8. Types, Traits and Interactionism Flashcards
What are the themes of the dispositional approach?
- Continuity in thoughts, feelings, behaviors
- Focus on individual differences rather than intrapersonal processes
- Differing approaches of theorist
What are the two different approaches of theorists in the dispositional approach
o Identification, classification and measurement of traits and types
o Identification and understanding of differences in needs that underlie behaviour
What are the 4 types of humours proposed by Hippocrates 2400 years ago?
Choleric, Melancholic, Sanguine and Phlegmatic
What is the character of a person with an Endomorph body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
relaxed, sociable, tolerant, comfort-loving, peaceful
What is the shape of an Endomorph body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
Pulm, buxom, developed visceral structure
What is the character of a person with an Mesomorph body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
Active, assertive, vigorous, cobative
What is the shape of an Mesomorph body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
Muscular
What is the character of a person with an Ectomorph (cerebrotonic) body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
Quiet, fragile, restrained, non-assertive, sensitive
What is the shape of an Ectomorph body type in Sheldon’s Body Shape Theory?
lean, delicate, poor muslces
Who was Meyer Friedman?
An Americal Cardiologist
What did Meyer Friedman hypothesise?
Hypothesized that his patients were driven, impatient people, who sat on the edge of their seats when waiting.
What was Meyer Friedman’s Type A personality?
workaholics, always busy, driven, somewhat impatient, and so on.
What was Meyer Friedman’s Type B personality?
laid back and easy going
How are types changed across the lifespan?
They dont, they are Categorical, distinct & stable across the life span
What do Types suggest about individuals?
Individual is either an introvert OR an extravert; melancholic OR sanguine
What are variations in types considered?
Variations are considered perceptual distortions rather than reflections of basic personality
What is the description of types?
– Discontinuous categories
– Represent qualitative differences in people
– Labeling convenience
– Used commonly in organisations (e.g., team building, communication workshops)
– Often viewed as biologically or genetically based
What is the description of traits?
– Continuous dimensions (e.g. sociability, aggressiveness)
– Represent quantitative differences in people
– Individual differences reflect differences in amount of a trait
– Constellation of traits scores create unique profile of a person
What is the Nomothetic view of traits?
o Sees traits as universal
o Comparison among individuals is possible
o Individuality reflected in unique combinations of traits
Where does the Nomothetic view of traits come from?
From the Greek meaning ‘proposition of the law’
What is the idiographic view of traits?
o Sees traits as idiosyncratic, not universal
o Not all traits are shared
o Traits may differ in connotation and importance among people
o Comparisons may be not be possible
Which is the dominant perspective of traits in psychology>
Nomothetic
What are the key issues with traits?
- How many basic traits are there?
- Which ones are they?
- Essentially, how to define and organize the many ways we describe personality?
What is the theoretical approach to deciding the nature of personality?
Researcher has an idea of what they seek to measure derived from literature, research, observations etc
What is the Empirical approach to deciding the nature of personality?
primarily derived from factor analysis
Why is Hans Eysenck?
a treat theorist
What was Hans Eysenck approach to studying personality?
Approach was emanated from theory
What did Eysenck propose to underlie dimensions of personality?
supertraits
What are the Supertraits proposed by Eysenck?
Extraversion, Neuroticism, & (later) Psychoticism.
What are the dispositions that feed into Eysenck supertraits called?
Component traits
How did Eysenck refine his approach?
Eysenck used factor analysis to refine rather than define his approach.
How did Eysenck start his thories?
Eysenck started with personality descriced in ancient scripts (e.g. Hippocrates)
What theoretical approach did Wiggens, Phillips, & Trapnell, 1989 adopt?
Interpersonal Circle
What does the interpersonal Circle theory assume?
Assumes that core traits derive from those that concern interpersonal functioning
what are the two core traits in the interpersonal circle theory
- Dominance (Dominant Submissive)
* Love (Cold-hearted Warm-agreeable
Where does the individual difference arise from in the interpersonal circle approach?
combinations of the two dimensions (dominance and love)
What approach did Gordon Alport take?
a theoretical/research basis for approach
What was Gordon Alport first to do?
First to extensively examine classification system
What were the classifications of traits proposed by Gordon Alport?
- Secondary traits; many of them, least important
- Central traits; are the 5-10 traits that best describe personality
- Cardinal traits; some individuals are dominated by a single all-important trait.
- Functional Autonomy; behaviour that is acquired for one set of motives to be satisfied that are later used to satisfy another motive
What is factor analysis?
Statistical technique for reducing large numbers of intercorrelations into basic underlying dimensions
How do factor analyses indicate underlying traits?
Patterns of commonality (covariance) between descriptors indicate underlying traits
What can results of factor analysis sed light on?
Results of factor analysis can shed light on the structure of personality
What is the caveat of factor analysis?
What you get out of a factor analysis depends on what you put in
What is Factor analysis a tool for?
FA is a tool used to make sense of these personality descriptions.
What is the process of factor analysis?
- Based on correlation, FA looks at how all items entered into an equation covary (to what extent all pairs of variables relate to each other).
- Next, a factor extraction of the correlation matrix essentially sorts out and groups variables based on patterns of covariation.
- The factors that emerge are then labeled.
Who demonstrated how to decide the nature of personality based on an empirical approach?
Raymond Cattell
How did Cattell apply the empirical approach to decide the nature of personality?
o Started with 4500 words (already reduced by Allport & Odbert 1936)
o He applied a Lexical Criteria: notion that important qualities will have more adjectives to describe them than less important ones.
o Factor analyzed 171 trait names
o Resulted in 16 primary factors of personality such as relaxed vs tense and trusting vs vigilent
What did Robert R McCraw develop and Paul Costa develop?
The big 5 personalities
Why is there disagreements about the exact nature of the 5 traits?
- Factor analysis is used to identify factors
- Labeling of factors is subjective
- Results depend heavily on the items you start with
What are the characteristics of neuroticism?
anxiety hostility depression self-consciousness impulsivity vulnerability
What are the characteristics of extraversion?
warmth gregarious assertive activity excitement seeking positive emotion
What are the characteristics of openness?
Fantasy Aesthetics feelings actions ideas values
What are the characteristics of agreeableness?
trust straight-forwardness altruism Compliance modesty tender-minded
What are the characteristics of conscientiousness?
Competence order dutiful achievement striving self-discipline deliberation
What are other labels for extraversion?
Social adaptability; Assertiveness; Surgency
What is extraversion reflected through?
behavioral and affective channels
What is the life domain for extraversion?
power
What are other labels for agreeableness?
:Conformity; friendly compliance; likeability
What is the relevant life domain for agreeableness?
love
What is agreeableness reflected through?
behavioral, affective, and cognitive channels
What are other labels of conscientiousness?
Responsibility; will to achieve
What is the relevant life domain for conscientiousness?
Work
What is conscientiousness reflected mostly through?
cognitive channels
What are other labels of neuroticism?
Emotional control; emotional lability
What is the relevant life domain for neuroticism?
Affect
What is neuroticism reflected through
affective channels
What are other labels of openess to experience?
Culture; inquiring intellect; intelligence
What is the relevant life domain for openness to experience?
Intellect
What is openness to experience reflected mostly through?
Reflected mostly through cognitive channels with some affect and behaviours input
Which of the big 5 has the least consensus about meaning?
openness to experience
What are other considerations of the big five?
• Are all traits included?
o What about evaluative words (e.g., good, bad, excellent, evil)
o Including these words may create 2 more factors (positive and negative valence)
• What is the best level of specificity?
o Perhaps 2 higher-order factors (socialization from N, A, & C and personal growth from E & O)
o Lower-order facets are more predictive of many socially significant behaviors
o Dimensions beyond the big 5 (Saucier & Goldberg, 1998, Paunonen & Jackson, 2000 etc)
Why do some people say that behaviour is not trait like?
o Behaviour across contexts tends to vary
o Low association between trait self-reports and behavior
o Walter Mischel’s personality coefficient (r ≈ .30)
Why are there low correlations between behaviour and traits?
o Faulty trait self-reports of personality
o Faulty measurement of behaviour
Why was there faulty measurement of behaviour when determining a correlation between traits and behaviours?
As many items test a trait but behaviour usually only has 1 measure, correlations will be low so Aggregation of behavior (measure behaviour more than once and combine data) is a solution; Epstein, 1979)
What was a major attack on the trait theory?
Situationism
What was the assumption of situationism?
- Situations really drives behavior
* Differences in personality are irrelevant
What is the weakness of situationism?
Data doest support it.
What was another attach on the trait theory?
Interactionism
What was the assumption of interactionism?
Differences in personality and situations interact to cause behaviour
What view of behaviour does interactionism suggest?
Analysis of Variance
e.g. Effect of personality on behaviour “depends on” strong vs. weak situations
What are the individual differences in consistency?
that people vary in strength of dispositions and people vary in consistency of specific traits
What did the Bem & Allen study about people varying in consistency of specific traits show?
Association between a personality trait and behaviour is higher in people who see themselves as being consistent on the trait
Why do people vary in strength of dispositions
Due to self-monitoring
How do high and low self-monitors differ?
- High self-monitors get situational cues from environment
* Low self-monitors don’t monitor situational cues
How does personalities influence situations?
- Personality influences the situations people choose to enter (e.g., church, scuba diving, work, even marriage partners)
- People evoke different responses from others
what is the result of personalities influencing situations?
Personality can influence situations such that the situation is actually different
When is personality coefficient someone higher?
When analysis is restricted to examination of carefully conducted studies
What is the size of correlated limited by?
Size of correlation is limited by the fact that behaviour is multiply-determined
What is the newer view of traits?
Personality is linked to behaviour only when in a situation that brings it out. Patterns of linkages between situations and actions vary among people
What do patterns of linkages in the newer view of traits represent?
represent individuality, uniqueness and differences represent idiographic differences in trait expression
What does assessment of personality represent?
Represents an important focus of the trait perspective.
What is the common nature personality assessment?
self-report
What are personality assessments often used to create?
personality profiles
What potential problems are there in investigating and/or finding cultural differences in personality?
o Ethics: problem not in the facts but in what some people may do with that e.g., discrimination, oppression and even genocide
o Conceptual problems: individual characterisations versus cultural characterisations
o Empirically: ethnocentric & xenophobic bias
Is the five factor model universally applicable?
- 50 cultures; college/university students
- Observer ratings – no self-report bias
- Rated adults or students (2 groups) they know well on the NEO-PI-R
- FA supported structure on most cultures (replicated or at least recognition)
In the Mid 19th century what did Adolf Bastian propose and idea of?
proposed the idea of the “psychic unity of mankind” - thought all humans were a single species & must therefore share all basic cognitive and psychological characteristics.
What are more recent anthropologists unwilling to do?
More recent anthropologists unwilling to root psychology so deeply in biology & argue culture shapes psychology.
What has supported Bastian’s hypothesis of psychic unity?
Data from McCrae’s FFM paper largely confirms recent findings of universality in trait psychology in a new sample of cultures using a different method of measurement, give strong support to Bastian’s hypothesis of psychic unity, and could be interpreted as evidence of the biological basis of personality traits.
What does McCrae’s FFM paper provide evidence for?
Paper provided cross-cultural evidence of gender differences in person perception, showing that women are more positive than men in their assessments of others, especially other women.
What are the strengths and limitations of the trait approach to personality?
- Biological evidence for personality dimensions
- Empirical evidence (FA), lexical criteria
- Ease of measurement & parsimonious & thus comparisons between individuals can be made
- Shortcut for information
- Cultural universality?
- Subtleties may be lost
- Doesn’t attempt to explain causality
- Personality profiling (good or bad?)
