Assessment of Personality Flashcards

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1
Q

What is personality? What are traits, states, and types?

A
  • Personality is the typical or characteristic way in which a person responds to or behaves in particular situations
    • Collection of traits, dispositions, and attributes
  • Traits; enduring and relatively permanent personality characteristics distinguished on a continuum
  • State; temporary behavioural tendancy usually in reaction to an internal or environment
  • Type; general description of a person into a distinct category eg introvert
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2
Q

According to Smith and Archer, what are the 5 purposes of personality assessment?

A
  • Purposes of Personality Assessment
    1. Describe psychopathology and obtain differential diagnosis
    2. Describe and predict everyday behaviour
    3. Inform psychological treatment
    4. Monitor Treatment
    5. Use personality assessment as treatment (therapeutic assessment model)
  • Types of Tests
    • Performance based (projective); unstructured response format whereyou can respond as much or little as you like
      • if standardised can be a test (eg Rorchach)
    • Self-report (objective); simply answer questions. Can be omnibus or narrow band.
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3
Q

What are some considerations regarding personality assessment for prospective adoptive couples?

A
  • Each country has different requirements
  • Impression Management:
    • The Neo doesn’t have a impression management scale
    • The PAI does, and shows very high impression management scores
    • However, does this mean they would be bad parents?
  • Qualities of suitable parents:
    • Sound reasons for adoption
    • Emotional Stability
    • Resolved grief over fertility issues
    • Flexibility over parenting styles
    • Cultural sensitivity
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4
Q

Outline the key features of psychodynamic personality theory

A
  • Personality is shaped by instinctive drives
    • Eros; sex and life
    • Thanatos; death and aggression
  • Behaviour is the result of interaction of 3 psychological forces
    • Id; Entirely unconscious, basic impulses, seeks immediate gratification
    • Super Ego; mostly preconscious, morals and parental influence, the conscience
    • Ego; mostly conscious, also preconscious, executive mediation between id and superego
  • Therapy focus is on drawing out the unconscious and preconscious aspects of personality
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5
Q

Outline the key features of behavioural and social learning theories of personality

A
  • Behaviour is learned through classical, operant, and vicarious conditioning, and observational learning
  • Focus on conscious, present oriented learned behaviours
  • Reciprocal Determinism; personality is result of reciprocal influences between
    • Environment; stimuli, reinforcement
    • Person; characteristics, cognition
    • Behaviour; nature, frequency, intensity
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6
Q

Outline the key aspects of humanistic personality theory

A
  • People are fundamentally good, constantly strive to achieve higher functioning
  • Focus on narrative information about self perception
  • Maslow’s hierachy of needs
    • Physiological needs
    • Safety and security
    • Love and belonging,
    • Self-esteem,
    • Self actualisation
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7
Q

Outline the key aspects of trait theories of personality

A
  • Focus on identifying and describing individual differences in terms of traits (usually via factor analysis)
  • OCEAN Model
    • Openness; curiousity, creativity, new ideas
    • Conscientiousness; organised, punctual, achievement oriented
    • Extraversion; outgoing, sociable
    • Agreeableness; sensitive, tolerable, trusting
    • Neuroticism; anxious, irritable, temperamental
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8
Q

What are the four broad types of personality assessment?

A
  • Projective Personality Assessment; Individual projects their subconscious dynamics onto test material
    • Psychodynamic theory based
    • eg InkBlot tests
  • Psychometric Personality Assessment; Individuals complete a battery of tests and rresults are summed
    • Trait theory based
  • Behaviour Rating Scales; Individuals complete standardised scales of behaviour
    • Social learning based
  • Clinical Interviews; Seeking information directly using unstructured or semistructured interviews.
    • Primarily humanistic
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9
Q

According to Smith and Archer, what questions should be asked when evaluating a test of personality?

A
  • What does this test measure?
    • Theory; background
    • Latent Variable; construct being measured
  • Is this test score reliable?
    • Temporal/ test retest (if the construct is theoretically consistent); 0.8 or greater
    • Internal consistency;
    • Inter-Rater Reliability
  • For what purposes is this test valid?
    • Translation validity; Face Validity and content validity
    • Criterion-related validity; concurrent and predictive
    • Construct Validity; convergent and divergent
    • Clinical Utility; incremental validity
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10
Q

Aside from reliability and validity, what factors influence test evaluation according to Smith and Archer?

A
  • Specificity and Sensitivity
    • Sensitivity = probability of correct positive result. Positive Predictive Power
    • Specificity = probability of correct negative result. Negative Predictive Power.
  • Cultural Differences
    • Issues of language, metrics of responding and assessor bias
    • Definition of traits in different cultures
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11
Q

Give four examples of projective personality assesments

A
  • Rorschach Inkblot test: 10 item ambiguous images
    • The Exner Scoring System was introduced to standardise measurement.
  • Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): Client is presented with 10-14 picture cards and required to construct a story about it. Assessment is based on recurring themes.
    • Often uses a CBT based scoring system
  • Projective Drawings; usually a child or adolescent, is asked to draw a picture
    • questionable validity, diagnostic utility and scoring
  • Play Therapy and Sand Trays; Children are encouraged to play and themes are interpreted.
    • Sand boxes and figurines allow children to express trauma without words/understanding
    • Also used for treatment and career decison making
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12
Q

What are the advantages and disadvantages of psychometric personality assessments?

A
  • Psychometric tests are administered and scored in a standardised manner and often use norms
  • Advantages;
    • Economical
    • Scoring is simple and objective
    • Interpretation is easier
    • Psychometric properties are clearly defined
  • Disadvantages
    • Often use a single summary score
    • Can rely heavily on self-knowledge
    • Influenced by honesty
    • Forced choice prevents elaboration or qualification of responses
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13
Q

What is the Myer Briggs Type Indicator?

A
  • A psychometric personality asssessment developed by Briggs and Myer in 1940s
  • Four dimensions based on Jung’s theory of 4 basic functions (information and decisions)
    • Introversion-Extroversion
    • Sensing-Intuition
    • Thinking-Feeling
    • Judging-Perceiving
  • Major Criticisms; questionable validity, factor analysis reveals big 5 solution, may be evidence of a Barnum effect (finding personal meaning in vague statements)
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14
Q

What is the 16 Personality Factor Questionnaire?

A
  • 16 personality dimensions based on Raymond Cattells factor analysis in 1949
    • most items are focused on actual behavioural situations
  • Patterns in factors (rather than raw numbers) can be used to guide therapy and career selection
  • Advantages; low face validity, easy to administer, good reliability and validity
  • Disadvantages; overeducated norm group, high comprehension requirements, new versions difficult to score
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15
Q

What is the NEO-PI-R?

A
  • Developed by Costa and McCrae based on the Big 5. 240 items, on a 5 point scale.
    • Openness;
    • Conscientiousness;
    • Extroversion;
    • Agreeableness;
    • Neuroticism;
  • Pros; Strong psychometric properties, includes both a self-report and other-report format
  • Cons; No social desirability scale, norm sample is quite small, some questions can be convoluted
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16
Q

What is the Minnesota Multiphase Personality Inventory?

A
  • 338 true/false items
    • Qs based on empirical method not theory
    • Includes Validity Scales; L-scale (Lies) and the K-scale (defensiveness) are key
    • 3 Higher order scales
  • Assessess psychopathology (primarily given to clients suspected of having mental health issues)
    • not a diagnostic tool
    • High scores are indicative of characteristics but low scores aren’t (some exceptions)
  • Considerations
    • Cultural sensitivity of Qs
    • Idiosyncratic answering styles
    • Requires high reading ability
17
Q

What are the three steps in CBT to address problematic automatic thoughts?

A
  • Identifying Thoughts;
    • The therapist needs to teach the client to identify automatic thoughts.
    • Thoughts are often linked by emotion or preoccupation
    • This requires sensitivity and respect
  • Emotional Valence
    • Automatic thoughts are not all equally impactful. Rate the thoughts by emotion and intensity in order to decide which to target.
  • Socratic Dialogue
    • Thoughts are considered hypothesis to be tested.
    • The therapist guides the client to evaluate their thoughts with evidence and critically evaluate them