CHAPTER 15 LECTURE NOTES: PERSONALITY



CHAPTER 15 Lecture Notes: PERSONALITY

➢ Personality: individual's characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting

o Four basic perspectives:

1. Psychoanalytic

2. Trait

3. Humanistic

4. Social-cognitive

➢ 5. Freud's theory: proposes that childhood sexuality and unconscious motivations influence personality

Psychoanalytic Perspective

Psychoanalysis

➢ Technique of treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret 6. unconscious tensions

➢ Freud's psychoanalytic theory of personality sought to explain what he observed during psychoanalysis

➢ 7. Free Association

o method of exploring the unconscious

o person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing

➢ 8. Unconscious

o Freud’s theory: a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings and memories

o Current theory: information processing of which we are unaware

➢ 9. Preconscious: information that is not conscious, but is readily retrievable into conscious awareness

Personality Structure

➢ 10. ID: reservoir of unconscious psychic energy

o strives to satisfy 11. basic drives … sexual and aggressive

o operates on the 12. pleasure principle; demanding immediate gratification

➢ 13. SUPEREGO: part of personality that represents 14. internalized ideals

o provides standards for judgment and for future aspirations

➢ 15. EGO: largely conscious, 16. "executive" part of personality

o 17. mediates among the demands of the id, superego and ego

o operates on the 18. reality principle, satisfying the id's desires in ways that will realistically bring pleasure rather than pain

Personality Development

➢ Psychosexual Stages: childhood stages of development during which the pleasure-seeking energies focus on distinct erogenous zones

➢ 19. Oedipus Complex: boy's sexual desires towards his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the “rival” father

➢ 20. Electra Complex: came later…. girl's sexual desires towards her father and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the “rival” mother

➢ Freud's Psychosexual Stages

|STAGE |FOCUS |

|21. ORAL (0-18 months) |Pleasure center on the mouth … sucking, biting, chewing |

|22. ANAL (18-36 months) |Pleasure focuses on bowel & bladder elimination; coping with demands for control |

|23. PHALLIC (3-6 years) |Pleasure zone is genitals; coping with incestuous sexual feelings |

|24. LATENCY (6 to puberty) |Dormant sexual feelings |

|25. GENITAL (puberty & on …) |Maturation of sexual interests |

➢ 26. Identification: the process by which children incorporate their parents' values into their developing superegos

➢ 27. Gender Identity: one's sense of being male or female

➢ 28. Fixation: a lingering focus of pleasure-seeking energies at an earlier psychosexual stage, where conflicts were unresolved … nail biters or gum chewers may be fixated in the Oral Stage.

DEFENSE MECHANISMS

➢ 29. Defense Mechanisms: the ego's protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality

o 30. Repression: basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness

o 31. Regression: individual retreats when faced with anxiety, to a more infantile psychosexual stage where some psychic energy remains fixated … college freshman goes home for Thanksgiving, has mom wash clothes, fix favorite dinner, tuck him in at night, etc……

o 32. Reaction Formation: the ego unconsciously switches unacceptable impulses into their opposites. People may express feelings that are the opposite of their anxiety-arousing unconscious feelings.

o 33. Projection: people disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others

o 34. Rationalization: offers self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening, unconscious reasons for one's actions

o 35. Displacement: shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person .... when angry with your parents, you kick a hole in your bedroom door

NEO-FREUDIANS

✓ 36. Alfred Adler: importance of childhood social tension

✓ 37. Karen Horney: sought to balance Freud's masculine biases

✓ 38. Carl Jung: emphasizes collective unconscious … concept of a shared, inherited reservoir of memory traces from our species' history

ASSESSING THE UNCONSCIOUS

❖ 39. Projective Test: personality test, such as the Rorschach or T AT, that provides ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one's inner dynamics

❖ 40. Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the stories they make up about ambiguous scenes

❖ 41. Rorschach Inkblot Test: most widely used projective test, uses a set of 10 inkblots designed by Hermann Rorschach to identify people's inner feelings by analyzing their interpretations of the blots.

TRAIT PERSPECTIVE

❖ Trait: characteristic pattern of behavior; a disposition to feel and act, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports

❖ 42. Personality Inventory: questionnaire (often with true-false or agree-disagree items) on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits

Big Five Personality Factors

|TRAIT DIMENSION |DESCRIPTION |

|43. EMOTIONAL STABILITY |Calm versus anxious |

| |Secure versus insecure |

| |Self-satisfied versus self-pitying |

|44. EXTRAVERSION |Sociable versus retiring |

| |Fun-loving versus sober |

| |Affectionate versus reserved |

|45. OPENNESS |Imaginative versus practical |

| |Preference for variety versus preference for routine |

| |Independent versus conforming |

|46. AGREEABLE |Soft-hearted versus ruthless |

| |Trusting versus suspicious |

| |Helpful versus uncooperative |

|47. CONSCIENTIOUSNESS |Organized versus disorganized |

| |Careful versus careless |

| |Disciplined versus impulsive |

➢ 48. Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)

❖ The most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests

o Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (still considered its most appropriate use)

o Now used for many other screening purposes

o 49. Empirically Derived Test: test developed by testing a pool of items and then selecting those that discriminate between groups … similar to MMPI

EVALUATING THE TRAIT PERSPECTIVE

➢ Situational influences on behavior are important to consider

➢ People can fake 49.5 desirable responses on self-report measures of personality

➢ Averaging behavior across situations seems to indicate that people do have distinct personality traits

HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVE

➢ 50. Carl Rogers (1902-1987): focused on growth and fulfillment of individuals

▪ Requires three conditions:

• 51. Genuineness

• 52. Acceptance- unconditional positive regard: an attitude of total acceptance toward another person

• 53. Empathy

o Self- 54. Concept: all of our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in an answer to the question "Who am I"?"

o Self- 55. Esteem: one's feelings of high or low self-worth

o Self- 56. Serving Bias: a readiness to perceive oneself favorably

o 57. 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

o 58. Collectivism: giving priority to the goals of one's group (often one's extended family or work group) and defining one's identity accordingly.

Contrasts Between Individualism and Collectivism

|CONCEPT |INDIVIDUALISM |COLLECTIVISM |

|SELF |59. Independent |59. Interdependent |

| |(identity from individual traits) |(identity from belongings) |

|LIFE TASK |Discover and express one’s uniqueness |Maintain connections |

|WHAT MATTERS |60. Me, personal achievement and fulfillment; rights|We, group goals and solidarity; social |

| |and liberties |responsibilities and relationships |

|COPING METHOD |61. Change reality |62. Accommodate reality |

|MORALITY |Defined by individuals (self-based) |Defined by 63. social networks |

| | |(duty-based) |

|RELATIONSHIPS |Many, often temporary or casual; |Few, close and enduring; |

| |64. confrontation acceptable |65. harmony valued |

|ATTRIBUTING BEHAVIOR |Behavior reflects 66. one’s personality and |Behavior reflects 67. social norm and |

| |attitudes |roles |

EVALUATING THE HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVE

➢ Concepts like self-actualization are 68. vague

➢ Emphasis on self may promote self-indulgence and lack of concern for others.

Theory does not address reality of human capacity for 69. evil

➢ Theory has impacted popular ideas on child rearing, education, management, etc.

SOCIAL-COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE

➢ Reciprocal Determinism: 70. interacting influences between personality and environmental factors

➢ Personal Control: 71. our sense of controlling our environments rather than feeling helpless

➢ External Locus of Control: 72. perception that chance or outside forces beyond one's personal control determine one's fate

➢ Internal Locus of Control: 73. the perception that one controls one's own fate

➢ Learned Helplessness: 74. hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive events

EVALUATING THE SOCIAL-COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE

➢ Built from research on learning and cognition

➢ Fails to consider 75. unconscious motives and individual disposition

Today, 76. cognitive-behavioral theory is perhaps predominant psychological approach to explaining human behavior

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