6 Identity and personality

Question 1

What is the theory of gender schema?

Answer 1

That components of gender identity are transmitted through cultural and societal means.

Question 2

Self-concept is all encompassing and our answer to the question ‘who am I?’ Identity is a little different in that it implied belonging to groups and can shift in different contexts.

Our identities are organized according to _________

Answer 2

Our identities are organized according to a hierarchy of salience. Such that we let the situation dictate which identity holds the most important for us at any given moment (e.g. sexual orientation becoming more salient at pride).

Salience associated with: amount of work invested in identity, gratification associated with identity, amount of self-esteem associated

Question 3

What is self discrepancy theory?

Answer 3

Maintains that each of us has three selves.

• Actual self: way we see ourselves currently
• Ought self: our representation of the way others think we should be
• Ideal self: who we would like to be

The closer these three selves are to one-another the higher our self-esteem/self-worth

Question 4

What is self-efficacy

What are the pitfalls of too much self-efficacy or too little?

Answer 4

Our belief in our ability to succeed.

Too much: overconfidence (dangerous)

Too little: learned helplessness (possibly leading to clinical depression)

Question 5

Freud theorized that from birth there is a need to reduce libidinal tension through various stages (drive theory of motivation). Give his stages and the neurosis that could arise from each fixation

Answer 5

• Oral stage: orally fixated adult would likely exhibit excessive dependency
• Anal stage: elimination and retention of waste. Potty training. Anally fixated adult would be OCD (anal retentiveness) or sloppy
• Phallic/oedipal stage: oedipal conflict for male children (envying dad), Electra conflict for females. Libido is sumblimated and child adopts dad’s moral/sexual identities.
• Genital stage: beginning at puberty and lasting through adulthood. Failure to resolve childhood sexual traumas results in homosexuality, asexuality, or fetishism may result.

THIS IS ALL DEBUNKED

Question 6

Describe Erikson’s psychosocial development stages

Answer 6

Mastery of each stage is not required to move on to the next. They are conflicts and failure has a consequence as well as success. Successful resolution of a stage marked by answering an existential question to imbue an individual with skills and traits that are carried through subsequent stages.

• trust vs. mistrust stage (0 to 1 years): If resolved successfully the child will come to trust environment and himself. If mistrust wins, suspicious of the world possibly for life.
• Autonomy vs. shame and doubt (1 - 3 yrs): Success is feeling able to exert control over world. Unfavourable outcome is external locus of control.
• Initiative vs. guilt (3 - 6 yrs): Success is sense of purpose, ability to enjoy success and initiate activities. If guilt wins, child may be afraid to seek success or overcompensate by showing off.
• Industry vs. inferiority (6 - 12 yrs): Success if feeling of competency. Failure is low self-esteem.
• Identity vs. role confusion (12 to 20 yrs): Physiological revolution, the favourable outcome is fidelity, the ability to see oneself as unique and integrated with sustained loyalties. Unfavourable outcome is confusion about identity and amorphous personality that can change daily.
• Intimacy vs. isolation (20 to 40 yrs): Love, intimacy, partnership. Failure is distancing and the ability to only have superficial relationships with others.
• Generativity vs. stagnation (40 to 65 yrs): Sucess if being productive, caring, and contributing member of society. Failure results in sense of stagnation and becoming self-indulgent, bored, and self centered.
• Integrity vs. despair (65+ yrs): If favourably resolved, will result in wisdom, acceptance of a worthwhile life, readiness to face death. Failure brings bitterness and fear of impending death.

Question 7

List the four main theories of personality/moral development

Answer 7

• Freud: psychosexual development
• Erikson: psychosocial development (conflicts)
• Kohlberg: moral reasoning (preconventional, conventional, and postconventional moral stages)
• Vygotsky: cultural and biosocial development

Question 8

Describe Kohlberg’s moral reasoning theory of moral development.

Answer 8

six stages broken into three ages/phases

1. Obedience (preconventional morality, preadolescence)
2. Self-interest (preconventional morality, preadolescence)
3. Conformity (conventional morality, adolescence to adulthood)
4. Law and order (conventional morality, adolescence to adulthood)
5. Social contract (postconventional morality, adulthood (if at all))
6. Universal human ethics (postconventional morality, adulthood (if at all))

As people move through stages the last stage is abandoned.

Question 9

Describe Vygotsky’s biosocial development theory for cognitive development

Answer 9

Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of human learning describes learning as a social process and the origination of human intelligence in society or culture. The major theme of Vygotsky’s theoretical framework is that social interaction plays a fundamental role in the development of cognition.

Zone of proximal development: The zone of proximal development, often abbreviated as ZPD, is the difference between what a learner can do without help, and what they can’t do (e.g. learning to ride a bike with an adult’s help). The concept was introduced, but not fully developed, by psychologist Lev Vygotsky

Question 10

What is theory of mind?

Answer 10

involved in the influence of others on identity.

The core concepts involved in Theory of Mind are beliefs, desires, and intentions, which are used to understand why someone acts in a certain way or to predict how someone will act (Kloo et al., 2010). Overall, Theory of Mind involves understanding another person’s knowledge, beliefs, emotions, and intentions and using that understanding to navigate social situations. A commonly used task to measure Theory of Mind is a false-belief task, such as this:

• Show the child a Band-Aid box and ask the child what he/she thinks is inside the box. He or she will likely respond “Band-Aids.”
• Open the box and show him/her that there is a toy pig inside, while saying “Let’s see….it’s really a pig inside!”, then close the box.
• Now, as you are bringing a toy boy who has been hidden up until now into view, the adults says “Peter has never ever seen inside this Band-Aid box. Now, here comes Peter. So, what does Peter think is in the box? Band-Aids or a pig?”

Question 11

What is the concept of the looking-glass self and reference group?

Answer 11

The looking-glass self is a social psychological concept introduced by Charles Horton Cooley in 1902 (McIntyre 2006). The concept of the looking-glass self describes the development of one’s self and of one’s identity through one’s interpersonal interactions within the context of society.

Reference group: A reference group includes individuals or groups that influence our opinions, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. They often serve as our role models and inspiration. Marketers view reference groups as important because they influence how consumers interpret information and make purchasing decisions.

Question 12

Give the four categories of theories of personality

Answer 12

• psychoanalytic (pstychodynamic):id (reckless desire), ego (reasonable reality based), superego (ideal/perfect personality), defense mechanisms
• Humanistic (phenomenological):
• Type and trait:
• Behavourist:

Question 13

Freud: Thoughts that we aren’t currently aware of are _____ and thoughts that have been repressed are _____.

Answer 13

Freud: Thoughts that we aren’t currently aware of are PRECONSCIOUS and thoughts that have been repressed are UNCONSCIOUS.

Repressing is a defense mechanism, the ego’s way of forcing undesired thoughts and urges to the unconscious. Suppressing is a more deliberate, conscious form of forgetting.

Question 14

What is reaction formation under Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality?

Answer 14

Defense mechanism

In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation (German: Reaktionsbildung) is a defense mechanism in which emotions and impulses which are anxiety-producing or perceived to be unacceptable are mastered by exaggeration of the directly opposing tendency.

e.g. a neckbeard expresses anger and hate towards a woman he wants but knows he cannot get.

Question 15

What does a Roschack inkblot test examine?

Answer 15

A subject’s projections, his or her unconscious feelings revealed by projection.

Similar to the thematic apperception test, which consists of pictures that are presented to the client who is asked to make up a story about each one. The story will presumably elucidate the client’s own unconscious thoughts and feelings.

Projecting is a defense mechanism.

Question 16

What is rationalization under Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality?

Answer 16

Defense mechanism

justification of behaviours in a manner that is acceptable to the self and society.

Question 17

What are displacement and sublimation under Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality?

Answer 17

Defense mechanisms

Displacement: Transferance of an undesired urge from one person/object to another (e.g. yelling at spouse instead of boss)

Sublimation: Transformation of unacceptable urges into socially acceptable behaviours. E.g. pent up sexual urges sublimated into drive for business success or artistic creativity.

Question 18

What are Jungian archetypes? List four important Jungian archetypes

Answer 18

Carl Jung understood archetypes as universal, archaic patterns and images that derive from the collective unconscious and are the psychic counterpart of instinct. They are inherited potentials which are actualized when they enter consciousness as images or manifest in behavior on interaction with the outside world.

They have an emotional component and may differ somewhat between cultures

• Persona: the aspect of our personality that we present to the world
• Anima: a man’s inner woman (emotional behaviour)
• Animus: a woman’s inner man (power seeking)
• Shadow: unpleasant and socially reprehensible thoughts, feelings, and actions in our consciousness.

Question 19

Jung described three dichotomies of personality. List these

Answer 19

• Extraversion vs introversion
• Sensing vs. iNtuiting (N)
• Thinking vs. feeling
• Judging vs. perceiving

Became Myers-Briggs Type Inventory personality test

Question 20

What is the creative life under psychoanalytic theory of personality?

Answer 20

Adler: The force by which each individual shapes his uniqueness and establishes his personality.

Question 21

What is object relations theory under Psychoanalytic theory of personality?

Answer 21

Object Relations Theory is a theory of relationships between people, in particular within a family and especially between the mother and her child. A basic tenet is that we are driven to form relationships with others and that failure to form successful early relationships leads to later problems.

Question 22

Describe the humanistic perspective of personality

Answer 22

Humanistic and phenomenological theorists focus on the value of individuals and take a more person-centered approach, describing those ways in which healthy people strive toward self-realization.

Humanism often associated with gestalt therapy (holistic view of self)

Question 23

What is Kurt Lewin’s force of field theory under the humanistic perspective of personality?

Answer 23

Lewin, a social psychologist, believed the “field” to be a Gestalt psychological environment existing in an individual’s (or in the collective group) mind at a certain point in time that can be mathematically described in a topological constellation of constructs. The “field” is very dynamic, changing with time and experience. When fully constructed, an individual’s “field” (Lewin used the term “life space”) describes that person’s motives, values, needs, moods, goals, anxieties, and ideals.

Lewin believed that changes of an individual’s “life space” depend upon that individual’s internalization of external stimuli (from the physical and social world) into the “life space”. Although Lewin did not use the word “experiential” (see experiential learning), he nonetheless believed that interaction (experience) of the “life space” with “external stimuli” (at what he calls the “boundary zone”) were important for development (or regression). For Lewin, development (or regression) of an individual occurs when their “life space” has a “boundary zone” experience with external stimuli. Note, it is not merely the experience that causes change in the “life space”, but the acceptance (internalization) of external stimuli.

Lewin took these same principles and applied them to the analysis of group conflict, learning, adolescence, hatred, morale, German society, etc. This approach allowed him to break down common misconceptions of these social phenomena, and to determine their basic elemental constructs. He used theory, mathematics, and common sense to define a force field, and hence to determine the causes of human and group behavior.

Question 24

Define personal construct psychology

Answer 24

Personal construct theory or personal construct psychology (PCP) is a theory of personality and cognition developed by the American psychologist George Kelly. From the theory, Kelly derived a psychotherapy approach and also a technique called the repertory grid interview that helped his patients to analyze their own constructs (schemas or ways of seeing the world) with minimal intervention or interpretation by the therapist. The repertory grid was later adapted for various uses within organizations, including decision-making and interpretation of other people’s world-views

Question 25

How is person-centered (nondirective) therapy relatively unique?

Answer 25

Lacks consideration of the unconscious (such as psychoanalysis) or faulty learning (as behaviorists would consider).

A psychotherapeutic approach in which the psychotherapist refrains from giving advice or interpretation as the client is helped to identify conflicts and to clarify and understand feelings and values. Compare directive therapy.

Question 26

What is unconditional positive regard?

Answer 26

A therapeutic approach by which the therapist accepts the client completely and expresses empathy in order to promote a positive therapeutic environment.

Question 27

Describe the type and trait perspectives on personality

Answer 27

Type theorists: attempted to create a taxonomy of personality types (e.g. Myers-Briggs Type inventory)

Trait theorists: prefer to describe individual personality as the sum of a person’s characteristic behaviors (big five: Openness, Conscientiousness , Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism)

Question 28

What are the big five traits of personality?

Answer 28

OCEAN

Openness
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism

Question 29

Describe the three traits in the PEN model

Answer 29

• psychoticism (social deviance)
• Extraversion
• Neuroticism (measure of emotional arousal in stressful situations)

Has been expanded to the big five traits:

OCEAN

Openness
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism

Question 30

Define the following types of traits:

• cardinal
• central
• secondary

Answer 30

Cardinal: traits around which a person organizes their life

Central traits: major characteristics of the personality that are easy to infer (e.g. charisma, uniqueness, nerve, and talent)

Secondary traits: traits that appear to closed groups or specific social situations

Question 31

Define N-ach

Answer 31

Need for achievement (N-Ach) refers to an individual’s desire for significant accomplishment, mastering of skills, control, or high standards. The term was first used by Henry Murray and associated with a range of actions.

These individuals avoid high risk (to avoid failing) and low risk (due to low sense of achievement) activities.

Question 32

Define reciprocal determinism

Answer 32

Reciprocal determinism is the theory set forth by psychologist Albert Bandura which states that a person’s behavior both influences and is influenced by personal factors and the social environment. Bandura accepts the possibility that an individual’s behavior may be conditioned through the use of consequences.

Question 33

What are the two approaches for defining psychological disorders?

Answer 33

Biomedical: interventions for symptom reduction

Biopsychosocial approach: Using direct and indirect therapy to tackle all aspects (biological, psychological, social)