Ch.5 Personality and Values Flashcards
Personality
The sum of ways in which an individual reacts to and interacts with others.
Heredity
Factors determined at conception; one’s biological, physiological, and inherent psychological makeup.
Physical stature, facial features, gender, temperament, muscle composition and reflexes, energy level, and biological rhythms are either completely or substantially influenced by parentage—by your biological parents’ biological, physiological, and inherent psychological makeup.
Personality traits
Enduring characteristics that describe an individual’s behavior.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
A personality test that taps four characteristics and classifies people into one of 16 personality types.
Big Five Model
A personality assessment model that describes five basic dimensions of personality.
Big Five Model- conscientiousness
A personality dimension that describes someone who is responsible, dependable, persistent, and organized.
A highly conscientious person is responsible, organized, dependable, and persistent. Those who score low on this dimension are easily distracted, disorganized, and unreliable.
Big Five Model- emotional stability
A personality dimension that characterizes someone as calm, self-confident, and secure (positive) versus nervous, depressed, and insecure (negative). High scorers are more likely to be positive and optimistic and to experience fewer negative emotions; they are generally happier than low scorers. Emotional stability is sometimes discussed as its converse, neuroticism. Low scorers (those with high neuroticism) are hypervigilant and vulnerable to the physical and psychological effects of stress. Those with high neuroticism tend to be nervous, anxious, depressed, and insecure.
Big Five Model- extraversion
A personality dimension describing someone who is sociable, gregarious, and assertive. Extraverts tend to be gregarious, assertive, and sociable. They experience more positive emotions than do introverts, and they more freely express these feelings. On the other hand, introverts (low extraversion) tend to be more thoughtful, reserved, timid, and quiet.
Big Five Model- openness to experience
A personality dimension that characterizes someone in terms of imagination, sensitivity, and curiosity. Open people are creative, curious, and artistically sensitive. Those at the low end of the category are conventional and find comfort in the familiar.
Big Five Model- agreeableness
A personality dimension that describes someone who is good natured, cooperative, and trusting. Agreeable people are cooperative, warm, and trusting. You might expect agreeable people to be happier than disagree-able people. They are, but only slightly. When people choose organizational team members, agreeable individuals are usually their first choice. In contrast, people who score low on agreeableness are cold and antagonistic.
Dark Triad
A constellation of negative personality traits consisting of Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy
Dark Triad-Machiavellianism
The degree to which an individual is pragmatic, maintains emotional distance, and believes that ends can justify means. High-Mach employees, by manipulating others to their advantage, win in the short term at a job, but they lose those gains in the long term because they are not well liked.
Dark Triad-Narcissism
The tendency to be arrogant, have a grandiose sense of self-importance, require excessive admiration, and possess a sense of entitlement.
They are more likely to be chosen for leadership positions, and medium ratings of narcissism (neither extremely high nor extremely low) are positively correlated with leadership effectiveness.66 Some evidence suggests that narcissists are more adaptable and make better business decisions than others when the issue is complex.
Dark Triad-psychopathy
The tendency for a lack of concern for others and a lack of guilt or remorse when actions cause harm.
Measures of psychopathy attempt to assess the motivation to comply with social norms; impulsivity; willingness to use deceit to obtain desired ends; and disregard, that is, lack of empathic concern for others.
core self-evaluation (CSE)
Bottom-line conclusions individuals have about their capabilities, competence, and worth as a person. People who have positive CSEs like themselves and see themselves as effective and in control of their environment. Those with negative CSEs tend to dislike themselves, question their capabilities, and view themselves as powerless over their environment.
self-monitoring
A personality trait that measures an individual’s ability to adjust his or her behavior to external, situational factors. High self-monitors show considerable adaptability in adjusting their behavior to external situational factors. They are highly sensitive to external cues and can behave differently in varying situations, sometimes presenting striking contradictions between their public personae and their private selves. Low self-monitors like Zoe can’t disguise themselves in that way. They tend to display their true dispositions and attitudes in every situation; hence, there is high behavioral consistency between who they are and what they do.
Proactive personality
People who identify opportunities, show initiative, take action, and persevere until meaningful change occurs
Proactive individuals have many desirable behaviors that organizations covet. They have higher levels of job performance and do not need much oversight.87 They tend to be satisfied with their jobs, committed to their organizations, and tend to engage in more networking behaviors. Proactive individuals often achieve career success.
situation strength theory
A theory indicating that the way personality translates into behavior depends on the strength of the situation.
situation strength theory- Clarity
degree to which cues about work duties and responsibilities are available and clear. Jobs high in clarity produce strong situations because individuals can readily determine what to do. For example, the job of janitor probably provides higher clarity about each task than the job of nanny.
situation strength theory- Consistency
cues regarding work duties and responsibilities are compatible with one another. Jobs with high consistency rep-resent strong situations because all the cues point toward the same desired behavior. The job of acute care nurse, for example, probably has higher consistency than the job of manager.
situation strength theory- Constraints
extent to which individuals’ freedom to decide or act is limited by forces outside their control. Jobs with many constraints represent strong situations because an individual has limited individual discretion. Bank examiner, for example, is probably a job with stronger constraints than forest ranger.
situation strength theory- Consequences
degree to which decisions or actions have important implications for the organization or its members, clients, suppliers, and so on. Jobs with important consequences represent strong situations because the environment is probably heavily structured to guard against mistakes. A surgeon’s job, for example, has higher consequences than a foreign-language teacher’s.
Trait Activation Theory
A theory that predicts that some situations, events, or interventions “activate” a trait more than others. For example, a commission-based compensation plan would likely activate individual differences because extraverts are more reward-sensitive, than, say, open people. Conversely, in jobs that encourage creativity, differences in openness may better predict desired behavior than differences in extraversion
values
Basic convictions that a specific mode of conduct or end-state of existence is personally or socially preferable to an opposite or converse mode of conduct or end-state of existence
