Chapter 1-3 Introduction Flashcards
What are the three general criteria of Personality?
- conveys sense of consistency or continuity, stability across time and/or situations
- causal force from within the person (internal causality)
- distinctiveness - qualities that summarize what an individual is like
Personality definition
personality is a dynamic organization, inside the person, of psychophysical systems that create the person’s characteristic patterns of behaviour, thoughts and feelings
What is personality? (4)
- personality has organization
- personality has processes and causal forces
- it is deterministic - personality is psychological and physical
- personality is individualized patterens (recurrences and consistencies)
how is behaviour deterministic?
it is something and it does something
it is not dormant, tells how someone will relate to their social world, helps people create to othes. Tells us how to behave
Personality psychology themes
individual differences
intrapersonal functioning
individual differences
a perspective on personality should address where these individual differences come from and why they are important
no two people are alike
Intrapersonal functioning
the idea that there are deterministic tendencies that exist within the individual which are elicited from situational factors
these personality tendencies are ready and waiting to be activated, therefore the situation should be considered
ex. a competitive personality will be obvious in a test session, but would’t come out when watching TV for example
i.e. different motives or needs exist within us
a theory
is a summary statement
a general principle, or set of principles about a class of events
can be specific or broad
the purpose of theories are to:
- explain some phenomena
2. predict new info
How is a theory evaluated?
should be testable!
should generate hypotheses
hypotheses
predictions about specific events that are derived from one or more theories
theories suggest predictions for ____, which suggests changes in _______
research
theories
basing a theory on one source of information ______ it.
weakens the theory
Parsimony
includes as few assumptions as possible
keeps a theory simple and more organized
be suspicious of theories that…
try to explain everything
Funder (2013) Psychological Triad
Thoughts, feelings, and behaviour
- important independently ofeach other
- (perhaps more interesting when they are combined/in conflict)
- inconsistencies between them s where personality psychology comes in
- personality psychologists view these inconsistencies as worthy of attention
situations where what you feel and what we do or think are inconsistent
i.e. watching netflix instead of studying
When do personality psychologists and clinical psychologists come together?
when patterns of personality are extreme, unusual, and cause problems, the 2 subfields come together
- share the obligation to try and understand the whole persons
personality is both the _____ and ________ subfield of psychology
smallest
largest
According to Funder, what is Personality?
Personality refers to an individuals characteristic patterns of though, emotion, and behaviour, together with the psychological mechanisms behind those patterns
funder > the only way to succeed is to limit what you want to look at, it is essential to narrow your focus and looks for specific patterns or ways of tying together the information
personality psychology tries to explain the _____ ______
whole persons
basic approaches to personality
trait biological psychoanalytic phenomenological learning and cognitive
these approaches complement rather than compete with each other, each addresses a different question about human nature
What is the focal topic of the trait approach?
conceptualization of individual differences
measurement of individual differences
What is the focal topic of the biological approach?
anatomy
physiology
genetics
evolution
What is the focal topic of the psychoanalytic approach?
unconscious mind
internal mental conflict
What is the focal topic of the phenomenological approach?
conscious awareness and expense
humanistic psychology
cross-cultural psychology
What is the focal topic of the learning and cognitive approach?
behaviourism
social learning theory
cognitive personality psychology
Funder’s first law
Great strengths are usually great weakness, and surprisingly often, the opposite is true as well
examples:
1. the flaws of US presidents were the sam attributes that allowed them to attain and use power effectively
ex. truthfulness can be a flaw
US President Nixon was devious and it allowed him to make good deals, but also led to Watergate scandal
2. Bobby Knight, long time coach at Indiana University
everybody’s personality comes as a package, all parts depend on each other
personality is ______ and each part stems from and depends on the _________
coherent
others
Pigeonholing
oftenenatils categorizing people and labelling them. It also leads the field to be extraordinarily sensitive to the fact that people really are different
Funder’s Second Law
There are no perfect indicators of personality. There are only cues, and cues are ambiguous
(ex. psychological triad)
Personality resides _____ in individuals, and inferences about personality must be ________
hidden
based on indications that can be observed
Second law
Funder’s third law
something beats nothing, two time out of three
the psychologist should maintain a healthy skepticism about the possibility that some clues might be misleading (but this skepticism should not go too far)
clues to personality?
test scores
observations
Four clues to personality
SILB Self reports Informants reports life outcomes behavioural observations
Self reports
- ask the person directly
- simple and straightforrward, the psychologist is just taking a direct measurement, and are not analyzing anything
- the way people describe themselves by and large, matches the way they are described by others
- has face validity
- the most common basis for personality assessment
- used with children as young as 5 years with accurate results
Pros:
- large amounts of info
- access to thoughts, feelings, and intentions
- some S data are true by definition (i.e. self-esteem)
- these aspects have to be right because they are self views. (if you think you have high self esteem then you do!)
- causal force (what you think of yourself may be aroong the causes of what you do, e.g. efficacy expectation, self-verification)
- simple and easy (cheap)
Cons:
- maybe they can’t tell you (Fish and Water effect: fish don’t notice that they are wet)
- info could be distorted in memory
- we become used to the customary behaviours of our own culture
- lack of insight
- maybe they won’t tell you
- too simple and too easy (might be overused because they are cheap and easy)
Informants reports
- knowledgable informants about general attributes of the individuals personality
- informant should be well-aquainted with the individual
- can be subjective
- frequently used in daily life (reference letters, gossip)
pros:
- large amount of info
- formant could be a roommate, and therefore has seen the participant in many different contexts (i.e. breakups, studying, working, relaxing)
- more observations = increase in liklihihood of accurate results (though aggregating the results)
this aggregation of data makes I data better than S data
- real world basis
- common sense
- take context into account
- distillations of behavioural
observations
- people are smart and I data takes advantage of that fact! - some I data are true by definition (i.e. likability)
- causal force
- reflect your reputation (people become what others expect them to be)
cons:
- limited behavioural information (people compartmentalize their personality, each compartment contains different people)
- limited validity - lack of access to private experience
- error
- bias (i.e. informant is sexist)
Life outcomes
- verifiable, concrete, real-life facts that may hold psychological significance
- obtained from archival records or questions asked directly
- “residue of personality” rather than a direct reflection of personality itself
- include important life outcomes (health)
pros:
- objective and verifiable
- intrinsic importance
- often constitute exactly what the psychologist needs to know (applied research)
- psychological relevance (strongly affected by psychological variables, e.g. married by 40)
cons:
- multi-determination (ha many causes, so finding specific connections might be difficult)
- possible lack of psychological relevance (can only predict an outcome to the degree that it is psychologically caused)
L data is influenced by too many factors (i.e. social class, educational opportunities, economic factors…) to successfully predict personality
Behavioural observations
Participants are placed in a testing situation and then their behaviour is observed
- context in real life and artificial settings
- when you’re trying to get to know someone, it’s common to watch them closely
pros:
- wide range of contexts (both real and contrived)
- appearance of objectivity (psychologist gathers info directly, data may be expressed numerically, and can be gathered with high reliability)
cons:
- uncertain interpretation (numbers do not interpret themselves), (ambiguity) (can’t know what the data means just by looking at it)
face validity
face validity: intends to measure what they seem to measure
you can take it at its face
no hidden intentions
ask questions that are directly and obviously related to the construct they are designed to measure
studies show that people self report similarly to how…
others rate them!
Emmons and King (1988)
Emmons and McAdams (1991)
S data
asked participants to list their personal strivings, defined as objectives you are typically trying to accomplish or attain
i.e. “make my mother proud of me”
“enjoy life”
the most common basis for personality assessment
S data
fundamental attributions errors
(tendency for people to place an undue emphasis on internal (i.e. personality) to explain someone’s behaviour)
expectancy effects
people become what others expect them to be
i.e. people expect you to become social, intelligent
sources of L data
your bedroom
ex. garbage is discarded aspects of personality (i.e. tells about eating habits, spending habits)
Gilmore girls clip
social media
useful for understanding someone’s personality
Social media profiles and L data
can yield accurate judgments of the traits of openness, extraversion, conscientiousness and agreeableness, but not neuroticism
L data: Psychological relevance ex. married by 40
married by 40
large marker for psychopathology (compared to people who have been married at least once by that point)
- mental illness is rare, regardless of when you marry, but it’s more rare for people who are married before age of 40
maybe people who aren’t married put work first
conscientious people tend to have _______ ________
narcissistic people…
clean rooms
post pictures of themselves
Criminal behaviour is affected by (L data)
criminal behaviour affected by the neighbourhood that they live in and their available economic ability is low
evaluating theories
should be testable
should generate hypotheses
breadth of info behind the theory
parsimony
Natural B data
Diary methods
Experience sampling methods
Ambulatory assessments
reports on specific behaviours offered by the participant or an acquaintance
watch what participants do to which a psychologist can gain access
- in natural contexts
ex. a university daycare
classroom equipped with one-way mirror/some recording device
psychologists gather data about what chid did throughout the day
realistic! Describes that participants do throughout their daily lives! Very expensive, and info and be hard to obtain
Ambulatory assessments
EAR assess ongoing behaviour technique to Electronically activated recorder digital audio recorder records snippets throughout the day pre set to record at particular intervals
natural B data
Laboratory B data
psychological experiments
- how long it takes a participant to react to smoke entering the room
- psychologists observe the response to the situation
personality tests
- MMPI
- TAT (thematic apperception test)
Lab B data: On an MMPI, items like “I am a special messenger of the lord: will give insight if the person is
schizophrenic
people who tend to answer “true” are schizophrenic
Lab B data:
primed thoughts of old age and hostile words
primed thoughts of old age, recorded how fast/slow people walked down the hall into a different room and BP was measured and primed with hostile words
self conscious people translated these thoughts into references towards themselves and it caused them to walk more slowly down the hallway
those with low self esteem reacted more strongly to hostile words and their BP went up
If a psychologist asks you a question because they want to know the answer it is ___ data
S
If a psychologist is interested in how you respond/answer a question, it is _____ data
B
why do we use all 4 types of data?
solution is triangulation
only ever clues, and clues can be ambiguous
all clues (data) can be ambiguous/incomplete/misleading
this is why you need all of them!
personality research requires that all of these be used and then all the advantages and disadvantages can even out
S data tends to correlate with ____ data
I data
both are equally valid at predicting behaviour
might work best when combined
discrepancies can also be useful
this can be informative in it’s own way
narcissistic individuals tend to
narcissium
individual thinks more highly of themselves than of others
Funder’s fourth law
There are only two kinds of data, terrible data, and no data
the potential shortcomings of all kinds of data are precisely what require researchers to always gather every kind that they possible can
Reliability
kind of like repeatability
the tendency of an instrument to provide the same comparative info on repeated occasions
less error variance = more reliable the measurement should be
reliability: measurement error
the variation of a number around its true mean due to uncontrolled, essentially random influences (i.e. error variance)
the influences considered to be extraneous depend on what you are measuring
trying to measure someone’s mood
- temporary
- moods change and that is not measurement error
Factors that undermine reliability
low precision
the state of the participant
the state of the experimenter
variation in the environment
techniques to improve reliability
take care with the procedure
use a constant, scripted procedure/protocol for all participants
measuring something that is important, rather than trivial
aggregation (the coming together of different measurements, such as by averaging them)
Validity
the degree to which a measurement actually reflects what it is intended to measure
reliability is a ______ but not ________ condition for validity
necessary
sufficient
a measure must first be reliable to be valid
but it doesn’t mean that its correct
Constructs
an idea about a psychological attribute that goes beyond what might be assessed through any particular method of assessment
i.e. gravity, intelligence
explains things that are visible, even if it can’t be touched
Construct validation
the strategy of establishing the validity of a measure by comparing it with a wide range of other measures
personality construct
can’t be directly seen/known
but we know it exists because of it’s effects
we can use sociability to measure personality
generalizability
the degree to which a measurement can be found under diverse circumstances, such as time, context, participant population, and so on
includes reliability and validity
Generalizability over participants
student samples
shows vs. no-shows
Cohort effects
ethnic and cultural diversity (WEIRD)
college students tend to be ______ and _______ than the general population
college students tend to be healthier and younger than the general population
Cohort effects
the tendency for a research finding to be limited to one group, or cohort, of people
Cohort effects:
results limited historically
we often only study one group of people in a particular place and time
it can be really expensive to conduct a study to account for this bias
WEIRD people
White/western educated industrialized rich democratic
a lot of studies are done with these people
Burden of proof
we should resist making simplistic generalization about members of other cultures (including jumping to conclusions above the ways they might be different)
the burden or proof should be shared by those who claim the research is not generalizable to show when, how, and why it is not
can be difficult to get enough info from a study
therefore we should be careful of making general conclusions
Case studies
studying a particular phenomenon or individual in depth to understand the particular case and in hopes of discovering general lessons or scientific laws
used all the time and in all sciences
most popular in psychodynamic approach
pros:
- it describes the who phenomenon
- a well chosen case study can be the source of ideas
- sometimes this method is necessary
cons:
- it isn’t controlled, not generalizable
- can’t determine causality
Experimental method
a technique that establishes the causal relationship between an independent and dependent variable, by ransoming assigning participants to differing levels of x and measuring the average behaviour that results
Correlational method
a research technique used to establish the relationship between two variables, x and y, but measuring both variables in the sample of participants
experimental vs. correlational methods
- both attempt to assess the relationship between two variables
- in the experiment, the presumably causal variable is manipulated, whereas in the correlational method, the same variable is measured
( gives the experimental group an advantage) - conclusion that the experimental method is superior is obviously wrong
- the two designs serve different goals
3 rules for causation
covariance
temporal precedence
internal validity
covariance
the proposed causal variable must vary systematically with change synth proposed outcome variable
temporal precedence
the proposed causal variable comes first in time, before he proposed outcome variable
internal validity
the ability to rule out alternately explanations for a causal relationship between two variables (i.e a third variable)
Complications for the experimental method
- you can never be sure what you are manipulating
(third variable?) - can create levels of a variable that are unlikely or even impossible to occur in real-life (whereas correlations assess levels that already exist and may reflect more precisely the degree to which one variable affects the other)
experiments determine whether one variable __ affect another, but not…
can
how often or how much it actually does
correlational coefficient
a number between +1 and -1 that reflects the degree to which one variable is a linear function of another
- indicates both direction and strength of the relationship
