12 - Persons & Situations Flashcards
Describe Kurt Lewin’s (1936) ‘field theory’ where behaviour (B) =…
B = f (P, E).
Behaviour is a function of person - needs, beliefs, values etc. & environment - social environment, psychological field.
What was Walter Mischel’s two key claims in his work that promoting the rise of situationism (over personality/behaviourism)?
- Personality is a weak predictor of behaviour (r = .30).
- Behaviour varies considerably over situations.
Therefore, personality traits are untenable.
How did Milgram’s obedience study commit the Fundamental Attribution Error?
It assumed the subject’s obedience reflected personal disposition as opposed to the potency of situational pressures & constraints.
What mistake in relation to the classification of traits does Shweder’s (1975) ‘Conceptual Similarity Crique’ suggest?
That ‘how ppl classify’ is mistaken for ‘how to classify ppl’… i.e. personality is indicative of classification system ppl used
as opposed to how ppl actually represent personalities.
What are some critiques of Mischel’s argument that ‘traits were weak predictors of behaviour (r = .30) & therefore untenable?
- Imperfect predictors do not make the constructs untenable.
- Effects of situations are no stronger than traits.
What are some critiques of Mischel’s argument that ‘behaviour varies considerably over situations.. & therefore untenable? & what was Gordon Allport’s rebuttal?
- Personality theorists’ never suggested traits are stable across every single setting & situation…
Allport - traits are not trying to explain ppl in every single situation, and in fact, would hold that some traits are not relevant to some situations.
Further, traits aren’t predictive of every single situation. They’re context-dependent.
Epstein (1979) studied the consistency of behaviour as a function of aggregation (more days measured) across four diary studies… What did he find?
Consistency increases with aggregation for 7 out of 8 of the behaviours.
What is the ‘thin slice’ paradigm & what did Borkenau at al. (2004) find from their study using this concept?
Twin Study where situations were set up to elicit different behaviours.. .unique
situations.
Finding:
- Found that, fewer situations were less reliable… i.e. stability of cross-situational
behaviour increased as a function of aggregation (more situations)… evidence for
cross-situations consistency…
- Also found Relations between other-rated personality and behaviour increased as a function of aggregation.
How did Fleeson (2001) should that traits can be flexibility but stable overtime? (using Exp. Sampling Methods).
Experience Sampling Methods (ESM).
- Model software that gets ppl to rate things; mood, behaviour etc.
- Surveys 5 x per day for 13 days… asked if they had been extraverted or other traits over last hour..
Found:
Individuals vary over time & space in their state expressions, however, average staties in week 1, predicted average states in wk 2, i.e. stability over time.
How does Sherman et al. (2015) describe the relationship between personality traits and state expressions?
Traits are useful for predicting state expressions across many situations. A single state in a single situation is subsequently dependent on the characteristics of his or her situation.
What is the ‘strong situation’ in social psychology & what does it do to the predictive validity of personality?
Where clear behavioural expectations & incentives/threats for compliance or individual ability to meet the demands of the situation exists - traits cease to predict behaviour.
Which traits predicted larger shocks in a conceptual replication of Milgram’s study?
A, r = .26 & C, r = .34 (both increased shock).
What is Trait Activation Theory?
- Trait-relevant situations strengthen trait-behaviour associations…
- Traits could be responses to a broad class of stimuli & situations…
In Judge & Zapata’s (2014) meta-anal of personality & job performance, how did the ‘strength’ of the work environment change the predictive validity of the Big 5?
Weak job situations - unstructured etc - All 5 predicted performance more strongly.
Strong - E stronger where social skills demands were high.
O where creativity/innovation were high.
C were attention to detail.
Describe the 3 person situation transcations
Situational Selection; traits predict the situation one is in.
- Extraversion> risk > accidents
Situational Evocation: traits impact dynamics of the situation.
- e.g. aggressive person interacts with the calmer environment may change the situation.
Situational perception: traits shape appraisal (schemas?) & how they experience situations
- e.g. N > negativity & frustrations.
