the traits
he
would classify the traits into different typesSlide55
The Trait Perspective
Business and career counselors try to classify people according to Carl Jung's personality types
in
order to assess these types the
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator can be
used
126 questions
choices
are offered and the choices chosen are
grouped
into certain typesSlide56
The Trait Perspective
How can psychologists condense the number of traits and group them more efficiently?
Factor
analysis- the statistical procedure to identify clusters of test items that tap basic components of intelligence
Hans
and Sybil Eysenck developed to a few dimensions or
types
Extraversion-Introversion and Emotional
stability-instability Slide57Slide58
The Trait Perspective
assessment techniques that come from trait concepts try to profile a person's behavior patterns
some
trait scales only look at one trait at a time
multiple
traits can be studied using
personality
inventories
a questionnaire on which people respond to
items designed
to gauge a wide range of feelings
and behaviors
used to assess selected personality traitsSlide59
The Trait Perspective
the most researched and widely used personality inventory is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory(MMPI)
the
MMPI items were
empirically
derived
a test developed by testing a pool of items and
then selecting
those that discriminate between
groups
the MMPI-2 is the modern day
version
includes a lie scale to try and detect if someone
is lying
in their responses to try and impress someoneSlide60
The Trait Perspective
personality inventories are scored
objectively
a
computer can administer and score the test
even
though it is objective it does not mean it is
valid
often
times people use it for other reasons than
what
it has been found to be valid for
self-report
personality tests are the most widely used method of assessing traits
David
Funder believes peer reports are more trustworthySlide61
The Trait Perspective
the Big Five- personality factors that are studied by using personality
inventories
it
specifies where you are in the dimensions
the
dimensions are on the next slideSlide62Slide63
The Trait Perspective
the Big Five traits are considered to be pretty stable with a possible slight change during the years right after college
the
Big Five describe different personality traits in different cultures pretty well
person-situation
controversy- when you look for genuine personality traits that persist over time and across
situations
in
order to consider someone friendly they must
show
it over time and in different situationsSlide64
The Trait Perspective
some people argue against the consistency of the Big Five and say that some behaviors are not consistent enough
the
critics believe the scores on the tests can only mildly predict someone's behaviorSlide65
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Social-Cognitive Perspective- views behavior as influenced by the interaction between persons and their social
context
proposed
by Albert Bandura
social-cognitive
theorists believe we learn many of our behaviors either through conditioning or by observing others and modeling our behaviors after theirs
they
focus on how we and our environment interact with each otherSlide66
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Bandura called the process of interacting with our environment,
reciprocal
determinism
this
is the interacting influences between
personality and
environmental
factors
example-
children's TV-viewing habits influence
their viewing
preferences, which influence how TV
affects their
current behaviorSlide67Slide68
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Social-cognitive theorists emphasize our sense of
personal
control
our
sense of controlling our environment rather than
feeling
helpless
External
locus of control- the perception that chance or outside forces beyond one's personal control determine one's fate
Internal
locus of control- the perception that one controls one's own fateSlide69
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Self-control- the ability to control impulses and delay
gratification
predicts
adjustment, better grades, and social
success
according to some psychologists
self-control
takes energy and must have a chance to replenish
people
who feel helpless perceive control as external
dogs
strapped to a harness and that receive repeated shocks, with no opportunity to avoid them, learn a sense of helplessnessSlide70
Social-Cognitive Perspective
even when that dog is given a chance to escape by jumping over a hurdle, the dogs cower as if without hope
learned
helplessness- the hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive eventsSlide71
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Spotlight effect- overestimating others' noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunders
Self-esteem-
one's feelings of high or low self-worth
Self-serving
bias- a readiness to perceive oneself
favorably
accept
good deeds more than bad
ones
consider
yourself better than averageSlide72
Social-Cognitive Perspective
Individualism- giving priority to one's own goals over group goals, and defining one's identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identifications
Collectivism-
giving priority to the goals of one's group and defining one's identity
accordingly
terror management theory- proposes that faith in one's worldview and the pursuit of self-esteem provide protection against a deeply rooted fear of deathSlide73
Other Terms
False Consensus Effect- the tendency to overestimate the extent to which others share our beliefs and our behaviors
People who cheat on their taxes or break speed limits tend to think many others do it as well
People who are happy, kind, and trustworthy tend to see others as the same
This is the term used by today’s researchers for Freud’s idea of projectionSlide74
Other Terms
Behavioral approach- in personality theory, this perspective focuses on the effects of learning on our personality development
We are conditioned to repeat certain behaviors, and we learn by observing and imitating others
A child with a very controlling parent may learn to follow orders rather than think independently, and may exhibit a more timid personalitySlide75
Other Terms
Positive psychology- the scientific study of optimal human functioning; aims to discover and promote strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive
Shares with humanistic psychology an interest in advancing human fulfillment
Its more scientific than humanism
Positive psychology is an umbrella term for the study of positive emotions, positive character traits, and enabling institutionsSlide76
Other Terms
Self-efficacy- one’s sense of competence and effectiveness
People who feel good about themselves have fewer sleepless nights
They succumb less easily to pressures to conform
They are more persistent at difficult tasks
Less shy, anxious, and lonelySlide77
Other Terms
Narcissism- excessive self-love and self-absorption
Generation Me(born in the 1980s and 1990s) is expressing more narcissism by agreeing more often with statements such as, “If I ruled the world, it would be a better place”